NYC based Animation Block Party, is coming to Los Angeles this week.

ABP is an annual New York festival dedicated to showcasing the world’s best independent, professional and student animation. The Best of Animation Block Party will be screening at the New Beverly Cinema in Hollywood on Thursday February 18, 2010 at 7:30pm and 10:00pm.

This program is highly recommended. A complete list of the films being shown is listed here. Filmmakers in attendance at screenings include Mike Hollingsworth, Rebecca Sugar, Max Winston, Turner Lange, Ben Li and Caroline Foley. Both shows will be introduced by ABP founder, Casey Safron. You can buy tickets online at Brown Paper Tickets.com.

Any excuse to post David Silverman (The Simpsons) playing his flaming tuba on The Tonight Show is worth it. My excuse this time is Silverman’s upcoming appearence with Fire Groove as part of the evening’s entertainment at the upcoming Pasadena Rock’n Comic Con this Memorial Day (May 28-30th) at the Pasadena Convention Center.

This event is a “film, art, music & entertainment convention” sponsored by Animation-Ink.com. They are planning rock concerts each night, and a full comic con experience during each day. “Top talents from major Animation Studios & Comic cons, lecture panels, art demos, autograph signings, recruiters, portfolio reviews, and an Animation Festival in a 3000 seat theatre”. Tickets for this have just gone on sale. For more information, visit their website.

Warner Bros. and TCM are running a Classic Film Festival in Hollywood on April 22nd-25th, showcasing restored prints of more than a dozen classic movies on the big screens of the historic Chinese and Egyptian Theatres. Robert Osborn will be hosting in person, Jerry Lewis will introduce The King Of Comedy, Tony Curtis will present Some Like it Hot and Leonard Maltin will introduce a program of classic MGM and Warner bros. live action shorts.

However, for cartoon buffs, here’s a big screen program we’ve been waiting decades to see publicily:

Removed from Circulation: A Cartoon Collection – Presented by author Donald Bogle

Donald Bogle, author of Bright Boulevards, Bold Dreams: A History of Black Hollywood, will present cartoons that have been kept from the public eye because of negative racial or cultural stereotypes. The collection includes several classic Warner Bros. cartoons. Bogle will provide insight into the racial attitudes of the times in which the cartoons were created. Titles include Clean Pastures (1937), Coal Black and De Sebben Dwarves (1943), Goldilocks and the Jivin’ Bears (1944), Hittin’ the Trail for Hallelujah Land (1931), The Isle of Pingo Pongo (1938), Sunday Go to Meetin’ Time (1936), Tin Pan Alley Cats (1943) and Uncle Tom’s Bungalow (1937).

My sources say all the infamous Censored 11 cartoons will be screened. A complete list of all previously announced programming for the TCM Classic Film Festival is available here. Festival passes and additional information are available at www.tcm.com/festival.

Truth be told, I’d never heard of Al Jarnow prior to learning about this screening, but I’m curious to see more of his work now. He did a lot of work for educational programs like Sesame Street and 3-2-1 Contact, as well as his own work. From a press release about his work: “Al Jarnow captured life’s scientific minutia and boiled it down for easy consumption between cookie eating monsters and counting vampires. Coupling time-lapse, stop motion, and cel animation with simple objects found in every day life, Jarnow deconstructed the world for an entire generation.

This Friday, February 12, there will be two screenings of his work at 92Y Tribeca (200 Hudson Street) at 7pm and 9pm. Both screenings are the same (sixty minutes of his films and a thirty-minute documentary about his creative process). Jarnow will do a Q&A after the 7pm screening and introduce the 9pm screening. Tickets can be purchased at the 92Y website. Additional screenings of his work will take place in Chicago on February 19 and 20th at the Gene Siskel Film Center. They will begin at 8pm each evening.

If you can’t make the screenings, a dvd of his work, Celestial Navigations, is being released later this month with 45 of his films, the documentary about his work, and a 60-page booklet. It’s a reasonable $25 at the Numero Group website.

(Thanks, Heather Harkins and Greg Condon)

Tonight is my monthly cartoon screening at the CineFamily / Silent Movie Theatre so I’ll be spending my birthday doing exactly what I love to do: screening 35mm Technicolor film prints on the big screen to an appreciative audience. The theme of the evening is Valentine’s Day and we’re calling it Toonstruck: Cartoons In Love. To reserve tickets or more information, check the website or our new Cartoon Tuesday’s Facebook page.

The 37th Annual Annie Awards were given out tonight at Royce Hall on the UCLA Campus. The winners included:

Best Animated Feature
Up (Pixar Animation Studios)

Best Animated Television Production
Prep and Landing — (Walt Disney Animation Studios)

Best Home Entertainment Production
Futurama: Into the Wild Green Yonder

Best Animated Short Subject
Robot Chicken: Star Wars 2.5

Best Animated Television Production for Children
The Penguins of Madagascar (Nickelodeon and DreamWorks)

Character Animation in a Feature Production
Eric Goldberg for The Princess and the Frog

Character Design in a Feature Production
Shane Prigmore for Coraline

Directing in a Feature Production
Pete Docter “Up” — Pixar Animation Studios

Writing in a Television Production
Daniel Chun – The Simpsons: Treehouse of Horror XX

Writing in a Feature Production
Wes Anderson and Noah Baumbach – Fantastic Mr. Fox

Congratulations to all! Click here for complete list of winners.

All you need to know in 14 seconds…