Harvey Beaks is one of those Nickelodeon shows that flew under the radar but really stuck with the people who found it. It ran from 2015 to 2017, created by C.H. Greenblatt (the same guy behind Chowder), and it follows Harvey, a polite young bird, and his two wild best friends, the imp twins Fee and Foo, around their forest town of Littlebark Grove.
I’ve broken down every Harvey Beaks character below, who voiced them and what made each one work, plus the behind-the-scenes story of why the show ended way too soon.
Created by: C.H. Greenblatt
First episode: March 29, 2015
Final episode: December 29, 2017
Networks: Nickelodeon, then Nicktoons
Setting: Littlebark Grove
What Harvey Beaks Was Like
The thing I always liked about Harvey Beaks is how calm it was. Greenblatt built it on purpose as the opposite of Chowder, trading the loud, absurd comedy for a softer, slice-of-life feel. He’s called it a throwback to the down-to-earth 90s Nicktoons like Hey Arnold! and Rugrats, where the everyday lives of the characters mattered as much as the jokes.
It also aimed at both kids and the adults watching with them, and the whole thing runs on one simple idea: Harvey is order, his friends are chaos, and the good stuff happens in between. It was the 36th Nicktoon, it pulled solid reviews (4 out of 5 on Common Sense Media), and the LA Times said it looked like a children’s storybook come to life.
Harvey Beaks Characters and Cast
What makes the cast work is how different everyone is. You’ve got Harvey’s careful nature, Technobear’s pure weirdness, Claire’s quiet wisdom, all bouncing off each other like a real friend group. Here’s the full lineup of cartoon characters, starting with the main trio.
Harvey Beaks
Harvey’s the calm center of the whole show, and honestly the one I related to most. He’s a young bird with a big orange nose and round glasses who’d rather read on a Saturday night than go looking for trouble.
- Personality: polite and a bit anxious on the surface, with a braver, wilder side his friends keep drawing out.
- His role: the balance point between order and chaos. The entire show is built on that push and pull.
- Age: starts at 9, turns 10.
- Voiced by: Max Charles (Mr. Peabody and Sherman).
Fee and Foo
Fee and Foo are the chaos to Harvey’s order, and they’re where most of the show’s fun lives. They’re imp twins, and the energy completely changes the second they show up.
- Fee: fearless, spiky-haired, acts before she thinks, but fiercely protective of Foo and Harvey under the tough act. Voiced by Angelina Wahler.
- Foo: the softer twin, just as wild but more in touch with his feelings, eats bugs, and would hand you his last piece of candy.
- Voice trivia: Foo was recast from Jackson Brundage to Tom Robinson partway through, when the actor’s voice broke (the crew’s words: “puberty happened”).
The Beaks Family
Miriam Beaks
Miriam is Harvey’s mom and the town librarian, and she’s one of my favorite small surprises in the show.
- The twist: she was wild, rebellious, and a big partier back in the day, which is clearly where Harvey gets his hidden adventurous streak.
- Comedy moments: smashing a library window and covering it with paper, or grounding Harvey over a mean anti-valentine.
- Voiced by: Kerri Kenney-Silver.
Irving Beaks
Irving is Harvey’s dad, a shy, sensitive, stay-at-home type who’d rather be home with the kids than out in the world.
- His best episode: “The Feelings,” where he plans a family trip to close the emotional gap with his own stoic father, Roland, and finally hears Roland say he’s proud of him.
- Voiced by: Scott Adsit (Chris Parnell voiced him in the pilot).
Michelle Beaks
Michelle is Harvey’s baby sister, and she’s got a great running gag built in.
- The gag: she spends all of season 1 as an unhatched egg that Irving lugs around.
- Her debut: she hatches in the season 2 premiere, “The New Bugaboo,” and turns out to be a mischievous troublemaker, the opposite of Harvey.
- Voiced by: Kari Wahlgren.
Harvey’s Friends and the Littlebark Grove Townsfolk
Dade
Dade is Harvey’s cautious rabbit friend, and he was Harvey’s best friend before Fee and Foo came along, something he’s never fully gotten over.
- Personality: grouchy and quick to list everything that could go wrong, but it all comes from caring.
- The type: the friend who complains about your bad idea and is still first in line to help when it falls apart.
- Voiced by: creator C.H. Greenblatt himself.
Claire
Claire is a timid, light brown fox with cream-tipped ears, and she’s usually Harvey’s voice of reason.
- Look: purple blouse, white ascot, glasses almost always on. When she takes them off (in “Someone’s Stealing My Stuff” and “Buds Before Studs”), her eyes go small and beady.
- Heads up: she’s a separate character from Princess. A lot of write-ups mix them up.
Princess
Princess is a snobby owl and the daughter of Doctor Roberts (not Claire, despite the common mix-up).
- Personality: plays the entitled rich kid, but the show keeps cracking that to show real insecurity. Deep down she just wants to be liked.
- Voiced by: Andres Salaff, a member of the production team.
Doctor Roberts
Doctor Roberts is Princess’s dad, a friendly, eccentric owl who lives in a Japanese-styled home.
- Quirks: obsessed with healing crystals and meditation, and endlessly proud of his daughter.
- Voiced by: Matt Berry, then later Jeff Bennett doing a (very good) Matt Berry impression.
Jeremy
Jeremy is one of the stranger residents of Littlebark Grove, a big, elephant-like creature with beige fur and a red-and-white mushroom cap.
- Hidden detail: the episode “Bag of Naughty” reveals the cap hides a scar from an accident with Barkquoise Plant Pods.
- Voiced by: C.H. Greenblatt.
Piri Piri
Piri Piri is a daydreaming yellow bird with curly green hair, a teal beret, and a long pink scarf.
- Her episode: in “Harvey’s Favorite Book,” Harvey gets her hooked on the Detective Dirk mysteries, and she becomes a bigger fan than anyone.
- Nice touch: she writes a letter to the author, Jackie Slitherstein, just to tell her how much Harvey loves the books.
Technobear
Nobody in Littlebark Grove is as gloriously weird as Technobear, the town’s unpredictable teen who carries a synthesizer everywhere.
- The vibe: awkward-teen energy plus a zen “I don’t care what anyone thinks” calm.
- His point in the show: the running reminder to lean into your own weirdness and rethink what “normal” means.
Kratz
Kratz is a clumsy, unlucky skunk with curly white hair and pulled-up brown pants.
- His thing: scared of almost everything, especially Fee.
- The catch: fear, nerves, or pain set off a stink cloud, which only makes his bad days worse.
Rooter Wellington
Rooter is a rugged pink boar with a maroon Mohawk and an Australian accent, always up for heading into the woods.
- Personality: the adventurous, survivalist one of Harvey’s friends.
- Voice trivia: like Foo, he got recast when his actor’s voice broke, from Laz Meiman to Addie Chandler in season 2.
Moff
Moff is a moth with a serious steampunk obsession, decked out in purple with goggles and a top hat.
- His episode: “Steampunks,” where he hops between goth, punk, and anime fandoms and shows off how wide his interests run.
Behind the Scenes
A lot of the most interesting Harvey Beaks stuff happened off screen. A few things worth knowing:
- It started as “Bad Seeds.” That was the original title; it changed to Harvey Beaks partway through production over a trademark issue.
- It was a homecoming for Greenblatt. He’d worked on SpongeBob, then created Chowder for Cartoon Network. This was his first show for Nickelodeon and his first work there in about a decade.
- The crew came from Tumblr. He hired a lot of his artists off social media, picking them for their personal work even when they had little animation experience.
- The creator voiced his own characters. Greenblatt himself plays both Dade and Jeremy.
Why Harvey Beaks Was Cancelled
The short version is low ratings, but the real story is messier, and it’s the part that stuck with me. Greenblatt has said Nickelodeon expected an instant hit, and when it didn’t pull SpongeBob numbers, they started working against it instead of building it up.
- The show got its timeslots shuffled and big gaps left between episodes, which made it hard to build a steady audience.
- It was pulled from Nickelodeon in late 2016 and cancelled after two seasons.
- The leftover episodes were burned off on the smaller Nicktoons channel, and Greenblatt has said he found out about that move from a Nickelodeon tweet, not from the network.
- After he vented online, Nickelodeon reportedly made him post a public apology, which he later deleted.
- The series finally wrapped on Nicktoons on December 29, 2017.
Awards and Recognition
For a show its own network treated this badly, it earned real awards attention. No wins, but some solid nominations:
- 2016 Annie Awards (2 noms): Best Animated TV Production for a Children’s Audience (“A Day of Not To-Do”), and Character Design for David Tilton (“Night Club Night”).
- 2017 Daytime Emmy nom: Outstanding Writing in an Animated Program.
- 2016 Young Artist Award nom: Best Voice-Over by a Young Actress.
Harvey Beaks Trivia
A few things even regular viewers probably don’t know:
- RuPaul guest-voiced the author Jackie Slitherstein.
- The episode “Steampunks” was made first but aired fifth in season 2. You can tell, it uses the season 1 intro and Michelle’s still an egg.
- Chowder cameos in one episode, even though he’s a Cartoon Network character.
- Two kid voice actors (Foo and Rooter) were recast when their voices broke.
- Fans nicknamed themselves the “Beaks Freaks,” and the crew used it too.
- After this, Greenblatt went on to make Jellystone! for HBO Max and Cartoon Network.
