Deborah Forte is an American producer of family television series and movies, websites and digital media including Clifford the Big Red Dog , Clifford's Puppy Days , Maya & Miguel , WordGirl , The Magic School Bus , the series Goosebumps , Sony's films Goosebumps and Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween , Horrible Histories , Dragon , I Spy , The Baby-Sitters Club , The Golden Compass , and Astroblast . She created Scholastic Media, a division of Scholastic Inc. She is the founder of Silvertongue Films and under that banner is currently producing a television adaptation of His Dark Materials. She is attached to produce The 39 Clues and Spirit Animals for Universal and Clifford the Big Red Dog for Paramount. Her productions have won six Emmys, one Academy Award, the Humanitas Prize, and the Annenberg Public Policy Center Award for Outstanding Educational Program on a Commercial Broadcast Station.
Forte began her career in publishing at Viking Press in 1976 before joining Scholastic Productions in 1984 as VP of new business development. [1]
Forte became President of Scholastic Media in 1995 and is the lead creative and business executive overseeing all media production including two production studios (Weston Woods and Soup2Nuts), Scholastic Interactive, Scholastic Audio Books and Scholastic Media Marketing and Consumer Products. Forte formed Scholastic Entertainment, a part of Scholastic Media, in 1997. [2]
At Scholastic, Forte has produced over 300 productions, which includes turning best-selling Scholastic book series Clifford the Big Red Dog , Dear America , I Spy , The Magic School Bus , Goosebumps , Animorphs and The Baby-Sitters Club into some of the longest running children's TV series. [3] [4]
Her feature film credits include the Goosebumps film (2015; Columbia Pictures), The Indian in the Cupboard , Clifford's Really Big Movie , The Baby-Sitters Club , The Mighty and Tuck Everlasting . Forte produced The Golden Compass , an adaptation of Philip Pullman's critically acclaimed trilogy His Dark Materials , which won the 2008 Academy Award for Visual Effects. [5]
She produced the 2018 film Mortal Engines , with Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh for Universal Pictures and will likely produce its TV re-adaptation. She also produced the TV re-adaptation of His Dark Materials.
Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
1990 | The Baby-Sitters Club | executive producer | |
1994-1997 | The Magic School Bus | executive producer | |
1995-1998 | Goosebumps | executive producer | |
1998-1999 | Animorphs | executive producers | |
2000-2003 | Clifford the Big Red Dog | executive producer | |
2001-2002 | Horrible Histories | executive producer | |
2002-2003 | I Spy | executive producer | |
2003-2006 | Clifford's Puppy Days | executive producer | |
2004-2007 | Maya & Miguel | executive producer | |
2007-2014 | WordGirl | executive producer | |
2008-2009 | Turbo Dogs | executive producer | |
2014–2015 | Astroblast! | executive producer | |
2017–2021 | The Magic School Bus Rides Again | executive producer | |
2019–2022 | His Dark Materials | executive producer | |
2020–2021 | The Baby-Sitters Club | executive producer |
Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
1995 | The Indian in the Cupboard | executive producer | |
The Baby-Sitters Club | executive producer | ||
2002 | Tuck Everlasting | executive producer | |
2004 | Clifford's Really Big Movie | producer | |
2007 | The Golden Compass | producer | |
2015 | Goosebumps | producer | |
2018 | Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween | producer | |
Mortal Engines | producer | ||
2021 | Clifford the Big Red Dog | executive producer |
Forte's productions have won over 100 industry awards, including those listed above.
In The New York Times article, "At Scholastic, Turning Books Into the Stuff Of Multimedia", [12] a colleague at Scholastic described her creative direction, by saying, "She takes tremendous care in seeing that our products get developed with the qualities that made them popular in the first place and making sure the new products are right for kids, educationally, developmentally and from an entertainment point of view." [13] In Fast Company's Spring 2014 interview, "How Scholastic Kept Its Relevance in a Digital World", [14] Forte shared that, “We have developed our brand so that it’s relative and meaningful to children when they want to read, when they want to watch and when they want to play." Fast Company remarked that the Bottom Line from her interview was, "Scholastic’s secret sauce is the development of a complementary media strategy across a variety of mediums, without losing focus on the company’s mission. " [15]
Forte was a founding member of the Board of Trustees of the Children's Museum of Manhattan and currently serves on the board of the American Center for Children and Media [16] and the International Emmys. She is a member of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences as well as the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.
A native of Newton, Massachusetts, Forte graduated from Hamilton College and lives in New York with her husband, Peter Stone, and their two sons.
The Haunted Mask is the eleventh book in the original Goosebumps, the series of children's horror fiction novels created and written by R. L. Stine. The book follows Carly Beth, a girl who buys a Halloween mask from a store. After putting on the mask, she starts acting differently and discovers that the mask has become her face; she is unable to pull the mask off. R. L. Stine says he got the idea for the book from his son who had put on a Frankenstein mask he had trouble getting off.
Scholastic Corporation is an American multinational publishing, education, and media company that publishes and distributes books, comics, and educational materials for schools, teachers, parents, children, and other educational institutions. Products are distributed via retail and online sales and through schools via reading clubs and book fairs. Clifford the Big Red Dog, a character created by Norman Bridwell in 1963, serves as Scholastic's official mascot.
Goosebumps is a series of horror novels written by American author R. L. Stine. The protagonists in these stories are teens or pre-teens who find themselves in frightening circumstances, often involving the supernatural, the paranormal, or the occult. Between 1992 and 1997, 62 books were published under the Goosebumps umbrella title. R. L. Stine also wrote various spin-off series, including, Goosebumps Series 2000, Give Yourself Goosebumps, Tales to Give You Goosebumps, Goosebumps Triple Header, Goosebumps HorrorLand, Goosebumps Most Wanted and Goosebumps SlappyWorld. Additionally there was a series called Goosebumps Gold that was never released.
The Golden Compass is a 2007 fantasy adventure film written and directed by Chris Weitz that is based on the 1995 novel Northern Lights by Philip Pullman, the first installment in Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, which was published as The Golden Compass in the United States. It stars Nicole Kidman as Marisa Coulter, Dakota Blue Richards as Lyra Belacqua, and Daniel Craig as Lord Asriel, alongside Sam Elliott, Ian McKellen, and Eva Green. In the film, Lyra joins a tribe of seafarers on a trip to the far North in search of children kidnapped by the Gobblers, a group supported by the universe's rulers, the Magisterium.
Clifford the Big Red Dog is an American children's book series about the adventures of a girl named Emily Elizabeth and her titular pet: a giant, red-furred dog named Clifford. It was first published in 1963 and was written by Norman Bridwell. Clifford is Scholastic's official mascot.
Raina Telgemeier is an American cartoonist. Her works include the autobiographical webcomic Smile, which was published as a full-color middle grade graphic novel in February 2010, and the follow-up Sisters and the fiction graphic novel Drama, all of which have been on The New York Times Best Seller lists. She has also written and illustrated the graphic novels Ghosts and Guts as well as four graphic novels adapted from The Baby-Sitters Club stories by Ann M. Martin.
The 80th Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), honored the best films of 2007. The award ceremony took place on February 24, 2008, at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles. During the ceremony, AMPAS presented Academy Awards in 24 categories. The ceremony was televised in the United States by ABC, and produced by Gil Cates and directed by Louis J. Horvitz. Comedian Jon Stewart hosted the show for the second time, having previously presided over the 78th ceremony held in 2006. On February 9, at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, the Academy Awards for Technical Achievement were presented by host Jessica Alba.
TelevisaUnivision is a Mexican-American media company headquartered in New York and Mexico City that owns American Spanish language broadcast network Univision and free-to-air channels in Mexico such as Las Estrellas, Canal 5, Foro, and NU9VE alongside a collection of specialty television channels and production studios. 45% of the company is held by the Mexican telecommunications and broadcasting company Grupo Televisa, which was a major programming partner for Univision until the company sold their content assets to Univision in 2022.
Goosebumps HorrorLand is a horror novella series by R.L. Stine, a spin-off of his popular Goosebumps books. There was an almost ten-year gap between the publication of the initial installment in the Goosebumps Horrorland.
Peter Duncan Lerangis is an American author of children's and young adult fiction, best known for his Seven Wonders series and his work on the 39 Clues series.
The Magic School Bus is an animated educational children's television series, based on the book series of the same name by Joanna Cole and Bruce Degen. Running originally from 1994 to 1997, the series received critical acclaim for its use of celebrity voice talent and combining entertainment with an educational series. The series stars Lily Tomlin as the voice of Ms. Frizzle. Its theme song is performed by Little Richard.
Goosebumps is a 2015 American horror comedy film directed by Rob Letterman and written by Darren Lemke, based on R. L. Stine's children's horror book series of the same name. The film stars Jack Black as a fictionalized version of Stine, who teams up with his neighbor and his teenage daughter, to save their hometown after all the monsters from the Goosebumps franchise escape from his works, wreaking havoc in the real world. It also stars Amy Ryan, Ryan Lee, and Jillian Bell in supporting roles.
Futz! is a Canadian animated series created by Vadim Kapridov and produced by 9 Story Entertainment for broadcast on Teletoon. The show's premise revolves around the eponymous main character and his zany adventures. Eschewing verbal dialogue, the series portrays the escapades of this character, who has been described as an anti-hero, in a comedic light.
Joel Little is a New Zealand record producer, musician and Grammy Award-winning songwriter. He is best known for his work as a writer and producer with artists Lorde, Taylor Swift, Broods, Sam Smith, Imagine Dragons, Ellie Goulding, Khalid, Elliphant, Jarryd James, Shawn Mendes, Marina Diamandis, Amy Shark, Goodnight Nurse, Noah Kahan, Years & Years, the Jonas Brothers, and Niall Horan.
The Magic School Bus is an American edutainment media franchise that includes a book series, a TV series, a streaming series, and video games. Each of the stories within the franchise centers on the antics of a fictional elementary school teacher, Ms. Frizzle, and her class, who board a "magic school bus", which takes them on field trips to unusual times and locations, such as the Cretaceous Period, outer space, and inside a human body.
Sarah Treem is an American TV writer-producer and playwright. She is the co-creator and showrunner of the Showtime drama The Affair, which won the Golden Globe Award for Outstanding Drama Series, and was a writer and co-executive producer on the inaugural season of House of Cards, which was nominated for nine Golden Globes, including Outstanding Drama Series. She also wrote on all three seasons of the HBO series In Treatment.
Kyle Mewburn is an Australian-New Zealand writer whose books have won many prizes and awards. She lives in Millers Flat, Central Otago, writes picture books and junior fiction and is a popular and well-known speaker at schools and literary festivals.
Goosebumps is an American supernatural horror television series developed by Rob Letterman and Nicholas Stoller for Disney+ and Hulu. It is based on the book series by R. L. Stine. The series abandons the anthology format of the 1995 original TV series to focus on a serialized style of storytelling instead, while still featuring some of the existing Goosebumps monsters and items.