‘Primos’ Creator Natasha Kline Shares the Inspirations Behind Her New Disney Channel Show

This article was written for the August '24 issue of Animation Magazine (No. 342).

When Natasha Kline was growing up in the Inland Empire, she was an introvert who liked to plan how she would spend her time. That’s exactly when her mom would invite a group of her cousins over to be together and play.

All that togetherness — the wonderful times and the annoying ones — inspired Primos, the animated show Kline created for Disney, which premieres this month after several years in development. The show follows Tater, an exceptional 10-year-old girl, through her adventures with a dozen cousins (primos in Spanish) who have been invited by her mom to move in for the summer. The show’s characters, storylines and backdrop all draw from Kline’s childhood growing up in an extended multicultural family in Fontana, California. The series also draws from an adult short she made while working with the alternative stand-up comedy troupe, Upright Citizens Brigade.

Kline is also a veteran director with an impressive resume that includes more than two dozen episodes of Big City Greens (Disney Channel). Moreover, she worked on The LEGO Ninjago Movie and the YouTube series Ollie & Scoops. She is Primos’ producer and creator. Philip Cohen (Penguins of Madagascar) is also a producer on the show, and the show’s two animation partners are Snipple Animation Studios and Sugarcube Animation Studio.

Unpacking Childhood Memories

“I pitched [Primos] in 2017, and then 2019 is when I finally started development,” says Kline. “I was literally in the office developing it for just a few months before the pandemic struck. So, I moved into my house, and it was a really cool experience being able to do that, because it was being in this amazing creativity cocoon where it was just me and my ideas kind of bouncing around. It was also fun to bring my actual family into it too. It was an opportunity to reach out to them and ask if they have any memories from childhood [that] they think would be cool for me to show.”

As Kline’s family members began sending her their own stories and memories, she developed a huge Google Doc. “That’s kind of how we launched the writers’ room,” she recalls. “I just gave them this Google Doc full of ideas as a starting point. We didn’t have to stick to them, but they were some springboards that we could use to see where we could go. They had a lot of amazing memories that I had actually forgotten. It was really fun to look through the treasure trove of their memories.”

Kline also wanted to represent the Inland Empire as closely as possible in the series. When she began to interview art directors for the show, she found a kindred partner in Ivan Aguirre, who also grew up around the same time and same area as her. Both of them were from multicultural backgrounds and wanted to make a show that spoke to their experiences as children.

Once on the show, Aguirre began creating environments steeped in the color palette and warm light that defined the neighborhoods where he and Kline lived and where Tater’s story takes place.

His inspirations came from many places: “I’ve always loved Sylvain Chomet movies, like The Triplets of Belleville,” says Aguirre. “I always loved how realistic it felt, but also how wonky it felt because it kind of had a hand-drawn line to it. And a good friend of mine is Willie Real, who’s a Mexican American artist from the Bay Area — his sketchbook drawings have an amazing line to them. I also loved the shapes and the lines in 101 Dalmatians, so these were the influences on the show. Ultimately, we wanted to make something very nostalgic and [which] kind of feels homemade. The whole story takes place in Natasha’s childhood and in the summertime. So, I wanted the palettes to feel warm. Whenever there’s a window, there’s always a pool of light coming in and there’s kind of almost a dreamy sort of aesthetic to it.”

The show is made up of several different art styles, including ones for the real world where Tater lives, the fantasy world of Tater’s imagination and the diary world where Tater’s diary comes to life. (Kline kept a diary when she was growing up and added this detail to Tater’s life.)

‘My hope for Tater is that she would become a comedic character who is fun to watch. I would love for kids to take away is that you can dream big, no matter what walk of life you come from.’

— Creator & producer Natasha Kline

Kline loved embedding the details of her childhood in the characters, storytelling and look of the show. She also wanted the voice cast to reflect on her memories.

Myrna Velasco (DC Super Hero Girls) plays Tater; Melissa Villaseñor (Saturday Night Live) is Tater’s little sister, Nellie; Michelle Ortiz (This Fool) voices Tater’s mother, Bibi; Jim Conroy (The Casagrandes) voices Tater’s father, Bud; and Angélica María (The Book of Life) plays Tater’s grandmother, Buela.

“That thing I was looking for [in casting the voice actors] was nostalgia, the person who could strike the sound of the person they were playing,” says Kline. “When they found [María] and I listened to her audition and she had the accent and everything just right, I started crying because she sounded exactly like Buela. It was like she was right there talking in my ear.”

With the music, Kline wanted to surround the show with sounds and songs that kept the spirit of the stories and animation in mind. She found her choice through Disney’s music department.

“When I was growing up, music was a big thing in our house,” says Kline. “MTV was a huge thing in our house. It was the late 1980s and early 1990s and that was music video time. I would think that if I was going to make a show, I wanted to make a music video. Disney’s music department is amazing, and they brought me all these choices. The person I ultimately picked was Alana Da Fonseca. It’s kind of impossible to say how talented she is. Every time she sends me a new demo, it’s jaw-dropping because she’s able to tap into whatever the feeling of the scene is. We’ve done a lot of pop songs for the show, and we also did a country song. We’ve done stuff that has more Mexican or Latino influences, too.”

For both Kline and Aguirre, their personal influences play a tremendous part in what makes the show meaningful for them. They’re both hopeful that kids who come from multicultural backgrounds will see themselves in the show and that it will make them feel seen and acknowledged.

Ties That Bind

As creator of the show, Kline wants kids to feel the sense of joy she had with her cousins, growing up as part of a large extended family. Now that many of her cousins live far away, she misses them and the fun they had.

“My hope for Tater is that she would become a comedic character who is fun to watch,” says Kline. “I know she has a lot of big expressions and a lot of cartoony takes. I think, ultimately, what I would love for kids to take away from her is that you can dream big, no matter what walk of life you come from. It’s important to have aspirations for yourself. No matter who you are, where you are, you as a human being can aspire to whatever you want, and your community and your family are there to support you.”

Primos premieres on Thursday, July 25 at 8 p.m. on Disney Channel. The first nine episodes will be available on Disney+ on Friday, July 26. Episode premieres will move to Saturday mornings at 9 a.m. from July 27.