Another purchase I made at Cinecon this past Labor Day, was an entire stack of Films In Review magazines, the entire run from 1956 through 1959. I’ve been going through them slowly and enjoying them throughly, finding many great insights and articles about the history of film. There was so little written about animation in these pages that I was surprised to find this piece on pioneer stop motion animator Ladislas Starevich in the April 1958 issue. It’s a nice overview of his career, written while Starevitch was still alive and working. Since I couldn’t find it posted anywhere else on the web, I figured it was my duty - in the interests of history - to add it here myself. (Click thumbnails below to enlarge)

For those who need to brush up on their Starevich I highly recommend the DVD collection, Cameraman’s Revenge & Other Fantastic Tales. In the meantime, here is the one of his classics, from 1933, The Mascot:

Steve Worth over at the Asifa-Hollywood Animation Archive has posted a plethora of Alvin and The Chipmunks memorabilia to tell the story behind this eternal pop-culture phenomenon. Steve has posted much rare material from the Format Films era Alvin Show including several storyboards (including the rare pilot) and Jules Engel color keys. Go there now! Here’s the direct link.

Here’s some show-and-tell. I found these odds and ends of UPA publicity at Cinecon, the classic movie convention held in Hollywood over Labor day weekend. None of these miscellaneous tid-bits are very important, but they are all part of the great jigsaw puzzle of film history — and can be telling on how the UPA cartoons were marketed and perceived by the public at the time. The first row is a four page spread from a pocket-sized movie magazine called Prevue (July 1953). I posted the cover below left (click on thumbnails to see full size image). You never know what you’ll find in oddball (and odd-sized) fan magazines such as these. In addition to the UPA pages, there were three pages promoting Disney’s live action feature The Sword and The Rose.

Next we have several clippings from Motion Picture Herald, a weekly trade magazine aimed at theatre owners. A dealer was selling a whole years run of 52 issues from 1952. I went through them all and found these items of interest: Columbia Pictures took out several back cover ads touting there current releases, done in a “newspaper” style, with press-style blurbs. At left, a bit about producer Steve Bosustow and his Academy Award; in the center, Columbia highlights a Bethesda Maryland theatre who billed Rooty Toot Toot and a bunch of Magoo cartoons over the main feature (Return of the Texan, a 20th Century Fox film); and at right, proving the incredible popularity of Mr. Magoo, the Herald ran this photo of a theatre in London who made a whole show of Mr. Magoo cartoons: “The First Mr. Magoo Show”. I wonder if there were ever a second or third?

And finally, a double-page ad in February 10th 1951 edition of Motion Picture Herald hyping the popularity and press (NY Times, Life Magazine, comparisions to Disney’s Three Little Pigs) of UPA’s Gerald McBoing Boing. It’s rare for any individual short to rate a full page ad - more so a two page spread.

John McElwee waxes nostalgic about collecting 8mm home movies and Flip The Frog on his Greenbriar Picture Shows blog. As usual on his site, McElwee’s illustrated the piece with rare trade advertisements from the 1930s.

Also, this Flip doll has to be one of the ugliest pieces of cartoon merchandising I’ve ever seen. That said, I want one.

Auctioneers Profiles In History are currently having an incredible entertainment memorabilia sale which is including a Lot of 100 puppets and pieces-of-puppets from the George Pal’s Jasper Puppetoons. The bids start at $8000. Here’s the link. There are also separate lots for puppets from individual non-Jasper films such as The Gay Knighties, Rhythm In The Ranks, Two-Gun Rusty, John Henry, Tubby The Tuba and on and on! This lot was part of the estate of William Nassour who, with his brother, produced several Hollywood movies and experimented in stop motion animation. Apparently they took over the Puppetoon shop when Pal moved on into feature production - and held onto these puppets until now!

If those prices are too steep, you can own one of Pal’s most iconic movie models for a more modest $35. Pegasus Hobbies, under license from Paramount Pictures, is exclusively selling reproductions of the Martian War Machines from War Of The Worlds. They sell them as either plastic model kits or pre-built and plated. I actually have one of the pre-built ones and it’s quite beautiful.

Mark Evanier also points out that the Hollywood auction above is also selling an astonishing collection of Walker Edminston’s Time For Beany Beany & Cecil puppets and memorabilia. Lot’s of jaw-dropping Clampett puppets and ephemera here.

Her birthday was yesterday, Friday September 18th. Mark Evanier sent us this great photo of June and Walter Lantz (click thumbnail at left to see it at full size) to mark the occasion. June’s new autobigraphy can be ordered at her website, www.juneforay.com - and I highly recommend it. She’s a living legend - and been much more than animation’s greatest voice actress: she’s been a tireless worker in bringing respect and recognition to the animation field. We love you, June! I know she’s reading this website, so feel free to send her a greeting in the comments below.

One of the rarest children’s books illustrated by an animation artist is Philippe Halsman’s Piccoli (1953), with illustrations by Paul Julian. It’s rare no longer as Michael Sporn has scanned in John Canemaker’s copy of the book, and has made available all of Julian’s stunning artwork from the book. The painting of the boy hiding under the sheets reminds me of a similar scene in UPA’s The Tell-Tale Heart, which shouldn’t be surprising because Julian was creating his exquisite paintings for that film right around the time he illustrated this book. For more Julian animation art, check out these Warner Bros. backgrounds; Pete Alvarado told me that Julian set the WB house style (and the standard) that all the other painters followed at WB in the 1940s.

Once again, Martha Sigall explains it all:

For more Martha, buy her book Living Life Inside the Lines.