Why Kirk Cameron is taking on children’s TV

Former teen star hopes Adventures with Iggy and Mr. Kirk can provide moral alternatives for families

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Kirk Cameron started acting when he was nine years old. His Hollywood career took off when he was cast as Mike Seaver in the TV show Growing Pains. He was nominated for two Golden Globe Awards. He made cameos on other television programs and appeared in movies such as Like Father Like Son with Dudley Moore.

Sounds like the typical story of a Hollywood star. Yet, there was a fascinating twist during the height of Cameron’s success with Growing Pains. It transformed his life, beliefs and personal faith.

Cameron considered himself an atheist in his teens. “I considered Jesus to be part of a different trinity when I was an atheist—and that was Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and god,” he said in an interview for the July-August 2019 issue of Decision Magazine, part of the Billy Graham Evangelical Association.

When his parents went through marital problems, the family went to church to find comfort and understanding. Cameron heard Chuck Swindoll “preach about God’s holiness and mankind’s sinfulness and need for a Saviour,” which led him to read Josh McDowell’s More Than a Carpenter and changed his entire perspective.

“I became convinced over time that it took more faith for me to deny God’s existence than it did to believe that this world was created and that Jesus is who He said He is,” he told Decision Magazine’s Lee Weeks. “And so, I decided that I would trust Him as my Lord and Saviour.”

Cameron eventually became an evangelical Christian. He works with Ray Comfort in an evangelical ministry, The Way of the Master. He shifted his focus to Christian-oriented productions, including the Left Behind series, Lifemark, Monumental: In Search of America’s National Treasure and TBN’s Takeaways with Kirk Cameron. He runs The Firefly Foundation with his wife, actress Chelsea Noble. He started the publishing company Brave Books and wrote a faith-based children’s book, As You Grow.

Cameron’s most recent project is a rather interesting one. He’s attempting to crowdfund a family-oriented children’s show, Adventures with Iggy and Mr. Kirk.

The show was launched in February 2024. A short teaser featured Iggy the iguana, Cameron (as Mr. Kirk) and former Disney actress Leigh-Allyn Baker discussing what the program would entail. Iggy asked Cameron, “There are tons of kids’ shows out there. What makes ours super unique?” Cameron responded, “That’s a great point. There are tons of kids’ shows out there, but how many of them can we actually trust?” Baker then said, “In the past, the worst a parent had to worry about was mind-numbingly boring or annoying content. But the content parents face today is unlike anything that’s ever come before.” Cameron remarked, “That’s right. It’s not only wildly inappropriate, but strips away children’s innocence with messaging that is confusing at best, or sets them on a path that ends in irreparable harm at worst.”

What did they mean by this?

“Hollywood executives have a monopoly on children’s entertainment,” Baker said. “As parents, we want world-class children’s content that we can trust. So it’s time we stop just wishing something better existed and instead took our children’s entertainment into our own hands.”

She looked at Cameron, who said, “Adventures with Iggy and Mr. Kirk is going to be the first children’s TV show that will both, one, be so good that even parents are going to want to watch it with their kids. And two, build children’s character and reinforce the Biblical values we believe in. Imagine a show that teaches solid morals like Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, only modernized with high energy, hilarious dialogue, animated stories, new surprise guest stars at every turn.”

Since that time, Cameron has posted a smattering of the 10 episodes of Adventures with Iggy and Mr. Kirk on YouTube. All of them were originally broadcast on the streaming service Brave+, and were professionally done from top to bottom.

The first episode featured Iggy, Cameron and Baker in Mr. Kirk’s treehouse at a time when spring and new life were in the air. They took care of an injured bird, aided by supporting characters who wanted to help. A Brave book, Little Lives Matter, was read out loud by Mr. Kirk with an animated version for children to enjoy. A young boy, Jack, appeared on the treehouse computer asking for suggestions before his new baby sister arrived. There was humorous banter, a few songs and scenes that lightly brought faith and Christianity into the conversation.

This episode was posted on YouTube on March 27. It has received nearly 1.2 million views. That’s quite impressive, and shows it has real potential to become a widely viewed, family-friendly program. Not only for Christian viewers, who are the primary target audience, but Jews, moderate Muslims and others who reject children’s shows containing a left-leaning agenda, political correctness and opposition to religion and traditional family values.

Alas, the second and third episodes of Adventures with Iggy and Mr. Kirk have only received 31,000 and 29,000 views to date. It’s not unusual for a new show to experience some growing pains (if you’ll pardon the pun). It may take a while to catch on.

Cameron is determined to make his new show a success. “You may not be Elon Musk who can buy Twitter. You may not be Mr. Rogers or a puppeteer or a famous songwriter,” he told the Washington Examiner on Feb. 19, 2024, “but what you can do if you love your children and grandchildren, you can be a part of creating something good in helping create this show, just like they did with The Chosen.”

Let’s hope and have faith that Iggy and Mr. Kirk continue to have fun-filled adventures for many more years to come.

Michael Taube is a political commentator, Troy Media syndicated columnist and former speechwriter for Prime Minister Stephen Harper. He holds a master’s degree in comparative politics from the London School of Economics, lending academic rigour to his political insights.