What It's Like Being Alone - Production

Production

The show was created by Brad Peyton of Newfoundland and Labrador, who explained that he identified himself as a "freak" growing up, and was thus motivated to try "celebrating flawed characters" in his work; he also employed stereotypical views of orphanages in the series. Peyton had previously made a black comedy short film called Evelyn: The Cutest Evil Dead Girl, and afterwards declined to shoot a major film. Instead, he turned to What It's Like Being Alone. He described the genesis of the series:

I had a friend who was depressed, so I went over to her house and started drawing. I made her a little book. She liked it and said I should try to sell it. So I photocopied 200 at Kinkos and sold them at Pages Books. Made like $150 dollars. That book turned into What It's Like Being Alone.

Peyton explained the writing by saying "it always comes out of an emotional place." One of the writers was Karen Walton, who had previously written the Canadian werewolf film Ginger Snaps. The producers chose the type of animation due to Peyton's personal interest in it, although he later claimed that a day's work could lead to seconds' worth of material. A factory was needed with 8 to 10 teams, with some of the animators having previously worked on the Tim Burton film Corpse Bride. The characters were made out of plastic and foam. Additionally, some animation was done through computers. Each character's figure had a number of add-on lips to express various sounds, and their eyes and eyebrows were also adjusted frequently during production. The figures could also be fastened into a surface, moved and fastened in again to portray movement. Peyton remarked that "The hardest thing is timing and pacing." Still, he also liked to emphasize that the series did not cost too much money to produce.

The airing of the series had been stalled for a year, perhaps due to difficulties within the CBC. To get CBC to adopt the series, Peyton showed the company a commercial with the CBC logo in blood, remarking that "It's been way too long that you've waited to have your logo covered in blood." He had also said that What It's Like Being Alone was meant to attract university and high school students as an audience, and he felt that these people did not ordinarily watch the CBC. CBC itself was looking for original material, and was enthusiastic about the series because it seemed to stand out among Canadian television productions. Peyton's co-producer was Fred Fuchs, who later rose in the CBC staff; one critic believed Fuchs' promotion to be a reason why CBC adopted the series.