A favorite Alaska kids TV show is getting two episodes in Alaska Native Languages. Molly of Denali, about a 10-year old Interior Alaskan girl and her friends, has been airing in English since 2019. Now the Doyon Foundation is working to dub two episodes of the show into the Gwich’in and Koyukon languages.
The language revitalization program of Doyon Foundation put out a call for actors who can speak two of the languages of the region. The Foundation is working with GBH Boston, which produces the fictional PBS Kids’ cartoon, Molly of Denali, to create episodes representing all the real Mollys out there.
Allan Hayton, the Language Revitalization Program Director says the episodes of the show called King Run and Grandpa’s Drum will be dubbed into Dinjii Zhuh K’yaa (Gwich’in).
We did have quite a number of auditions. I've been reviewing those and we were able to nail down the Gwich'in cast; we're still working on the second cast, the Denaakk’e, or Koyukon.
Children have been cast in the lead roles. Lynnea Frank will play Molly and Adriel Ginnis will play her friend Tooey.
Gwich’in cast members will rehearse to perfect the language pronunciations and the emotions of the stories. Then they will record the voices, which incidentally, will be at KUAC’s radio studio.
And then once we have the audio, we'll have to make sure it times out as well, because Athabaskan language is very different than English and a word in Athabaskan could be full sentence length, especially the verbs. So you have to time it with the actual animation, because we can't change that that's going to stay the same.
When the Gwich’in audio is correctly timed with the animation, the tracks will be sent to Atomic Cartoons in Vancouver, Canada, who will integrate the audio into the existing Molly of Denali episodes. Hayton says he’s consulted on the show and trusts folks in British Columbia and Boston to represent Alaska faithfully.
They do a really good job at WGBH and integrating culture and making sure that they vet things, including all those cultural elements that maybe most people would miss, but people that are here in Alaska watching the show would definitely know.
The cartoons will be used in Doyon region language revitalization efforts.
“I can see it being aired here in Fairbanks, perhaps Anchorage.”
The Denaakk’e/Koyukon (duh-NA-kuh) group chose the episodes “Have Canoe Will Paddle” and “Main Game.”
Hayton says the cast for the Denaakk’e episodes will be chosen soon.
The second season of Molly of Denali just began on November 1.
The Molly of Denali project is just one effort of Doyon Foundation’s language revitalization program, which works to preserve the ancestral languages of the Doyon region.
Hayton has a lot of experience in re-imagining theatrical productions in Alaska Native settings and languages, including an original play by Vera Starbard called “Our Voices will be Heard,” but also King Lear, Midsummer Night’s Dream.