Animator Sherm Cohen has posted an illustrated tribute to cartoonist/storyman/cartoon director Dan Gordon (Popeye, SuperKatt, The Flintstones) on his Cartoon Snap blog. Cohen’s article first appeared in The Comics Journal last July. He’s added images and video to his online version. Worth a visit!
Last week’s post about Frank Zappa, Tex Avery and the place of executives generated a lot of feedback, including this email from Bruno Afonso in France:
Recently, you posted a great video with Frank Zappa, about how the old-school executives were way more hands-off than now. It reminded me of something I had seen in a BBC programm called “Comedy Connections” about the creation of the Monty Python. It was more or less the same thing. When they made their first TV series, the BBC executives just told them “Well, you’ve got an order for thirteen episodes, go and make them, you’re on the air in September” and that was it! I found the clip on YouTube where the Montys explain it. They say it in the first minute. I, for one, think it’s quite interesting that all of these geniuses (Tex Avery, Frank Zappa, Monty Python) made their best work when left alone.
For the sake of posterity, here are the comments from the castmembers. John Cleese said:
“I was incredibly impressed with the risks they’d take. We went in to see Michael Mills and we explained extremely inadequately what we had in mind. There were huge gaps absolutely everywhere and at the end of a thoroughly unsatisfactory meeting, from Michael’s point of view, he said just go away and make thirteen.”
And from Eric Idle:
“Well, the BBC was a much more laid back place. It was a bit more like a retirement from the RAF filled with people who were having offices and going off smoking their pipes and having beer. So they were very laid back about it. They said, “Well look, here we are, we’ve got thirteen of them, you’re on the air in September and see you then,” and they sort of left. They didn’t really care. It was fabulous. It was the golden age of executives. There weren’t any.”
Personally, I find the contemporary balance of power between executives and artists very curious. Why do non-creative people exercise so much control over artists in the creation of animated projects? Does it make the finished product any better? Is there a precedent showing that quality work was previously created in this manner? The answer to that latter question is clear at least; if one looks back at the history of how classic works of animation (and other media) have been produced, in every instance it was different from the way animation is produced nowadays. How much of that is the fault of the artists themselves? If somebody accepts the input of a creatively inferior person and gives equal weight to that person’s opinions, doesn’t that eventually legitimize that person? In other words, could it be that industry artists have weakened their own standing throughout the years by consistently collaborating with creatively inferior people?
Say hello to Mecha-Mouse!
Going on sale next month in Japan are a pair of Mickey Mouse Transformers toys. One in shimmering black and white (Steampunk Willie?), the other in glorious multiplane Techincolor. No word yet on a Pluto-bot, Goofytron or Decepta-Duck.
More cool pictures of robo-Mickey below and here.
(Thanks, Ed Austin)
Kat lovers unite – you’re about to be hit with a brick! Craig Yoe has just started a website devoted to cartoonist George Herriman.
It’s a treasure trove of all things Krazy including separate blogs filled with Herriman comic strips, rareties, animation, news and more! Go there now!
(In the archival photo above: producer Charles Mintz, unknown, Miss Krazy Kat, animators Ben Harrison and Manny Gould)
Cartoon Brew TV is back from the holidays and we’re ready for action–19th century style! This week’s offering, Love on the Line (2008) by G. Melissa Graziano, offers the tale of a pair of star-crossed lovers who yearn to communicate with one another in a time before texting, IMing and the Internet. A combination of stop-motion cutouts and 2D computer animation, the short was made at the UCLA Animation Workshop and has won multiple awards since. Watch Love on the Line only on Cartoon Brew TV.
Film reporter Patrick Goldstein, in today’s LA Times, writes about movies that are long shots for the Oscar’s Best Picture nomination. One of them is Pixar’s Wall•E:
A wonderful, critically beloved movie, “Wall-E” in any normal world would be a shoo-in nominee for best picture. Its problem? It’s an animated film, the one genre (along with comedy) that gets no respect from the academy — no animated film has won an Oscar for best picture, even though many classics, notably “The Lion King,” “Toy Story 2,” “Spirited Away” and “Ratatouille,” were just as good as the live-action winners in their year of eligibility. Actors, who make up the biggest branch of the academy, almost never vote for animated films, so it’s virtually impossible to put together enough support from other branches of the academy to register a win.Hence, the best animated film ghetto, which, just like at Sunday’s Golden Globe Awards, allows an animated delight like “Wall-E” to get some recognition without having a legitimate shot at best picture stardom. Some commentators have suggested that if Disney had spent just another $20 million to push “Wall-E,” it could’ve gotten over the top, but Disney is probably right not to throw good money after bad — too many academy members have a built-in bias against animated films, viewing them as just not “important” enough to vote for.
As much as I’d like to see an animated film recognized alongside live action in the Best Picture category, I’m afraid Goldstein speaks the truth. This is the reality: no matter how much money animation makes, or how many hits Pixar and Dreamworks churn out, animation is still a 2nd class citizen in Hollywood.
I don’t like it that way. It’s not how I think — but it’s the way it is. And nothing that happens seems to change that perception. Four of the top 10 movies of 2008 (in U.S. box office gross) were animated features – four – and the other six were blockbusters that had more than their fair share of CGI effects (Iron Man, Dark Knight, etc).
And consider this scenario, which is entirely within the realm of possibility: Waltz with Bashir could be nominated (and win) in three categories (Animated Feature, Foreign Film and Documentary), Wall•E could be nominated (and win) as Best Picture, and leave, perhaps, Kung Fu Panda (my pick) winner as Best Animated Feature. Even if this could happen (and it’s not impossible) animation would still be considered by non-animation folk, as Goldstein says, “not important enough”.
It’s been a hell-of-a-good year for animation but, according to some, we still rank 2nd place.
Sound cartoons… Disturbing sound cartoons. Cartoons too violent, too scary, too depressing and, though made decades ago for all ages, are considered no longer suitable for todays kids! Tonight, Tuesday January 13th, at 8pm I’m returning to the Silent Movie Theatre in Hollywood with a full program of classic cartoons no longer shown on television and not on DVD.
If your childhood wasn’t already perverted by hours upon hours of unhinged animation, this show will make it up to you. I promise to fry your brain with ultra-rare 16mm and 35mm prints. Bring kids at your own risk. For more details, check the Silent Movie website.
UPDATE 3:00pm: The 8pm show is almost sold out! A second screening at 10:15pm has been added. The show also got a nice plug on LAist.
Every year around the holidays I receive a whole slew of animated greeting cards. The new year’s greeting below by French artist Art Grootfontein is the most impressive from this past season’s batch of e-cards. It should be evident from the piece itself, but Grootfontein also tells me that one of his favorite sources of inspiration is my book Cartoon Modern.
Wanna meet three comic art legends? The YIVO Institute in New York will be presenting one-on-one interviews with three comic book innovators.
Al Jaffee, Jules Feffier and Harvey Pekar will be interviewed by comics writer and critic Danny Fingeroth. YIVO’s Comics and the American Jewish Dream series kicks off Wenesday January 21st at 7:00 pm with The MAD, MAD, MAD (Jewish) World of AL JAFFEE. The series continues with Jules Feffier on Tuesday, February 3, at 7:00 P.M. and Harvey Pekar on Tuesday, February 17, 7:00 P.M. The YIVO Institute For Jewish Research is at 15 West 16th Street, in Manhattan. Admission $25 / YIVO members: $18 / students: $12. For tickets call 212-868-4444 or visit smarttix.com.
A new site launches today: CartoonMojo.com. It’s a video sharing site in the YouTube mold that focuses exclusively on animated shorts. In that respect, it’s similar to sites like AniBoom and MyToons. Notably, the site was created by artists–industry veterans Louie del Carmen and Octavio Rodriguez. It remains to be seen how Cartoon Mojo will distinguish itself from its already more established brethren but there is still plenty of room for competition in this arena. Below is one of the shorts featured on their website: “Anniversary” by the boys at Ghostbot.
We’ve plugged the forthcoming It All Started Here! several times already, but once more couldn’t hurt. I also couldn’t resist posting this photo of J. J. Sedelmaier and Howard Beckerman which appeared in the Westchester section of the local NY Times on Thursday. The Times article gives a good overview of the events planned starting next Saturday around the New York area. Don’t miss this series if you live in the Northeast. You’ll hate yourself if you do. For even more details, click here.
Already deep in production on Astro Boy and Gatchaman, the creative heads at Imagi Studios now have their sights set on another classic anime series to revive in CG: Gigantor.
They have just produced a kick-ass teaser trailer for T28 (short for Tetsujin 28, aka Gigantor). Click here to watch. It looks very hot to me. Faithful to the original manga and beautifully rendered. Looks like a winner – if they can get it produced.
“Edward Gorey at the Bowery” by Morgan Kelly
Need something to do tomorrow evening? Then head on over to Atwater Village for the opening of “Y’aint Gonna Get There Free: Screams in Hollywoodland,” a new show of paintings by JJ Villard, Morgan Kelly, and Jeremy Bernstein. It opens 7pm at the Little Bird Gallery (3195 Glendale Blvd. LA, CA). Since emerging out of CalArts, all three of these guys have been working in the bowels of the animation industry, at studios like DreamWorks and Sony, but they’ve managed to retain strong artistic identities by self-publishing books and painting. It bears mentioning that Villard, who currently isn’t working at a studio, is also the director of some amazing animated shorts like Son of Satan and Chestnuts Icelolly. A preview of the work can be seen on the gallery’s website. They also put together a bizarre series of show invites, a few of which can be viewed on Jeremy’s blog.
The Looney Balloons above remind me that today is the deadline for you to contribute your personal lists of favorite Warner Bros. cartoons. This is your chance to influence the outcome of the contents of my forthcoming book, The 100 Greatest Looney Tunes. Please post your choices in the comments below – or in the comments of the original post. Thank you to all who have participated!
(and thank you to Adam King for the Looney Balloon link)
A postscript to my post last week on the Library of Congress selection of the home movie Disneyland Dream to the National Film Registry.
Apparently comedian/actor Steve Martin, a former Disneyland cast member and Disneyland buff, appears in the home movie itself! Says Martin, in a letter to filmmaker Robbins Barstow, published in The Hartford Courant:
“At age eleven I worked at Disneyland. I sold guidebooks at the park from 1956 to about 1958. I am as positive as one can be that I appear about 20:20 into your film, low in the frame, dressed in a top hat, vest, and striped pink shirt, moving from left to right, holding a guidebook out for sale.”
