There are bi-coastal events tied in to Ted Thomas’s must-see documentary Walt and El Grupo that Brew readers may want to attend.

In New York, the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art will present a special advance screening of the film, along with a Q&A with writer/director Ted Thomas and producer Kuniko Okubo, moderated by John Canemaker. The screening will be Thursday, August 27th, 7:30 PM at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, BAM Cinema 4, (30 Lafayette Avenue, Brooklyn, NY). Admission is free for Members of MoCCA. To rsvp, call (212) 254-3511, Tuesday through Sunday between 12-5 PM. Seating is limited.

In L.A., The Egyptian Theatre will be hosting a panel, moderated by Geoff Boucher of the LA Times, with panelists including writer/director Ted Thomas, producer Kuniko Okubo, composer James Stemple and director of photography Shana Hagan, who will discuss Disney’s South American tour. The evening will include a rare theatrical showing of Saludos Amigos in 35mm. This event will take place on Tuesday September 8th, 7:30pm at the Egyptian on Hollywood Blvd. It is FREE for Asifa Hollywood members and members of the American Cinematheque. Check the Egyptian’s website for more details later this month.

UPDATE: We just found out these are fairly private events, with only seats available for members. Cartoon Brew is giving away 5 pairs of seats at the NY event to the first 5 people who request them at fumi-at-theprkitchen.com.

We will give away 20 seats for the L.A. American Cinematheque/Asifa event at the Egyptian, sometime next week. Stay tuned to Cartoon Brew for further details.

Okay guys, the animation-geek social event of the summer is here. On Saturday night, Meltdown Comics in Hollywood is hosting a really cool art show to celebrate the just-published 2010 pin-up calendar created by Girls Drawin’ Girls.

The Girls are a collective of over 30 female animation artists, who include animator Anne Walker, Simpsons director Nancy Kruse and designer Anand Duncan - among many others.

The opening night party is this Saturday, August 15th, 7pm-11pm at Meltdown Comics, 7522 Sunset Blvd. The gals promise an awesome show “with tons of fantastic artists, fantastic ladies, and fantastic good times”. For more information, visit the Girlsdrawingirls.com website.

The Ottawa International Animation Festival has announced their official selections for this year’s festival, which takes place between October 14-18.

There are ninety-three films competing in the various short categories. Competition selections in Ottawa are a wonderful reason to attend and always one of the highlights of the festival. The line-up is filled with challenging, progressive and interesting uses of the animation medium. Check out the list of competing films here. I’m especially pleased that they maintain such high standards because I’m on the festival’s short film jury this year alongside filmmakers Suzan Pitt and Jim Blashfield.

Feature competition is also more robust than usual with seven films vying for the prize: Henry Selick’s Coraline, Tatia Rosenthal’s $9.99, Neil Burns’s Edison and Leo, Priit and Olga Pärn’s Life Without Gabriella Ferri, Sunao Katabuchi’s Mai Mai Miracle, Adam Elliot’s Mary and Max, and Paul and Sandra Fierlinger’s My Dog Tulip. It’s nice to see a healthy selection of features, especially after the feature debacle in Ottawa last year in which the best feature prize was inexplicably awarded to Battle for Terra.

(Ottawa poster by Theodore Ushev)

Next Tuesdsay night at 8pm, I’ll be presenting a program of animation reflecting the styles, language and music of the Beat Generation. The screening will take place at the Silent Movie Theatre in Hollywood (on Fairfax and Melrose), continuing my series of first-Tuesday-of-each-month animation spectaculars there. Rare film prints and video will be screened and the program will include independent films, TV cartoons (though not any Dick Tracy cartoons with Heap O’Calorie and Nick, as pictured above). We will screen works by Ernest Pintoff, Bob Clampett, Jay Ward and others. Grab an Espresso and join me next week. It’ll be cool, Daddy-o! More info here.

“The Colors of Mary Blair” is a major new exhibit of Mary Blair’s artwork that has opened at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo, Japan. Over five hundred pieces of original artwork are on display, including her animation work, book illustrations, package designs, watercolors, and personal artwork. The show’s website is in Japanese, but there is an English section with basic address and admission details. These photos on Flickr (HERE and HERE) give a sense of the exhibit’s scale, and this image shows that the exhibition is accompanied by merchandise and a catalog. The show runs through October 4.

(via Disney History)

If you’re stuck in Los Angeles, and you can’t get into tonight’s Academy program with John Lasseter and Hayao Miyazaki, take heart! Cartoon Dump goes on this evening at 8pm with our gala 2nd Anniversary Show!

That’s right! It’s our second birthday (our first performance was in July 2007) and tonight we celebrate with special guests David Feldman (from Conan, Comedy Central, and Bill Maher) and Dave “Gruber” Allen (Freak & Geeks, Naked Trucker, Two Headed Dog)!

Join me, Frank Conniff, Erica Doering, J. Elvis Weinstein, and Mighty Mr. Titan (putting the spotlight on his ass, above) tonight at the Steve Allen Theater, 4773 Hollywood Blvd. • Free Parking! • Advanced Tickets here • Phone: (323) 666-9797 • Map & Directions

I’m just back from “Comic Con” aka the San Diego Comic Con (for the record, I refuse to call it Comic Con International) and, all said and done, I had a pretty good time. I’m one of those who has been distressed by the Hollywood domination of the convention, and the massive attendance of fans/pros and Hollywood types (125,000 plus) that have made this one-time delightful experience a literal nightmare for the uninitiated.

I’ve finally accepted the Con for what has now become, planned my own schedule of events, met up with my friends, made my way into all the parties and panels I wanted to attend, and just decided to enjoy myself.

I’m not going to recount or review specific panels in great detail; I haven’t even unpacked yet and probably have a bunch of comics, fanzines and freebies worth noting… that’ll wait for later. For now, here’s an overview of selected highlights over the last few days:

Wednesday: I was planning to leave at noon, in hopes of arriving in San Diego before 5pm, so I could attend the Preview Night. I got an email at 8:30am from my friends with the Astro Boy movie and they wondered if I could show up at the Con by 3:30pm to run-through the panel I was to moderate on Thursday morning. Knowing it would take at least four hours (especially if I stopped for lunch), that meant I had to leave at 11am - which I did. At 3:30, I was inside the convention hall reviewing the plans for the panel with the folks from Summit and Imagi.

Thursday: Began the day moderating a 10:30am panel on the new Astro Boy movie (looks great, by the way). Got to meet Freddy Highmore and Kristen Bell, and interviewed them on stage. Superhero Hype.com posted a transcript of the panel here.

Later that day I got to see the Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs panel. The clips they ran were excellent. It’s going to be a very funny movie - unlike almost any CG animated film we’ve seen yet. It’s much more a “cartoon comedy” than I expected and I’m quite jazzed to see the full length film.

Friday: At 8:30am I had breakfast with Craig Yoe, Harry McCracken and Tom Knott. At 12:30pm, I got into Hall H to see the big Disney presentation - and it was superb. John Lasseter was the M.C. and he did a great job presenting the clips and talking about each film. He would tell the crowd how great something would be, then showed a clip to prove it. He showed the first ten minutes of Toy Story 2 in 3D (it looked incredible). Lasseter then introduced the new 3D teaser trailer for Toy Story 3 which was very funny. He also showed a hilarious new short featuring Ken (Barbie’s boyfriend), voiced by Michael Keaton and probably directed by Teddy Newton (that was Teddy’s voice narrating it). This short will probably be a bonus extra on the Toy Story 3 DVD in a year and a half. The short, Groovin’ With Ken, was presented like an old 1970s 16mm promo film (Academy leader countdown, lines, splices, abrupt cuts, etc.) and was a parody of Ken’s supposedly swingin’ life style.

The footage from The Princess and The Frog reassured me that Disney is on the right path with this film. The animation is superb and the storyline is looking to be a lot more clever than I had thought. They showed two long sequences and both were terrifically entertaining. Nothing to worry about here.

The big surprise of the Disney presentation was the the clip (the first five minutes) of Prep and Landing a new CG Christmas special from Disney Animation Studios. I knew very little about this before… the five five minutes are wonderful and it could be a new Christmas classic. It’s about two Santa’s elves who prepare each home for Santa’s arrival. Check this out when it airs in December.

Lasseter showed a sequence (and trailer) for Beauty and the Beast in 3D. This was interesting because it’s not only in 3D, but the new technique they use adds 3D to the 3D, making the “flat characters” feel even more dimensional than the “viewmaster” feel of previous 3-D cartoons like Melody or Lumberjack Rabbit. Not sure if it’ll work based on the clips I saw, but it’s an interesting experiment.

Lasseter then brought out Hayao Miyazaki (to a standing ovation) and they did a little Q & A, showed a great scene from Ponyo and then took questions from the audience - comedian Patton Oswald took over at this point as a moderator. The questions from the audience - mostly directed to Miyazaki - were respectful and intelligent. This was a great panel, perfectly coordinated and produced. Photo above is from Toonzone.com - pictured left to right, Lee Unkrich, Kirk Wise, Ron Clements, John Musker, translator, Hayao Miyazaki, John Lasseter and Patton Oswalt.

Later that day, I attended Mark Evanier’s tribute panel to Stan Freberg, which was delightful - and hilarious. That night I attended a Disney Publishing party. Great party with great food, free books and t-shirts! At 9pm I screened my latest collection of Worst Cartoons Ever to a capacity crowd (2000 plus). If you are interested in obtaining a dvd of my 2009 compilation, please write to me at jbeck6540-at-aol.com.

Saturday: I began the day doing jury duty - as one of the celebrity judges for Titmouse Animation’s new reality series (in production), 7200 Frames. The judging took place on a yacht docked behind the Marriot Marina hotel, next door to the convention center. Loads of fun.

Later that day, Mark Evanier and Earl Kress did a panel with June Foray. It was a love fest between her and the audience. That night was the annual Writers Guild of America/Animation Caucus cocktail party. Again, great food and drink and wonderful conversation with old friends like Michael Uslan, Patric Varrone, Tom Kenny, Craig Miller, Marc Zicree, Jim Wheelock, Stan Berkowitz and others. This party was on a fourth floor Terrace ballroom at the Hyatt Hotel, and ended with a perfect view of a fireworks show over the Marina.

All of the above accounted for only fifty percent of the last five days. I ran into many old friends, Brew readers and business contacts in the exhibit hall (aka dealers rooms) - and I bought way too many things. My head is still spinning but, unlike last year, I’m ready to do it again - next year!

The sixth annual edition of Animation Block Party runs this weekend in Brooklyn. The event is the closest thing there is to an animation festival in the New York City area. There are five programs of the latest animated shorts from around the world, as well as a few parties. Tonight at 8pm is the opening night screening, which takes place outdoors on the roof of the Automotive High School in Williamsburg. More screenings follow on Saturday and Sunday. Film line-up, ticket info and locations are all available on the Animation Block website.