Connie's Warwick Davis Fanpage and Leprechaun Center

The Tenth Kingdom

The Tenth Kingdom
Originally scheduled for broadcast in November 1999, then rescheduled. Broadcast in the US on NBC in five 2-hour segments starting February 27, 2000 and ending March 6, 2000. Also released on video.
Directed by David Carson and Herbert Wise
Starring John Larroquette, Kimberly Williams, Scott Cohen, Dianne Wiest

As the miniseries begins, trouble is brewing in the magical world known as the Nine Kingdoms. The evil queen who is the land's most dangerous criminal is escaping from the Snow White Memorial Prison with the help of the troll king, when Prince Wendell of the Fourth Kingdom happens to arrive for a royal visit. She magically turns him into a dog. He flees to a basement storeroom full of forgotten junk, and a magic mirror takes him out of the Nine Kingdoms and into New York City, which is soon dubbed The Tenth Kingdom. The dog now known as Prince is befriended by Virginia, the waitress daughter of janitor Tony Lewis (John Larroquette). But Prince is being pursued by the three children of the troll king and a non-hairy wolfman whom the queen released from prison after he agreed to serve her. Havoc ensues, and soon Prince, Virginia, and Tony flee through the mirror back into the Nine Kingdoms.

Tony is quickly arrested as a suspect in the escape of the queen. He is put into a cell with Clayface the Goblin and Acorn the Dwarf (Warwick Davis). These are frightening characters at first - goblins are naturally scary-looking, and Acorn isn't a pretty sight either, as he apparently lost an eye in a knife fight. But the goblin turns out to be a basically gentle character. And although Acorn is obviously a tough character who might be very dangerous when provoked, on the whole he's polite and helpful in a rough kind of way.

Acorn is not a major character; he has a total of maybe ten minutes of screen time in this ten-hour miniseries, and appears briefly in the last hour of the first segment, the first hour of the second segment, the first hour of the third segment and the first hour of the fifth segment. He never does anything that's overtly heroic or villainous, but he has a significant influence on the story nonetheless. He helps Tony escape from prison, complicates matters by inadvertently running off with the magic mirror that is Tony and Virginia's only way home, and helps Virginia acquire a weapon that is capable of destroying the evil queen. Considering the brevity of the part, he's a pretty well-developed character, and is fun to watch.

Actually, the series as a whole is fun to watch: the storyline is decent, and there are some interesting characters. The troll king's children are a lot of fun; they're sort of like very dumb Klingons. The characters don't always behave rationally, but hey, that's TV for you. The main characters have many adventures beyond what's described here, and the story ends with a strong hint that there will be a sequel.

The miniseries was produced by Robert Halmi, who in recent years has brought several other successful fantasy miniseries to the screen, including Gulliver's Travels, The Odyssey, and Merlin. His miniseries tend to take great liberties with classic stories, which is offensive to some. But there's no such problem here - although it plays around with innumerable references to classic fairy tales, this is a totally original story.

Ever After is a nice site with a most noteworthy guestbook entry on November 5th 2004. It was signed by Warwick Davis himself! The 11th Kingdom is another nice site that has more on Acorn than you find on most 10K sites.

The official website is here on the RHI Entertainment website (formerly Hallmark).

DMOZ has a list of fanpages and other interesting websites.