Bravo, Amid.

Very interesting find! Frank Zappa’s view on music execs was very insightful, and explains why i don’t listen to listen to music anymore because of all these young, hip ‘Ryan Seacrest’ clones dictating what we can, and can’t hear. I also like the comparisons made with the animation industry. Which also explains why i don’t watch much animation anymore, and i like animation. This really makes me sad because I’m influenced by alot of the great legends of animation. With the current execs running the studios right now, when will we ever see the next Bob Clampett, Chuck Jones, or Tex Avery? After reading this article, i really have to give Schlesinger, Selzer, and Quimby some credit for giving these legends their chance to shine as artists. Heck, even Lou Scheimer of Filmation should get some credit for giving Bruce Timm, Paul Dini, and John Kricfalusi entry level jobs before they made it big.

There is truth here, certainly, but the obvious exceptions of Walt Disney’s active participation in every aspect of his productions and of John Lasseter and John Walker’s engagement in Pixar animations poke some holes in this argument. I think Frank is talking about the wannabe hipsters, the non-musician (and non-animator) with no grasp of real value or quality. “I’m hip and young so I know” is lame, but “Say, let’s make this better” is great.

Were the executives to leave you alone and you sucked then everyone would lose money. I can see leaving Chuck Jones and Ken Harris to their own devices, but if there was a really good story-focused executive it might be even better.

Great points, Josh. A firm directing hand by an enlightened despot isn’t always a bad thing. Conversely, creative freedom doesn’t guarantee success either. Most of us will agree that Ren and Stimpy was at its best during the first season at Nickelodeon. John K. got more creative latitude when the show was produced for Spike, but (I’m sorry to say) all that freedom didn’t make a more entertaining show.

Zappa is absolutely right that it’s bad business to try to second-guess an audience too much. Sometimes you just have to go out on a limb, prepared to try wacky concept B if goofy concept A falls flat. Of course, this is easier done when you’re cranking out hundreds of 6-minute shorts a year.

Frank was always right about everything.

The vast amount of people that need to be appeased throughout the process of making a cartoon series is staggering.
Perhaps in feature film things run differently, but with TV series production every single facet is scrutinzed by dozens of executives.
I can barely imagine the freedom of making a cartoon with fellow aritsts with little or no interference.
Damn, that musta been fun.

Frank Zappa is a total bad-ass (and my all-time favorite musician/composer) He’s actually made several contributions to the animation world too. He worked extensively with morphing-stop-motion madman Bruce Bickford. Mind-blowing.

As far as his music industry comment (with animation studio parallels), I’m gonna have to agree with Amid that artist driven studios aren’t really what he’s talking about here. He would often rant about his disastrous stint with major labels (Waner Bros. and others) and about lawsuits with them over ownership rights etc. He eventually ran his own record label. Which seems to be the only avenue to bypass the MBA-types that wanna get their grubby hands on the creative process.

Bottom line for those fools is the “bottom line”. They need safe bets. Thats why (at least in Hollywood and TV animation) we haven’t seen anything new. The biggest problem is that the public still shows up in throngs to buy it. Only proving the execs right.

Pardon my cynicism. I must say though, I’m very hopeful that indie produced work will soon gain traction (perhaps we’re due for a complete paradigm shift in the studio model?). We’ve seen more and more artist-produced work successfully released over the past few years. Here’s to more (clink). Now we just have to ween the public off of the shiny crap they’ve grown accustomed too. I think the best way to do that is to offer them options.

Here here!

Excellent article Amid!

I’ve seen it this way since I got blacklisted from some of the major animation houses after leaving a comment here. Just whoa.

ahhhhhhhh……….cigar chompin’ old guys………

i miss ‘em too, frank!

…or maybe classic cartoons have just gone the way of the Hollywood movie musical. How often do you see one of those that are any good? Just a relic of a bygone era that isn’t going to happen on such a wide scale ever again.

I’m in the gaming business and it’s the same all around. If a company is gonna spend millions and millions of dollars on a project, then they are gonna do what ever it takes to make sure that there is an audience for that product. In the Old days before tv and children’s programming, there was one audience at the movies. Now everything is focus tested to death and then the creative decisions are being made by marketing people, and not the production folks.
And in some extreme cases, the children of marketing people.
I felt the same this year about the Christmas Specials on network TV…rather than take a chance on playing some new, or original holiday shows, (Opus’ wish for wings that work, for example)the network ran the Grinch 3 times in primetime and Charlie Brown Christmas Ran Twice in the same week . Frosty ran twice as well. That’s 4 slots that could have been filled by something new or different. These shows are indeed classics but there should be room for others.

I find it ironic that the studios that have the deepest pockets are often the ones afraid to “throw it out there.” To take a risk.

These studios want guaranteed success — so they end up being risk averse — and that’s why they produce watered down crap.

Hell, even Walt Disney took chances and fell on his face on occasion. Today’s studios are run by wimps. All they really want is not losing their cushy jobs.

“The biggest problem is that the public still shows up in throngs to buy it. Only proving the execs right.”

This is because they aren’t being OFFERED anything else or anything different.. the public as a whole will buy into “almost” anything you put in front of them with the right marketing, and that is evident anytime you sit and watch the garbage they call cartoons on most of the channels with a few exceptions.

The fact that great executives that don’t interfere with the creative talent “don’t receive much praise in history books” is why we have the glut of fame seeking jackholes in the studios today. Fact of the matter: Katzenberg isn’t that talented, but he is famous. Damn straight he is!
And thats what producers want to be. Its sad.

It all gets boiled down to ego, I guess… and balls.

The moguls of the Golden Age didn’t care much about recognition and fame. They just wanted to make money. But nowadays everybody wants to be the next Walt Disney; and as Amid mentioned, he was the exception to the rule—an artist in his own right, AND an incredible businessman.

And with more players in the game, everybody wants to play it safe; they want people with graphs and formulas that show them what is hot and what’s not, and those people—the marketing ‘experts’—merely come up with regurgitated memes: they watch what’s trendy of the current youth culture and try to make sense of it, even though they don’t feel related to it. Hence they’re always 2 steps behind of everything; they don’t lead, they merely copy.

I would say John Lasseter is part of the problem, not some exception.

Lassater doesn’t take risks. Pixar sticks to a very tried and true formula. Wall-E took a risk within the first 30 minutes and then became the regular old shtick.

Also thanks Lassater for saturating our market with the new 3D Tinkerbell movies, the next Disney Princess money maker.

People trust him because he’s an animator, but I say bring back the cigar smoking suit who doesn’t know shit.

All the wimp studio runners absolutely fear losing their cushy jobs. That’s why all their energy goes into spinning.

Another thing was the producers of yore actually HAD EXPERIENCE IN ENTERTAINMENT ! Leon Schlesinger’s early career included being an usher as well as a stage actor. Famed Co-producer of the James Bond films Harry Saltzman joined a traveling circus when he was 17. Alot of today’s producers are former bean counters who know nothing of entertaining people.

There’s a bit of apples and oranges at work here. Keep in mind that the bulk of the work we admire from producers like Schlesinger, Quimby, et al, were produced during the era of the studio system, where block booking and studio ownership of theaters was the norm. Risks could be taken, because they knew they had an outlet for their product. The cartoons were also stand-alone. If one didn’t work (and many didn’t), there was a new one right behind it that might. That’s a much lower exposure risk than producing multiple episodes of a new series.

Zappa does make good points, but ignores the flip side - sometimes, those cigar-chomping execs released things that didn’t work, and I’m sure more than a few of them lost their jobs over it. It wasn’t all risk=reward.

Zappa is god.

Frank was correct…still applies to music, animation, etc. Luckily, I got to meet and speak with Frank on a few occasions (at clubs in NYC).

Walt Disney was one of the biggest risk takers in Hollywood history. Everybody, including his own staff, second guessed him on just about everything he did. It’s also a fact that his risk taking didn’t really pay off until he opened the parks in the 50’s. (that’s almost 15 years of little or no profits from films) It’s more of a testament to his brother Roy’s talents as a businessman than Walts. I doubt any young Hollywood producers today would mortgage their own house to get a film out.

Amid,

This post is solid GOLD!

Amir

The cigar-chompers are all running web services now, not studios. They make web sites like YouTube and say, “Well let’s just see what happens.” Then the artists are free to fill it up with their stuff.

Actually, Frank Zappa’s dream is here.

There’s no such thing as television animation anymore. I have not seen a single good animation on television in over 5 years. I don’t mean to offend anyone, but some of the best animations I find on the web are made people slapping things up on Newgrounds. Unbelievable natural talent that seems fearless.

I kind of think that Google is a giant cigar-chomper.

Great post Amid, and everyone’s comments are awesome on this subject. Really…if it’s Disney-perfect that today’s exec’s are trying to be, maybe they should learn to mortgage their own home just to keep their studio in business. If you care more for yourself than what you do then it really shows.

“, but some of the best animations I find on the web are made people slapping things up on Newgrounds.”

Lord in heaven, I hope you are joking. That website is the definition of amateur hour, even TV animation has a higher standard then that site.

Great post, Amid..

Paul N, I’m in total agreement with you on the “apples and oranges” argument.

As always with this type of discussion, it provides an ample opportunity for many people to talk themselves out of trying to make their own contributions. The conclusion is, “why bother?”

No matter how flawed the world of development is today (or tomorrow), sincere and talented creators will find a way to get their cartoons on the web, the TV, on cellphones, or what have you. That’s the lesson to take out of this discussion.

I could not agree more Amid. That was pretty much spot on.

So… why did cartoons suck in the past when unhip executives were in charge? You know, the way the quality of HB cartoons kept dropping in the ’60s and ’70s, when H and B were in charge, claiming they knew the cartoons weren’t what was good but were what made business sense?

You betcha! World class post, Amid!

Interesting post Amid and I certainly agree with Zappa. You didn’t mention Max Fleischer, but I think he should be added into this conversation. A former artist, cartoonist and animator, none the less I doubt that Max “got” some of the wild imagery or the popular music that were in his early sound cartoons. Not a single person I interviewed ever spoke about Max interfering with the creative process– granted that was Dave’s responsibility. Dave, though, seemed much more interested in adding gags to a sequence than worrying about the issues Zappa brought up.

Speaking from experience, it is near impossible to pitch something entertaining without being told “kids won’t watch that”, the truth is it’s executives who think that they’ll be sued if they show something funny that rocks the boat or lose their jobs if the thing is daring.

Old Hollywood must have been great, because all the moguls started the studios by flying by the seat of their pants. Walt was no exception to that, only he cared more about what he produced. I believe the future of animation lies with independent producers, after all Walt was an independent long before the studio gained ‘major’ status.

There is so much room for animation to grow, with different genres to explore like live action has done long ago.

May not be as simple as that. The major labels only got into rock’n'roll once the genre proved it could sell records; then they could sweep in and pick off a recording star like Elvis because Sun Records was still jobbing racks from Sam Phillips’ car, or even just buy national distribution to the master of a single regional hit. They weren’t taking a chance, they were widening a trail blazed by others.
The case of Columbia Records could fall to either side of the argument. In the late 50’s, they stayed strictly in Mom and Pop territory, evidenced by their very successful “Sing along With Mitch” albums. Mitch Miller happened to be Columbia’s Artists & Repertoire director, and made darn sure none of the rock’n'roll crap had a Columbia “eye” on it (perhaps to be fair, Rock was largely a “singles” genre, while Columbia was more heavily invested in LPs). John Hammond brought him Aretha Franklin, Mitch had her singing Broadway standards. Mitch allowed Hammond to sign Bob Dylan because folk music at the time was still safe, “singalong” traditional songs. Only after he retired from A&R was Columbia able to swoop into San Francisco and sign up almost everyone on the Haight scene. So was Mitch the cigar-chomper or the “expert” who knows too much?

Sidenote: The “Sing along with Mitch” TV show pilfered Max’ “follow the bouncing ball” gimmick. I had to mention before someone else did.

Rick Roberts:
“Lord in heaven, I hope you are joking. That website is the definition of amateur hour, even TV animation has a higher standard then that site.”

Yes, 99% of the stuff that’s there is terrible. But their rating and awards systems typically allow the best submissions to rise to the top, and so you also find some absolutely ASTOUNDING films there that you’ll be hard-pressed to find anywhere else. As an artist, your work if submitted there simply reaches more people than anywhere else, it’s as simple as that. It seems to me that Newgrounds needs to get a lot more respect than it has gotten, because it has meant more for indie animation this decade - in connecting artists with audiences - than just about anything else I can think of.

Where else, for example, can a brilliant mature animation about the suicide of a 19th century poet get over 200,000 views and nearly 1000 reviews? (See “Hanged Man’s Elegy”:)
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/303968

Not on Youtube (where it has 8000 views) or Atomfilms (20,000).

Where else can a dark, experimental animation such as Kol Belov’s “PUSTOTA” get nearly 120,000 views?
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/135621

Other great NG animations: “Mr. Coo”, “Nim’s Winter Tale”, “the YuYu”, “Angry Dog” - just mentioning a few of my favourites.

this is a really great post. Thanks much.

On a frank zappa side note, any chance to highlight some swell bruce bickford animation ala city of tiny lights?

The problem is that everyone wants to be an artist.
Nobody wants to just entertain.

Hopefully, a few of those Hippie execs will be checking this post out! A very cool find, thanks Amid and Seamus.

Mark McD: I’d say Goddard Lieberson (Columbia’s Exec VP from ‘50-56, then President until ‘67) was the “cigar-chomper.” Sure, he put Miller in charge of pop and folk, but he also had Hammond for jazz and Don Law for C&W, and they were both kicking artistic butt with their signings. Plus, let’s face it, Miller made tons of money for the label and when that dried up, he was gone. My grandparents were buying his “sing-along” albums in the sixties. Does anyone see any seniors in the local CD store these days? Of course not; the “hip” execs have thoroughly scrubbed that market share. Based on the number of “Sing Along” albums you see in the thrift stores, it wasn’t a meaningless demographic back in the day. “Hipness” made it meaningless. I’d better stop now before this gets TOO off-topic.

Rick Roberts:
“Lord in heaven, I hope you are joking. That website is the definition of amateur hour, even TV animation has a higher standard then that site.”

No, I am not joking. Newgrounds has been the high-water mark of animation on the web for years. iFilm and Atom films were utterly pretentious and I recall infuriating an executive at Atom films when I red-penciled his stupid contract on every single sentence of it. Newgrounds shows animations. Period. From anyone who wants to put one up. The talent spills out of the pile every day. It’s magnificent.

I don’t need to make friends anywhere so I’ll say Pixar is a crashing bore and not worth discussing. ‘Pasty’ is the word that springs to mind. And most animation studios specialize in making commercials. There’s your problem. The kids on the web though, they are a different story. They are telling their stories. They are animating with bravado.

I have seen animations done by 16 year old animators that tear the hair off the heads of many professional animators. These kids when they grow up and if they continue this work will make Pixar look like a flip book. This is a natural progression and a healthy one. I went to a film festival and listened to Bill Plympton give an auditorium full of animators the worst advice I’ve ever heard: ‘Keep it funny,’ he said. That is precisely what’s wrong with animation. It’s not the executives. It’s the overarching effort to keep it funny and catchy and popular.

The Russians figured this out long ago.

Mitch Miller was the guy who made Frank Sinatra record “Mama Will Bark”, because in the very early 1950’s Frank’s straight romantic ballads arranged by Axel Stordahl weren’t selling and novelty crap was hot. “Mama Will Bark” featured Frank crooning along with tone-deaf actress Dagmar and a guy barking like a rabid dog. The record proved a supreme embarrassment over the long haul and Sinatra didn’t speak to Miller for thirty years. Mitch Miller was a cigar chomper with a certain kind of experience, but it wasn’t a good fit for everyone. Cornball he did well.

Please note that Frank Zappa died in 1993, and since then, 16 years have passed. Since he doesn’t look nearly as bad as he did at the end, I expect that the video was made sometime in the early to middle ’80s.

Hence it doesn’t explain anything.

Ok someone had to speak on our behalf. Man, I can’t believe how bitter so many animators are. You have jobs that people would kill for - as do I - and all you do is complain. As an exec, my job is to champion YOUR project, represent it to the rest of the company in the best light possible and fight for YOU all day every day so you don’t have to.

Sure, there are crappy execs who give crappy notes, but there are also plenty of crappy writers and artists who make crappy shows. If you are talented and your show/movie is good, you won’t get as much exec interference. Fact.

This is an awesome post.

Allessandro, while I don’t 100% agree with you, I have to say that yours are the most refreshing comments posted all day.

I’d also like to say that I don’t believe cartoons today suck. “Mighty B” on Nick and “Chowder” on CN are absolutely killer. Remember that the bulk of these shows are aimed at kids and as kids’ entertainment they are top-notch.

On the adult side, “Robot Chicken,” “Venture Bros.” and “Superjail” continue to impress.

Yeah, the industry produces a lot of crap (that’s the case for a lot of things) but there’s plenty to like too.

Fact: All sentences beginning or ending with “fact” are facts.

Or not. Hip Exec is right, there are a lot of crappy artists and crappy execs. But Zappa is talking about execs that don’t take any risks anymore because they “know” what the audience wants.

“If you are talented and your show/movie is good, you won’t get as much exec interference. Fact.”

Hilarity.

Hip Exec, I worked with a fantastic guy who had exactly your position and unfortunately it was quite a thankless job. He was constantly fighting for ideas, trying to get as much ‘funny’ into the show as possible. On the fence trying to appease all sides and in the end, ended up with a lot of compromise.
This is exactly the problem…it shouldn’t need to be such a ‘fight’ to get wild,weird and wonderful ideas through the system because of a preconcieved idea of ‘what the audience will want’.
I also agree with JPDJ, there is still some great stuff squeezing through the system, just not as much as there could/should be.

If Zappa were alive today he’d be by passing the record labels entirely and offering his work directly to his audience. Now that we have the means of independent production and distribution why should we care about crappy execs?

Ah yes, good ol’ Frank.

Funnily enough, I just read in Harryhausen’s “Century of Stop Motion” book today that it was the exact same mentality that made “Son of Kong” a disaster of a film and an insult to the genius of Willis O’Brien who made the first film great. Schoedsack and Cooper left him alone to do his thing and he created a landmark in film animation effects….then they got more involved thinking they could create a follow-up sequel on their own, and the results were very different.

He talks about sex at the end and how does that relate to animation. If an animator today gets carpal tunnel his sex life is over!

You should post a link to the article “Why executives think that Frank Zappa sucks”.

fantastic!

That’s the difference between an entrepreneur and a manager.

The old guys all were willing to risk something, to try out something new and to give new talent a chance. Sure, they wanted to make money too. But that was only a PART of the game to them.

The new guys are mostly pencil pushers and hired mercenaries. They don’t care about WHAT they do as long as they get to the money - quick. Why give a damn about your company still existing in two years if you can make the quick buck now - even by ruining it all the way?

This reckless thinking has spread into almost any kind of business and the worst (or best?) thing about is that they JUST DON’T LEARN.

See how much dumb money is pumped into stupid movie remakes, mindless rip-offs and idiotic music bands that will be down the drain and completely forgotten in two years!
See how much money is invested in (faulty copy) protection - whereas the customers just won’t buy it (the video game SPORE is a good example). No learning curve there.

See on the other hand how really creative art (e.g. Sita Sings the Blues) is hindered and in the end ruined by a degenerated and perverted set of laws that allows the CONTENT industry to cash money decades after the death of an artist - whereas new talent must basically check every detail of their creativity by a lawyer - with lots of cash in the background to finance the legal aspect in the first place.

And it won’t get any better I’m afraid! (Obama having pro-DRM-Ogden and anti-consumer-Biden in his team is not a good sign).

Zappa was the man. Prostate cancer sucks. Amid, excellent correlation. Thank you.

I’ve said this on another forum, and i’ll say it again. If any ‘young. hip’ executive should ever get involved in animation, he, or she should be required to take animation, or film classes. Not so they can become animators, or film makers per say, but to understand the process more, and how animation is more than just a ‘kids’ medium. As well as how to think outside the ‘demographic’ box, and how it’s better to leave some artists alone. Maybe then these ‘young, hip’ execs could get on John K’s ‘good side’.

Garret and Michael are more detailed than I was about the Mitch Miller scenario (yes, I love dragging threads off-topic, but I also wanted to post something in harmony with other posters instead of perpetuating flame wars).
Just to offer an example more in accord with the thesis of this thread, I once worked a temp job with Calvin Carter, Jr., whose father had been A&R head for Chicago’s VeeJay Records. They never had a distinct “sound” like Motown or Chess did, because Cal Sr.’s policy was to let just about anybody come in and make a record, and see what sticks (like the Impressions) and what stinks (Jimmy Cross, “I Want My Baby Back” — just Google it). Having had some success in expanding VeeJay’s geographic reach to sign the Four Seasons, Cal went to England to try and secure American rights to the UK’s yodelling hitmaker Frank Ifield. EMI Records told him they’d let VeeJay release Ifield’s records, but only if they also take on another act that the suits at Capitol (EMI’s US subsidiary) had passed on. Four guys from Liverpool named after an insect.
And now you know … the rest of the story!

‘No, I am not joking. Newgrounds has been the high-water mark of animation on the web for years.’

Speaking of which, I’ve made some animated cartoons that i posted on Newgrounds, as well as on Youtube.

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/151830

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/284719

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/403213

Also, ZAR makes a very good point about how the current people in charge of these entertainment companies only care about money, and nothing more. These schmucks couldn’t give a crap about the reputation, of quality of their company, or their products just as long as they get quick cash. People like that should not be running the entertainment business, they should be flipping burgers instead!

I’ve been out of TV animation for 20 years, so I expect I’m out of the loop. If Hip Exec can’t greenlight a show, why would I pitch to him? Who is it you’re fighting? Maybe you need me to pin his arms back for you.

You make it sound as though your job function is to take the blame for someone important if a show flops. Wouldn’t you rather get fired for being uppity?

“If you are talented and your show/movie is good, you won’t get as much exec interference. Fact.”

In my experience, if execs smell a success, they’ll swarm all over it trying to inject their own ‘creative’ DNA into it.

Hip Exec said:
‘You have jobs that people would kill for - as do I - and all you do is complain.’

Well, I don’t know but I love complainers. I try to hang out with complainers as much as possible. When they get on a good bitch roll I’m happiest. I like a good fight with a nasty complainer. Because most of would actually kill for their jobs.

What I have little time for is a ‘champion,’ champ.

Zappa missed a certain type of old fellow who simply knew his business and didn’t run around championing people, I guess. But of course let’s remember that some of these guys, like Dylan for example, lied cheated and manipulated these businessmen into doing what they wanted them to do. Dylan told stories that were completely fabricated in order to get his business done. That’s what good artists do. But I think the secret is that, all along, the business guys knew Dylan was lying and liked him the better for it. Artists complain and lie and cheat and sneak and fight until they get what they want. I would expect nothing less.

Sean wrote:

I would say John Lasseter is part of the problem, not some exception.

People trust him because he’s an animator, but I say bring back the cigar smoking suit who doesn’t know shit.

If we’re going to have a “cigar smoking suit who doesn’t know shit,” then it’d better not be Michael Eisner. Disney became a hopeless sinking ship, mostly because of him, and Pixar was the studio’s only hope.

I personally respect Lasseter, because he may not “take risks” in a big way, like some people would expect from him, but he knows what he wants.

I know some people can’t get over the AMERICAN DOG/BOLT fiasco, but you have to keep it in perspective. If you want to do something personal that you want to express to the world, and you’re doing it at Disney/Pixar, play it cool and LISTEN TO JOHN LASSETER. The guy knows what he’s talking about, especially as both an animator and storyteller. He didn’t come all this way overnight. If Lasseter fires a major player like Chris Sanders, then it was not an easy decision, and he hated to do it. He was under a lot of pressure as it was. And as far as I know, Brad Bird is not complaining about the major changes Lasseter made to THE INCREDIBLES (like changing the main villain from the intended Xerek to Syndrome, originally a minor character). If you want to do something you want to express, to the point of self-indulgence (nothing personal), don’t bother working at Disney/Pixar. Just move to some other company you feel understands you better, or at best, be independent and do it yourself (like Teddy Newton and Bert Klein did for BOYS NIGHT OUT)!

With Disney Animation, I can understand why Lasseter was tightening up. Disney’s first 3D film without Pixar (for a while), CHICKEN LITTLE, was a total failure. The designs were cute and the animation impressive, but the story was a smashing bore. Mom’s reaction to the film (in the climactic 30 minutes) was better than the film itself! If *that* was how Disney was going to do 3D films without Pixar’s assistance, then I’m glad Lasseter stepped in.

But the good thing is that Sanders survived the ordeal, and moved over to DreamWorks, which has surprisingly improved (thanks to KUNG FU PANDA and the upcoming MONSTERS VS. ALIENS), so I think he’ll do fine. I don’t know how, but magic is beginning to blossom over there. Perhaps Jeffrey Katzenberg is wising up?

There are some decent animation execs out there today, like Fred Seibert and Jean MacCurdy, and Tad Stones has said that Gary Kristel (head of Disney TV) left him alone pretty much when they made Darkwing Duck. And one “creative exec” who actually is creative is Greg Weisman, who was a development exec on shows like Darkwing, and when on to prove himself a great storyteller with Gargoyles.

I agree with Ted: nearly all of the American animated TV shows from the ’70s (and to a slightly lesser extent, the ’80s) were worlds worse than most shows produced this past decade (pardon me, but I’d frankly rather be raped in my behind than watch Josie and the Pussycats) , and those were generally produced by “cigar-chompers” and animators.

But I do agree that ideally execs should not meddle in areas thay know little about.

Thank you so much for posting that.

I agree, Bravo!

I have nothing to add.

But the general sentiments being expressed here are ones I’ve felt for a long time.

The current way of trying to create with a bunch of executives butting in just isn’t conducive to doing great work.

Business people understand the money end but that’s about it - with a few exceptions. If the suits stuck to what they do well and let the creative people do what they do well everything would be better all around.

But the suits don’t trust the creatives and vice-versa.
So there isn’t much mutual respect.

Amen!

…THANK YOU.

Alessandro Cima, I think I love you.

Ted says: <So… why did cartoons suck in the past when unhip executives were in charge? You know, the way the quality of HB cartoons kept dropping in the ’60s and ’70s, when H and B were in charge, claiming they knew the cartoons weren’t what was good but were what made business sense?>

Well, there is a contradiction going on here in this thought; remember, while Hanna-Barbera got to where they got due to cluelessness, they soon imposed *THEIR* cluelessness on their animators, like the smarmy hip execs who “know” what’s happenin’! Hanna-Barbera’s cartoon output was not the fault of clueless executives; it was the fault of the “hip” execs who claim that “if they liked it once, they’ll love it twice!” I have to say that it is nice that Hanna-Barbera had the clout that they had. Imagine if some of the more truly creative forces had that kind of control.

Today, more than ever before, an up-and-coming artist has to be a business person, and that’s not always easy since the climate of popular media acceptance in this country changes almost monthly! Even public opinion cannot be counted on. Most people that I encounter are far too complacent, too content with what is out there, like the “hip exec”, who tells us all to stop complaining! How can you, as a thinking, feeling person, even concerned about your kids, tell us to stop complaining? Look at the stuff that now passes as “quality”.

There is enough room on that very large cable dial for channels devoted to just about every small notion in the minds of us all, but the unfortunate thing is that we all have to be incredibly business savvy, a term that, in and of itself, is vague, because just what *IS* savvy today?

To an extent, I, like Frank Zappa, sometimes think of the viewing and listening public as vacant channels that will accept anything that it is fed. They’ve got their own miserable lives, as do I, and they can’t be bothered having to really search for the good stuff, but it is getting less and less easy to find on major channels, unfortunately, due to reasons already discussed here. So it takes the truly “hip” (not to be confused with “hippie”) business person who can really convince those who are equal parts clueless and snotty about it at the top of the major companies that what they’re doing will effect major populations at all, and there are few artists, as someone pointed out with the comments doled out by Bill Plimpton) who are willing to do it all. Many otherwise talented people sooner or later rely on the bigger company to determine what works and they fall into the regime just to keep food on their tables. It isn’t right, but I kind of understand why they do it.

The most unfortunate thing is that eclectic just isn’t the mass norm today. I’d love to imagine, once in a while, a world where anything really *CAN* happen, as our President-elect likes to say, but I unfortunately know the reality. I guess that my living with a disability that had hampered any real creativity had alerted me to how much decision-makers really want to hear what the individual has to say. It is that mental block that we should be discussing here.

But thanks, Amid, for posting that incredibly insightful talk by Frank Zappa, someone I’ve admired for years, even though he just might just consider me an “over-educated shithead”.

The whole “hip executive” is just a good example of micro management gone wrong. From reading the posts, I think today’s executives are so bent on perfect success that they can’t trust creative individuals and can’t take chance with innovations. No matter how smart and how well-educated the person is, he or she still can’t predict the future. Sometimes, failure is a part of the life and they have to accept it.

The blame doesn’t stop at executives alone. Artists themselves have to work hard to make something meaningful and has to take responsibility for possible failures. Artists can’t be like irresponsible child who takes his/her experimentation for granted and wind up with a mediocre result or product.

Again it’s all about the trust. The Golden Age WB animations were successful because trust between artists and executives kept the golden age animations to be good to this day. I think the executives understood the shortcomings of running creative business and found satisfaction in taking risks from someone he can trust.

I liked the points you made in your article. You were right on the money too! All too often studio heads THINK they know what kids want to see, or try & follow the latest craze. This, of course, causes the shows to become bland & kids quickly grow bored w/them (for all their “savvy,” they don’t always research the market well). An example of this would be the Pokemon craze. Since ‘97, everyone has tried to come up w/a show that mimics/borrows heavily from Poke’mon or similar card-inspired series. This has gone on for so long (over 11 years now) that it has tapped the creativity well dry. This is commercialism at it’s worst.

While similar things did occur in the 80’s (mostly centered in Japan) w/ Go bots, Transformers etc. That craze only really lasted from about ‘84-89/90 (it would continue-here & there w/various incarnations of Transformers, but wasn’t as strong, and most robot-geared toons had died in the U.S.).Cartoon studios (of course,also having ties to toy companies) realized quickly, that kids would begin to move into other phases & enjoy different shows.

One of the biggest things that has influenced the direction of animation (and children’s shows in general..having especially to do with the scripting/stories/plot of the show), is the pressure put upon the industry by congress & the politically correct watchdog groups that made it their mission to scrutinize & patrol the idiot box. Many of these groups exaggerated the amount of violence that was actually in your average cartoon. One of these “crusaders,” was Dr. Thomas Radecki of National Coalition for Television Violence (NCTV). Radecki would often drag out his soapbox, but forgot to nail it tightly. More than once did he fall from that rickety perch. On one occasion, back in ‘83 I believe, He called Masters of the Universe “a murderous Cartoon” where “a barbarian roamed around killing his enemies.” He later admitted that he had never actually seen a single episode of the show. Radecki was not the only one either. Several people/organizations (though most of them not quite as ridiculous as Radecki) made similar statements. This was important, of course, because these groups appealed directly to congress, who pressured both TV networks & studios to “tighten up” Children’s programming. In reality, many of these groups wanted nothing but educational programming. This was also evident, when laws like “The Children’s television act of 1990,” was established. This law was meant to A) not only get more “educational” programming on the air during prime times when children would see it, but also B) restrict “fantasy” and “alien based” cartoons that children enjoyed. This was basically the nail in the coffin for cartoons. Around ‘91 or so, you started to see a ton of eco-friendly/morality cartoons on the air. By the mid 90’s they were nearly sanitized of anything resembling fun._the ose

John Panazzi: “I agree with Ted: nearly all of the American animated TV shows from the ’70s (and to a slightly lesser extent, the ’80s) were worlds worse than most shows produced this past decade (pardon me, but I’d frankly rather be raped in my behind than watch Josie and the Pussycats) , and those were generally produced by “cigar-chompers” and animators.”

I disagree here. While their has been somewhat of a return to action/adventure in cartoons, most of them are still so P.C. that they lack any excitement. Some of the animation is good, but much of it is a cheap knock-off of anime (especially the “cutsie” style…think the characters on Poke’mon or the characters on the old “Unico” movie) rather than the more detailed anime that combined with or inspired American animation in the 80’s. Before the early-mid 80’s, there had not been much detail in animated Children’s programming since the mid 50’s. In fact, the old Fleisher “Superman” cartoons (of the 30’s) looked more modern than the Hanna Barbera-inspired limited animation that dominated from the late 50’s-early 80’s. I know that sending animation overseas also left some studios w/a bad taste in their mouths, but those that combined anime’s attention to detail (especially w/machines & background) and AMerican animations attention to character facial/body expression (through Disney, old Fleisher toons, Don Bluth & even American comic books) turned out great shows. Even having toy tie-ins didn’t hurt animation (there’s the whole debate over whether it was “good” for children..but that’s a different story) because the toy industry was willing to put anything out there to see if it would sale (w/some input from little Johnny of course). Animation studios (influenced by the toy companies that waved the greenbacks in front of them) were willing to animate them. Like the old cigar chomper, they were willing to put these shows out there to see if they would make money. The fact that these shows are still popular among younger people today (even with the watchdog groups having seriously limited the amount of violence/conflict that can be in them) is a testament to that. The stories themselves were new, unique and at times could be complex.

Mark: “Speaking from experience, it is near impossible to pitch something entertaining without being told “kids won’t watch that”, the truth is it’s executives who think that they’ll be sued if they show something funny that rocks the boat or lose their jobs if the thing is daring.”

True. Once again, the almighty dollar trumps common sense (when it comes to animation execs). Of course, as I pointed out earlier, political correctness has burrowed in to animation as well. Disney is supposed to be releasing the old Pecos Bill cartoons..but, they are going to edit out the cigar that Bill smokes, because it might be a “bad influence” on children. If they are willing to go back and edit a 50-something year old cartoon, then I have no doubt that they (and other studios) will severely neuter future projects before they even leave the page.

Some of the most innovative animation came out under these execs, but it’s interesting that Chuck Jones wasn’t too kind to either Schlesinger, Quimby or Selzer in his Autobiography.

“Many of the producers of animated cartoons were just as ignorant, foolish, and dangerous as their counterparts in the feature division. From Freed Quimby at MGM, who adminished Tex Avery in the midst of the war to be circumspectin his caricature of Adolf Hitler in the Blitz Wolf (”After all Tex, we don’t know who’s going to win the war”)…”

…”Leon’s sole method of determining the quality of a cartoon was how far it came under budget”

It’s a lot easier to be risky selling 7-minute shorts than 90 minute features that will cost $100M+ to make and $20M+ to market and distribute. When you’re dealing with that much of other people’s money leaving it to the creatives alone isn’t enough. If you want to make features, you have to get with the inevitability that it’s a marriage between the aesthetic, technical and economic. If you want to make innovative animations, it’s shorts and the lo-fi Bill Plympton pics with limited distribution.

Just like in the Golden age, the best animation to watch now is probably less than 7 minutes.

would Schlesinger have let his creatives run amuck if they were making a feature?

According to Tedd Pierce (who wrote many of the golden age warners shorts), “Schlesinger’s initial response on seeing Snow White was delivered with his usual amazing grace: ‘I need a feature cartoon like i need two assholes.’”

was he really more enlightened than the folks we have now?