By Heather Taylor, Editor-in-Chief, PopIcon
The stakes were more technical than creative when the team at Calabash Animation refreshed Tootsie Roll’s iconic “How Many Licks” commercial last year. The redrawn spot was brighter and cleaner with familiar faces, like Mr. Owl, making appearances. But the 2025 spot worked off its 1970 blueprint. Certain famous moments, like the number of licks it takes to reach the center of a Tootsie Pop, stayed the same in keeping with the original’s spirit.
Tootsie Roll’s latest commercial “The Fruit Ones” has been described by the brand as the next chapter in the Mr. Owl story. Developed by ad agency Schafer Condon Carter (SCC) and with Calabash Animation returning to perform its animation, the new chapter avoids overtly retreading its famous footsteps. Mr. Owl is back and joined by a Chameleon sidekick. Tootsie Pops are out and flavored Tootsie Roll Fruit Chews are in. And instead of answering the question “How many licks?” the Chameleon wants to know “How do you pick a favorite flavor of Tootsie Rolls?”
In adland, everyone is asking “How do you make a Tootsie Roll commercial from scratch when there hasn’t been a new ad in over a decade?” We spoke to Calabash’s animation director Wayne Brejcha and executive producer Sean Henry about their experience working on “The Fruit Ones” and how it compares to the 2025 refresh.
After the updated “How Many Licks” spot, did you have any advance notice you’d get to work on a brand-new Tootsie Roll commercial?
Henry: The revamped “How Many Licks” spot was such a popular hit, Tootsie Roll Industries and SCC wanted to take advantage of the momentum and highlight some of their other classic products. SCC involved us very early in the development process. We were able to help finalize the design of Mr. Chameleon, and we created a test animatic prior to the actual commercial production.
Mr. Owl gets a Chameleon sidekick. Was the Chameleon developed by SCC? Did Calabash play any major role in the Chameleon’s character development?
Brejcha: As far as I know, it was Alison Quagliato at SCC who designed the Chameleon. SCC had presented several possible scenarios of Mr. Owl with other critters, and the Chameleon idea won, but I don’t know if the folks at Tootsie contributed to the idea of a Chameleon in the first place. The Chameleon, as Alison illustrated it in the first creative concept we saw, was so solid and appealing that we pretty much kept that design, although we did try out a few other possibilities just for due diligence’s sake.
Henry: The original 1-minute “How Many Licks” spot from 1969 had quite a large cast of animal characters — a cow, a fox, Mr. Turtle, and Mr. Owl, each one with a unique personality and voice. SCC did such a great job creating “Mr. Chameleon” and with the casting of his voice, keeping him in the spirit of the original spot. We helped refine the design, but after exploring a wide range of design variations I think we landed not far from SCC’s original concept.
There were a lot of other questions to figure out, such as nuances of Mr. C’s character, how he changes colors, how closely we should adhere to the original animation style, what if it’s “Mrs.” Chameleon?, etc.
Were there any challenges in animating this new commercial? It was probably different from “How Many Licks” since you were working off an established spot and only making subtle updates.
Brejcha: Exactly — they were very different projects. “How Many Licks” was, as Sean says, kind of an art restoration, and demanded a lot of technical problem solving in tracing the figures and updating a few image elements. But the timing, staging, and shots for it had all been established.
With “The Fruit Ones,” we were working more from scratch. We had a script, a design for the Chameleon, and a basic layout of a tree branch, but we needed to go through all the stages of doing boards, and an animatic with a scratch track, and trying out various stagings and different possibilities of cuts from wide to closeups to see what worked with the screentime. The creatives as SCC were wonderful to work for. They gave us good feedback and adjusted the script at a few points to help some timing issues.
Henry: Trying to capture the quirky, breezy style of those original Fred Wolf animations from the ‘60s was deceptively difficult! On the surface, it’s not very sophisticated animation but that is its charm. It is surprisingly nuanced despite the minimalist aesthetic.
Our primary goal was never to duplicate someone else’s work; it was to create something authentic that can be appreciated on a nostalgic level but connects with new audiences.
“The Fruit Ones” is much more colorful than “How Many Licks.” Can you expand on the role of color in the new spot?
Henry: Color and flavor are a huge aspect of Tootsie Rolls Fruit Chews candy. A chameleon, with its ability to change colors, is the perfect character to represent that in fun ways we could explore in cartoonland. It also contrasts nicely with Mr. Owl, who sort of gets a taste of his own medicine in this episode.
Brejcha: One of our goals was to make the spot seem as if it might have been made around the same time as “How Many Licks” and had only recently been unearthed. We wanted as much continuity as possible with how Mr. Owl looked. Sean was especially great at really analyzing the quirkiness of the original and steering the look of Mr. Owl, throughout all the animation. Hopefully, most viewers will think this spot stayed in the realm of what the original animators had done. Mr. Owl is the same slightly mottled, off-white color.
The color is more or less obvious in that the product being advertised is multi-colored little Tootsie rolls; the correlation we make between color and flavor is instant and deep. So you have to have these nice strong colors to show the candy flavors, which are everything from chocolate to vanilla to the whole fruity spectrum. The rest of the background has the task of being a foil to those, so the environment couldn’t be too bright or too busy. And then you have this Chameleon turning bright green for instance for having eaten a lime-green tootsie roll — as if in some magic way that wonderful flavor could shine through your very essence and light you up for a while! It just couldn’t be done in black and white. Nobody advertises their pizza with B&W photos.
Who is the Chameleon?
Henry: As far as we know, it’s simply “Mr. Chameleon.” It was fun developing his character and personality — a little bit sneaky, but friendly. It would be fun to develop him further. Part of the fun of the world of Tootsie Rolls is the joy of discovery. Rather than getting too deep into any character, I’d like to think there are lots of fun new characters out there waiting to be discovered.
Brejcha: He’s kind of a sly and rather opportunistic little guy, isn’t he! We didn’t create a backstory for the Chameleon, he is just known by how he acts in the few seconds of screentime.
This ad is being billed as the next chapter in the Mr. Owl story. Do you know if another commercial could debut this year?
Brejcha: At one point, SCC sounded optimistic about getting another one underway sooner or later, but my guess is it wouldn’t be out this year. “The Fruit Ones” took many months to create. We first saw a script and concept at the end of October 2025.
What was your favorite part of working on a new Tootsie Roll ad?
Brejcha: Loved creating boards and animatic from the script, thinking through the pacing, figuring how to best tell a funny story that was modeled somewhat along the lines of the original “How Many Licks” spot, bouncing ideas off Sean and the Calabash crew. It’s a relief to be able to hand off rough layouts and initial poses to such good animators as Jeff Mika and David Schuttenhelm and watching them turn first scribbles into character animation that, I hope, might have made the original animators [Jimmy] Murakami and Wolf happy.
The creative team at SCC was wonderful to work for. From the start, their concept for the spot was such a strong idea, and the script really fun and funny, which was a relief because we were entrusted with the care and handling of this thing that’s nearly on the order of a cultural treasure. And of course, it’s just a lovely thing to sit down and draw.
Henry: It was fun thinking our way into a retro-inspired animation style with a classical narrative and being included in the process from such an early stage. Wayne is a master storyteller and one of the most inventive thinkers I have ever worked with. It’s been an honor collaborating with the creative team at SCC and with Tootsie Roll Industries on this campaign. We appreciate the trust they have put in us to help carry the legacy forward.
Image Credits: Calabash Animation
About the Author
Heather Taylor is the senior writer and editor-in-chief of PopIcon, Advertising Week’s blog about brand mascots. Got a pitch on brand mascots or want to wax nostalgic about characters? Drop her a line at howveryheather@gmail.com.
