Salute Your Shorts Turns 35 as Cast Reunites for Camp Anawanna Celebration

Camp Anawanna is back in session, at least for one very special afternoon. The Splat Attack Podcast marked the 35th anniversary of Salute Your Shorts with a cast reunion, bringing together Danny Cooksey (Bobby Budnick), Michael Ray Bower (Eddie “Donkeylips” Gelfen), Venus DeMilo Thomas (Telly Radford), Megan Mahdavi, credited on the show as Megan Berwick (Z.Z. Ziff), and Heidi Lukacsik, known to fans as Heidi Lucas (Dina Alexander). Thirty-five years after the series premiered on Nickelodeon, the campers of Anawanna proved the friendships forged on that set are still very much intact.

For a show that has loomed so large in the memories of 90s kids, the actual history of Salute Your Shorts is surprisingly compact. The series grew out of a 1986 humor book, Salute Your Shorts: Life at Summer Camp, written by Steve Slavkin and Thomas Hill. Nickelodeon, hungry in 1990 for original scripted programming that could shake its reputation as a game show network, commissioned Slavkin to adapt it. A pilot was shot at the Griffith Park Boys Camp in Los Angeles in March 1990 and aired as a one-off special that October. By the time the network finally picked the show up to series in early 1991, most of the young cast had outgrown their roles, and nearly everyone had to audition again. Only Danny Cooksey, Michael Ray Bower, and Kirk Baily survived the recast, which is exactly why the reunion’s audition stories ring so true. Several cast members recalled originally trying out for multiple roles before landing the characters that would define their childhoods, and in some cases the parts they eventually played were not the ones they first read for.

The series proper premiered with a primetime July 4, 1991 special and ran just two seasons, ending in 1992 with only 26 episodes to its name. The show was famously done in by logistics rather than ratings. Nickelodeon wanted production moved from Los Angeles to its new Orlando studios, and most of the cast was unwilling to relocate. Slavkin himself had walked off the production in protest after the network refused raises for his young cast. None of it dimmed the show’s afterlife. Nickelodeon ran those 26 episodes in heavy rotation until 1999, and even brought the series back in 2004 after fans voted it onto the air for the network’s 25th anniversary. It is that rerun saturation the reunion hosts and cast laughed about, noting that many fans are stunned to learn a show they seemingly watched every day for a decade produced barely two seasons of material.

The conversation was full of the warmth fans would hope for. The actors described a supportive, family-like environment on set, crediting the cast and crew with creating a genuinely positive experience for a group of young performers at a time when that was far from guaranteed in the industry. They swapped memories of long filming days at Griffith Park and other Los Angeles locations that doubled for the fictional camp, and shared a detail longtime fans will appreciate: as the series went on, the writers began folding pieces of the actors’ real personalities into their characters, letting Budnick, Donkeylips, Telly, Z.Z., and Dina evolve into something closer to the kids playing them. And of course there was the theme song. The mock camp alma mater, composed by Ed Alton with lyrics by Slavkin and famously sung live by the cast, remains as beloved as ever. Michael Ray Bower joked that he has been asked to perform it more times than he could ever count.

The cast also did not hide their frustration over the show’s home media situation, and here the history is genuinely maddening. When the influential tracking site TVShowsOnDVD.com shut down in 2018, Salute Your Shorts was the single most requested television show without a DVD or Blu-ray release. Trevor Eyster, who played Sponge, even attempted to work with the rightsholder on a physical release, only to discover that music licensing costs and cast royalties made the project unprofitable on paper. Today a partial selection of episodes streams on Paramount+, with a few more available for digital purchase, but a complete official release of all 26 episodes still does not exist anywhere, 35 years on. The cast made clear they find that as baffling as the fans do. In the meantime, the actors have preserved the show’s history in their own ways, sharing stories about props, costumes, behind-the-scenes photos, and personal keepsakes they held onto from the production.

The most emotional stretch of the reunion came when the group paid tribute to Kirk Baily, who played beleaguered counselor Kevin “Ug” Lee and passed away in February 2022 at age 59, just six months after a lung cancer diagnosis. The cast remembered Baily as a mentor and big brother figure, a gifted performer, and one of the most beloved people ever associated with the show. The big brother description was no exaggeration. Baily and Bower stood as groomsmen at Danny Cooksey’s wedding in 1998, and Baily remained close with his former castmates for the rest of his life. After the show, he built a prolific second career as a voice actor, with credits ranging from the English dub of Cowboy Bebop to voice work on major animated films. His absence was deeply felt, but the affection in the room made clear how much of the show’s heart he carried.

The reunion is also a reminder of how far the campers have traveled since 1992. Cooksey became one of animation’s busiest voice actors, including his run as Montana Max on Tiny Toon Adventures, alongside a music career. Bower went on to memorable film roles and now connects with fans through his own YouTube channel. Venus DeMilo Thomas coaches young actors today, and even shared her original Salute Your Shorts audition footage with fans. A fan documentary about the series, Forever Anawanna, has been in the works for several years, further proof that the appetite for this show has never gone away.

Before wrapping, the cast fielded fan questions about everything from the mysteries of the dreaded Awful Waffle to favorite episodes, camp activities, and where their characters might be today if the series were ever revived. Asked why Salute Your Shorts still resonates 35 years later, the group pointed to its innocence, its relatable characters, its multicultural cast, and its timeless portrayal of summer camp friendship. The reunion closed the way any good camp season should, with gratitude flowing in both directions as the cast thanked fans for keeping the legacy of Camp Anawanna alive, and fans thanked them right back. Camp Anawanna, we hold you in our hearts. Thirty-five years later, that has never been more true.