Li'l Elvis and the Truckstoppers
Li'l Elvis and the Truckstoppers is an animated musical children's television series and the Australian Children's Television Foundation's (ACTF's) first joint venture under the Distinctly Australian Program introduced by the Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating. The Director of the ACTF Dr Patricia Edgar selected Peter Viska's character Li'l Elvis to design and co-produce the ACTF's first long-form 26-episode-series animation. As an original concept, not commissioned from overseas or based on an adaption of a classic story, production of the series on this scale was a  massive undertaking for the Australian animation industry. With "Li'l Elvis", an $11.5 million project, the ACTF opened up a new overseas market in partnership with France 2 and France Animation, a French production company, and Ravensburger, a German distributor, with the financial participation of Centre national de la cinématographie. A team of 90 animators and artists worked for 18 months including 39 trainees were employed on the production in support roles. Plot. The story follows a group of children and their adventures in outback Australia. The title character of the show, Li'l Elvis, who is a ten-year-old  boy with the weight of the world on his shoulders. He has a gift for music, a talent for trouble, and a desire for only one thing: to find out who he really is and be a normal kid again. The opening sequence and music reveal that he was thrown out of a gold Cadillac in a guitar case, hinting that he is the illegitimate child of Elvis Presley (in real life, Presley only had one daughter named Lisa Marie). He is raised by foster parents, truck-stop proprietors Grace and Len, who are fervent fans of Presley. As Li'l  Elvis is musically talented, singing and playing the guitar, his foster mother is convinced he is the son of Presley. Li'l Elvis and his two friends, Lionel and Janet, form the band "The Truckstoppers", and the show follows their adventures in the outback town of Little Memphis (formerly Wanapoo). Lionel is an Indigenous Australian boy who plays the didgeridoo and has a penchant for exclaiming "deadly", while Janet is a beret-wearing Asian Australian girl who plays the drums standing up, similar to The Velvet Underground's drummer Maureen Tucker. The Truckstoppers' recurring enemy is the businessman W.C. Moore, who  wants to become their manager to exploit them commercially, turning Little Memphis into a tourist attraction. He is also infatuated with finding deposits of the mysterious mineral Berkonium. He has a Berkonium marble, which he uses to beat children at the game of marbles, their major recreational activity. He also frequently electrically zaps his hapless limousine driver, Duncan.