I hate Barney! You know though, it’s not so much that stupid purple dinosaur as it is the children on the show. They are overly happy and fake in everything they do, and since it is all of them, its got to be the fault of the director. He or she must really want to do theater instead of television. Either that or he or she is in dire need of a course in acting.

In the theater, hand and body movements as well as facial expressions have to be greatly exaggerated so that the people in the back of the house can easily see what is going on. Regardless of what the children do on Barney, this is not this exaggeration is not proper for the camera. A television camera magnifies movement and therefore the acting techniques should not be the same.

The children in Barney seem completely insincere because they don’t know how to act in front of a camera. This is a bad lesson for children because it teaches them that they should hide their true feelings.

Point of Interest: There is a great quote in The New York Times; April 11, 1993, v142, Sec. 2, pH28 in the article "Of all dinosaurs, why must this one thrive?". James Gorman claims that, "...it has been proved, time and again, that none of the real dinosaurs were half as dumb as Barney (and they were better dancers too.)"