>After the success of his animated cartoon series on NBC, Ross Bagdasarian, Jr. began developing a concept for a full-length feature film. Fortunately for Bagdasarian Productions, the box-office failure of Disney's The Black Cauldron in 1985 had led to the layoff of a number of Disney animators, whom Bagdasarian promptly hired to work on his film. The result was extremely high-caliber animation.
>Bagdasarian and his wife Janice Karman decided to finance the project themselves, having generated so much revenue from the Alvin and the Chipmunks TV series. Their decision to work with several overseas studios led to major production delays. By late 1986, production had fallen far behind schedule, and a shortage of time and money resulted in major cuts being made to the film.
