Two names that helped shape early 1960s TV animation - Al Brodax and Fred Ladd - will both be making live appearences in the Los Angeles area in late August.
August is shaping up to be a feast for fans of classic cartoon kitsch...
In case we didn't mention it before, it's Donald Duck's 70th Anniversary this year.
The short-tempered duck will be honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame next year. He is not, as this article says, the first cartoon character to have a star in cement on Hollywood Blvd., I know at least Bugs Bunny and Mickey Mouse already beat him to it.
Donald will also appear on a set of Disney character first class U.S. postage stamps this summer.
If you act fast, and have $2,295. dollars, you can own the uber-rare, uber-cool one sheet poster for SCRAPPY'S PUPPET THEATRE. It's on ebay today.
Warner Bros. KRYPTO THE SUPERDOG and THE BATMAN (a new animated series not by Dini & Timm) look very good - but I noticed that they were offering SUPERBABY licensing. Scary!
This is sad.
From the studio that brought you THE IRON GIANT... YU-GI-OH The Movie.
At the Lion King reunion on Monday night in Glendale, Steve Worth gave a great introductory speech about traditional animation and Asifa-Hollywood's plans for its animation archive. Steve printed the text on the Animation Archive Project blog here.
While everybody was in Anncey last week, French filmmaker Philippe Capart was in Los Angeles and handed me a copy of his new documentary, "BELVISION: The Goldmine At The Bottom Of The Corridor" (that's the english translation).
Even though it was in French (no subtitles) I could tell this is a superb work, documenting the history of a pioneering Belgium studio that first animated Tintin, Asterix, Lucky Luke, not to mention Bozo The Clown, The Smurfs, the feature Pinocchio In Outer Space and even a pilot for The Flintstones (if my video card wasn't broken I'd display some grabs from the clips in the documentary - man, the French "Flintstones" look cool - I'll try to update this post with an image when I can).
There are interviews with key surviving personnel, as well as Fred Ladd, Norm Prescott and Larry Harmon. But the highlights are the vintage behind the scenes film clips (apparently Belvison shot behind-the-scenes footage for most of their productions) and scenes from classic French animated TV films and commercials... stuff we American rarely see.
I remember seeing their limited Tintin animations on (U.S.) TV in the early 1960s - it got me interested in the character, whose exploits were being serialized in CHILDREN'S DIGEST (anyone remember that publication?).
I don't know where anyone could see this documentary, but I assume Philippe will be submitting it to animation festivals. I understand it ran on Belgium television a few months ago. Hopefully someone will translate it and air it in the U.S. someday. It's a fascinating chapter in animation history and I highly recommend this film.
Saturday, the last day of Annecy, was a time to kick back and relax. Everybody recognized the festival was coming to an end and it seems a good percentage of festivalgoers decided to take it easy in anticipation of the awards ceremony and party on Saturday evening. In the afternoon, there was a wonderful picnic/peddleboat race by Lake Annecy. The hosts were the incomparable Nik and Nancy Phelps and an eclectic group of forty or so folks made it to the gathering. I'm sorry to report that the boat I was in arrived last in the race, despite the star peddling power of Bill Plympton and Ottawa festival director Kelly Neall. It probably didn't help that we veered off course by over a mile. After the picnic, it was time for the Annecy awards ceremony. Assuming that it would be your typically overlong and tedious awards presentation, I wasn't exactly looking forward to attending the event. Imagine my surprise when it turned out to be a beautifully orchestrated, briskly-paced Japanese-themed awards ceremony. After accepting their awards, the winners remained on-stage, sitting on Japanese-style benches and drinking tea, a fanciful touch that worked perfectly. The top two prizes went to Chris Landreth's RYAN (Special Jury Award) and Mike Gabriel's LORENZO (Grand Prix Annecy Cristal), both well deserving of their accolades. (And Mike gets bonus points for telling me he's a regular Cartoon Brew reader.) The closing night party followed afterwards for a superb ending to an incredible week in France.
Here's to all the awesome people I saw in Annecy last week: Barry O'Donoghue, David Verral, Patrick Smith, Rita Street, Georges Schwizgebel, Lance Taylor, Peter Lord, Kelly Neall, Biljana Labovic, Harald Siepermann, Joseph Gilland, Aron Steinke, Greg Araya & Julie (congrats you two!), Chansoo Kim, Don Duga, Adam Yaniv, Rajesh Chakraborty, Kevin Lofton, Jimmy Murakami, Dan Sarto, Heather Kenyon, Bob and Cima Balser, Giannalberto Bendazzi, Mike Barrier, Will Ryan, David Calvo, Marysia Nowaczynski, Ed Hooks, Signe Baumane, Jennifer Aujame, Celia Bullwinkel, Didier Pasamonik, Tony Tulipano, Jim Campbell, Fernando Pazos, Maryam Fahimi, Mike Gabriel, Raul Garcia, Robert Kohr, Bill Plympton, Felix Gonnert, Claudia Romero, Reglan Brewer, Evelien Hoedekie, Hisko Hulsing, Dick Roberts, Gene and Zdenka Deitch, Nik and Nancy Phelps, Tomm Moore, Paul Young, Emad Hajjaj, JJ Villard, Wouter Sel, Meren Imchen, Jamie Badminton, Jo Jurgens, Andrew Park, Peter de Seve and many many others. See you in Annecy next year!
Tomorrow afternoon, Wednesday June 16th, at 4pm Eastern or 1pm Pacific Jerry Beck will be a guest on QR77 Afternoons with Dave Taylor on CHQR AM 77 in Calgary. We are going to spend a whole hour discussing classic cartoons and taking your phone calls. You can listen live on the web at the QR77 website. So if you have the time, listen in tomorrow for full hour of cartoon chat!
Brew correspondent Tom Giatras sent me this link from Carlton Cards showing off their 2004 Xmas ornament cartoon collection (yes, already). They have some good new ones featuring Dexter's Lab, Gumby, Rankin-Bass' Rudolf & Frosty, The Simpsons and Mr. Bill. But for me, the big news is this nice one based on UPA's Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol! With Gerald McBoing Boing on his shoulder (as Tiny Tim)! Pretty cool.
Perhaps Carlton will dig deeper into the UPA line and next year produce Joe Jitsu and Go-Go Gomez Christmas cards, Christopher Crumpet and Pete Hothead wrapping paper, and a Tell-Tale Heart snow globe.
Poore Bros. has announced today that their saltly snack chips, that had packaging tied into the Looney Tunes brand, has officially failed. They are discontuing the brand as of September 30th. The press release is here.
Where've I been? The Missus and me took an anniversary trip (it's been one year since we got married!) up the coast to Hearst Castle.
So I've been off the internet for three days, out of touch with the real world, and having a a great time exploring the towns along the US 101. And I found a few cartoon items in the Antique stores along the way... blogging to continue shortly.
Here's an interesting poster I ran across in Annecy. It says "The Lion King is Coming to Disneyland." And, of course, what better way to promote THE LION KING than to have Captain Hook hanging off of a building? I'm still scratching my head over this one.