Warner Bros. Cartoons
Encyclopedia
Warner Bros. Cartoons, Inc. was the in-house division of Warner Bros. Pictures
during the Golden Age of American animation. One of the most successful animation
studios in American
media history, Warner Bros. Cartoons was primarily responsible for the Looney Tunes
and Merrie Melodies
theatrical cartoon short subjects. The characters featured in these cartoons, including Bugs Bunny
, Daffy Duck
, Porky Pig
, Speedy Gonzales
, Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner
, are among the most famous and recognizable characters in the world. Many of the creative staff members at the studio, including directors and animators such as Chuck Jones
, Friz Freleng
, Robert McKimson
, Tex Avery
, Robert Clampett, and Frank Tashlin
, are considered major figures in the art and history of traditional animation
.
The Warner animation division was founded in 1933 as Leon Schlesinger
Productions, an independent company which produced the popular Looney Tunes
and Merrie Melodies
animated short subject
s for release by Warner Bros. Pictures
. In 1944, Schlesinger sold the studio to Warner Bros., who continued to operate it as Warner Bros. Cartoons, Inc. until 1963. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies were briefly subcontracted to Freleng's DePatie-Freleng Enterprises
studio from 1964 until 1967. The Warner Bros. Cartoons studio briefly re-opened in 1967 before shutting its doors for good two years later.
A successor company, Warner Bros. Animation
, was established in 1980. That company continues to produce Looney Tunes related works, in addition to television shows and feature films centering around other properties. The classic Warner Bros. animation studio is sometimes referred to as "Termite Terrace", a name given to the temporary headquarters Tex Avery and his animators were assigned to during Avery's first year as a Looney Tunes director.
and Merrie Melodies
series of animated short subjects in 1930 and 1931, respectively. Both cartoon series were produced for Leon Schlesinger at the Harman-Ising Studio on Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California, with Warner Bros. Pictures releasing the films to theaters. The first Looney Tunes character was the Harman-Ising creation Bosko, The Talk-ink Kid
. Despite the fact that Bosko was popular among theater audiences, he could never match the popularity of Walt Disney
's Mickey Mouse
, or even Max Fleischer
's Betty Boop
. In 1933, Harman and Ising parted company with Schlesinger over financial disputes, and took Bosko with them to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
. As a result, Schlesinger set up his own studio on the Warner Bros. lot on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood.
into the Looney Tunes. Disney animator Tom Palmer
was the studio's first senior director, but after the three cartoons he made were deemed to be of unacceptable quality and rejected by the studio, former Harman-Ising animator Isadore "Friz" Freleng
was called in to replace Palmer and rework his cartoons. The studio then formed the three-unit structure that it would retain throughout most of its history, with one of the units headed by Ben "Bugs" Hardaway
, and the other by Earl Duvall
, who was replaced by Jack King
a year later.
In 1935, Freleng helmed the Merrie Melodies cartoon I Haven't Got a Hat
, which introduced the character Porky Pig
. Hardaway and King departed, and a new arrival at Schlesinger's, Fred "Tex" Avery
, took Freleng's creation and ran with it. Avery directing a string of cartoons starring Porky Pig which established the character as the studio's first bonafide star. Schlesinger also gradually moved the Merrie Melodies cartoons from black and white, to two-strip Technicolor
in 1934, and finally to full three-strip Technicolor in 1936. The Looney Tunes would be produced in black-and-white for much longer, until 1943.
Because of the limited spacing conditions in the Schlesinger building at 1351 N. Van Ness on the Warner Sunset lot, Avery and his unit - including animators Robert Clampett and Chuck Jones
- were moved into a small building elsewhere on the Sunset lot, which Avery and his team affectionately dubbed "Termite Terrace" Although the Avery unit moved out of the building after a year, "Termite Terrace" later became a metonym
for the classic Warner Bros.
animation department in general, even for years after the building was abandoned, condemned, and torn down. During this period, four cartoons were outsourced to the Ub Iwerks
studio; however, Iwerks struggled to adapt his style to the type of humor that the Looney Tunes had developed by this time, and so Clampett took over as director (using Iwerks' staff) for the last two of these outsourced cartoons. Schlesinger was so impressed by Clampett's work on these shorts that he opened a fourth unit for Clampett to head, although for tax reasons this was technically a separate studio headed by Schlesinger's brother-in-law, Ray Katz.
From 1936 until 1944, animation directors
and animators such as Freleng, Avery, Clampett, Jones, Arthur Davis, Robert McKimson
, and Frank Tashlin
worked at the studio. During this period, these creators introduced several of the most popular cartoon characters to date, including Daffy Duck
(1937, Porky's Duck Hunt
by Avery), Elmer Fudd
(1940, Elmer's Candid Camera
by Jones), Bugs Bunny
(1940, A Wild Hare
by Avery), and Tweety Bird (1942, A Tale of Two Kitties
by Clampett). Avery left the studio in 1941 following a series of disputes with Schlesinger, who shortly after closed the studio for two weeks due to a minor strike similar to the more known one that occurred at Disney, this time Schlesinger lost nearly all of his employees of the Avery unit. By 1942, the Schlesinger studio had surpassed Walt Disney Productions as the most successful producer of animated shorts in the United States.
Among the Warner Bros. cartoon stars who were created after Schlesinger's departure include Yosemite Sam
(1945, Hare Trigger
by Freleng), Sylvester
(1945, Life with Feathers
by Freleng), Foghorn Leghorn (1946, Walky Talky Hawky
by McKimson), Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner
(1949, Fast and Furry-ous
by Jones), and Speedy Gonzales
(1953, Cat-Tails for Two
by McKimson). In later years, even more minor Looney Tunes characters such as Freleng's Rocky and Mugsy
, Jones' Marvin the Martian
and McKimson's Tasmanian Devil
have become significantly popular.
After the verdict of the United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc.
anti-trust case ended the practice of "block booking
", Warner Bros. could no longer force theaters into buying their features and shorts together as packages; shorts had to be sold separately. Theater owners were only willing to pay so much for cartoon shorts, and as a result by the late-1950s the budgets at Warner Bros. Cartoons became tighter. Selzer forced a stringent five-week production schedule on each cartoon (at least one director, Chuck Jones, cheated the system by spending more time on special cartoons such as What's Opera Doc, less time on simpler productions such as Road Runner entries, and had his crew forge their time cards). With less money for full animation, the Warner Bros. story men — Michael Maltese
, Tedd Pierce
, and Warren Foster
— began to focus more of their cartoons on dialogue. While story artists were assigned to directors at random during the 1930s and 1940s, by the 1950s each story man worked almost exclusively with one director: Maltese with Jones, Foster with Freleng, and Pierce with McKimson.
With the advent of the 3-D film
craze in 1953, Warner Bros. shut its cartoon studio down in June of that year, fearing that 3-D cartoon production would be too expensive (only one Warner Bros. cartoon was ever produced in 3-D, Jones' Lumber Jack-Rabbit
starring Bugs Bunny). The creative staff dispersed (Jones, for example, went to work at Disney on Sleeping Beauty
, Maltese went to Walter Lantz Productions, and Freleng went into commercial work). Warner Bros. Cartoons re-opened five months after its close, following the end of the 3-D craze. In 1955, the staff moved into a brand new facility on the main Warner Bros. lot in Burbank. KTLA
television took over the old studio location on Van Ness where the old Warner Sunset Studios is now called Sunset Bronson Studios.
By 1957, Selzer had retired, and veteran Warner Cartoons production manager John Burton
took his place. Warner Bros. also lost its trio of staff storymen at this time. Foster and Maltese found work at Hanna-Barbera Productions, while Pierce worked on a freelance basis with writing partner Bill Danch. John Dunn
and Dave Detiege, both former Disney men, were hired to replace them.
During Burton's tenure, Warner Bros. Cartoons branched out into television. The Bugs Bunny Show
was a package program featuring three theatrical Warner Bros. cartoons, with newly produced wraparounds to introduce each short. The program remained on the air under various names and on all three major networks for three decades, finally ending its long broadcast run on ABC
in 2000. All versions of The Bugs Bunny Show included edited versions of Warner Bros. cartoons released after July 31, 1948, as all of the Technicolor cartoons released before that date were sold to Associated Artists Productions
in 1956.
David H. DePatie became the last executive in charge of the original Warner Bros. cartoons studio in 1961. The same year, Chuck Jones moonlighted to write the script for a UPA
-produced feature titled Gay Purr-ee
. When that film was picked up by Warner Bros. for distribution in 1962, the studio learned that Jones had violated his exclusive contract with Warners and he was terminated. Animator Phil Monroe supervised the completion of The Iceman Ducketh
, the last cartoon Jones had been working on; the remainder of the Jones unit was laid off after its completion. Most of Jones' former unit subsequently re-joined him at Sib Tower 12 Productions
to work on a new series of Tom and Jerry
cartoons for MGM. Freleng left the studio in November 1962, four months after Jones' termination, to serve as story director for the feature Hey There, It's Yogi Bear!
at Hanna-Barbera; his layout artist Hawley Pratt
directed the Freleng unit's final cartoon, Señorella and the Glass Huarache
.
In mid-1962, at the height of television popularity and decline in moviegoing, DePatie was sent to a board meeting in New York, and he was informed that the cartoon studio was going to be shut down. DePatie completed the task by spring 1963. The final cartoon to be completed was the Bugs Bunny cartoon False Hare
, directed by Robert McKimson, while Señorella and the Glass Huarache was the final cartoon to be released in 1964. The final project at the studio before it closed for good was the animated sequences, directed by McKimson, for the 1964 Warner Bros. feature The Incredible Mr. Limpet
. With the studio closed, Hal Seeger Productions
in New York had to be contracted to produce the opening and closing credits for The Porky Pig Show
, which debuted on ABC
in 1964. This marked one of the first times that the Looney Tunes characters were animated outside of the Los Angeles area.
in 1963, and leased the old Warner Bros. Cartoons studio as their headquarters. In 1964, Warners contracted DePatie-Freleng to produce more Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies, an arrangement which lasted until 1967. The vast majority of these paired off Daffy Duck against Speedy Gonzales, and after a few initial cartoons directed by Freleng, Robert McKimson was hired to direct most of the remaining DePatie-Freleng Looney Tunes.
In addition to DePatie-Freleng's cartoons, a series of new shorts featuring The Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote was commissioned from an independent animation studio, Herbert Klynn
's Format Films
. Veteran Warner animator Rudy Larriva
, who had worked for years under Road Runner creator Chuck Jones, assumed directorial duties for these films, but even with the Jones connection Larriva's Road Runner shorts are considered to be mediocre by critics. McKimson also directed an additional two Road Runner shorts with the main DePatie-Freleng team, which are slightly better regarded than Larriva's efforts.
After three years of outsourced cartoons, Warner Bros. decided to bring production back in-house. DePatie-Freleng had their contract terminated (they subsequently moved to new studios in the San Fernando Valley
), and Format Films were commissioned to produce three "buffer" cartoons with Daffy and Speedy (again, directed by Rudy Larriva) to fill the gap until Warner Bros.'s own studio was up and running again.
and Hanna-Barbera animator Alex Lovy
was appointed director at the new studio. He brought his longtime collaborator, Laverne Harding
to be the new studio's chief animator, and brought in Disney animator Volus Jones and Ed Solomon who also started at Disney as an assistant, which contributed to make cartoons from this era of the studio stylistically quite different from the studio's "Golden Age" (aside from the budget limitations, possibly to mirror the later introductory title cards that preceded the featurettes as well, which also could've been the source of inspiration for the transition of direction in the animation styles, and vice versa), down to being Hanna-Barbera knock-offs (though for good measure, Lovy also brought in animator Ted Bonnicksen and layout artist Bob Givens, both veterans of the original studio). Shortly after the studio opened, Warner Bros. was bought out by Seven Arts Associates, and the studio renamed Warner Bros.-Seven Arts
.
Initially, Lovy's new team produced more Daffy and Speedy cartoons, but soon moved to creating new characters such as Cool Cat and Merlin the Magic Mouse, and even occasional experimental works such as Norman Normal
(1968). Despite the latter gaining a cult following after its release, Lovy's cartoons were not well received, and many enthusiasts regard them (particularly his Daffy-Speedy efforts) as the worst cartoons ever produced by the studio.
After a year, Alex Lovy left and returned to Hanna-Barbera, and Robert McKimson was bought back to the studio; for the most part though, he focused on using the characters that Lovy had created (and two of his own creation: Bunny and Claude) rather than the studio's classic characters. The new studio's cartoons remained unpopular however, and in 1969 Warners ceased production on all its short subjects and shut the studio down for good. The back catalog of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts would remain a popular broadcast and syndication package for Warner Bros. Television
well into the 2000s, by which time it had reacquired the pre-August 1948 shorts it sold to A.A.P. in 1956.
. The success of this film spurred Warner Bros. to establish its own studio to produce similar works, and Warner Bros. Animation
opened its doors in 1980.
Under the supervision of Friz Freleng, three new compilation features were produced: The Looney Looney Looney Bugs Bunny Movie
, Bugs Bunny's Third Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales, and Daffy Duck's Movie: Fantastic Island. Later in the decade, the concept of compilation films was revived by writer-directors Greg Ford
and Terry Lennon, and new short subjects were produced for theatres.
Warner Bros. Animation continues sporadic production of Looney Tunes-related specials and TV series to this day, the most recent being the Saturday morning
action series Police Academy: The Animated Series and Loonatics Unleashed
. The studio's main focus is on original and licensed television program
ming; in this field, Warner Bros. Animation has had major successes with Looney Tunes-esque shows such as Tiny Toon Adventures
and Animaniacs
, DC Comics
-licensed shows such as Batman: The Animated Series
and Superman: The Animated Series
, and shows based upon other properties such as ¡Mucha Lucha!
and Hanna-Barbera
's Scooby-Doo
(Hanna-Barbera was acquired by Warner Bros. after the 1996 Time Warner
-Turner
merger). The studio briefly delved into feature animation production from 1994 to 2003, although Space Jam
(1996), a live-action/animation combination film starring National Basketball Association
star Michael Jordan
opposite the Looney Tunes characters, remains the studio's only financially successful feature. The abandonment of feature film animation was mainly due to the poor box office performance of the feature Looney Tunes: Back in Action
.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...
during the Golden Age of American animation. One of the most successful animation
Animation
Animation is the rapid display of a sequence of images of 2-D or 3-D artwork or model positions in order to create an illusion of movement. The effect is an optical illusion of motion due to the phenomenon of persistence of vision, and can be created and demonstrated in several ways...
studios in American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
media history, Warner Bros. Cartoons was primarily responsible for the Looney Tunes
Looney Tunes
Looney Tunes is a Warner Bros. animated cartoon series. It preceded the Merrie Melodies series and was Warner Bros.'s first animated theatrical series. Since its first official release, 1930's Sinkin' in the Bathtub, the series has become a worldwide media franchise, spawning several television...
and Merrie Melodies
Merrie Melodies
Merrie Melodies is the name of a series of animated cartoons distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures between 1931 and 1969.Originally produced by Harman-Ising Pictures, Merrie Melodies were produced by Leon Schlesinger Productions from 1933 to 1944. Schlesinger sold his studio to Warner Bros. in 1944,...
theatrical cartoon short subjects. The characters featured in these cartoons, including Bugs Bunny
Bugs Bunny
Bugs Bunny is a animated character created in 1938 at Leon Schlesinger Productions, later Warner Bros. Cartoons. Bugs is an anthropomorphic gray rabbit and is famous for his flippant, insouciant personality and his portrayal as a trickster. He has primarily appeared in animated cartoons, most...
, Daffy Duck
Daffy Duck
Daffy Duck is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons, often running the gamut between being the best friend and sometimes arch-rival of Bugs Bunny...
, Porky Pig
Porky Pig
Porky Pig is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons. He was the first character created by the studio to draw audiences based on his star power, and the animators created many critically acclaimed shorts using the fat little pig...
, Speedy Gonzales
Speedy Gonzales
Speedy Gonzales is an animated caricature of a mouse in the Warner Brothers Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons. He is portrayed as "The Fastest Mouse in all Mexico" with his major traits being the ability to run extremely fast and speaking with an exaggerated Mexican accent...
, Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner
Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner
Wile E. Coyote and The Road Runner are a duo of cartoon characters from a series of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons. The characters were created by animation director Chuck Jones in 1948 for Warner Bros., while the template for their adventures was the work of writer Michael Maltese...
, are among the most famous and recognizable characters in the world. Many of the creative staff members at the studio, including directors and animators such as Chuck Jones
Chuck Jones
Charles Martin "Chuck" Jones was an American animator, cartoon artist, screenwriter, producer, and director of animated films, most memorably of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts for the Warner Bros. Cartoons studio...
, Friz Freleng
Friz Freleng
Isadore "Friz" Freleng was an animator, cartoonist, director, and producer best known for his work on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons from Warner Bros....
, Robert McKimson
Robert McKimson
Robert "Bob" Porter McKimson, Sr. was an American animator, illustrator, and director best known for his work on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons from Warner Bros., and later DePatie-Freleng Enterprises...
, Tex Avery
Tex Avery
Frederick Bean "Fred/Tex" Avery was an American animator, cartoonist, voice actor and director, famous for producing animated cartoons during The Golden Age of Hollywood animation. He did his most significant work for the Warner Bros...
, Robert Clampett, and Frank Tashlin
Frank Tashlin
Frank Tashlin, born Francis Fredrick von Taschlein, also known as Tish Tash or Frank Tash was an American animator, screenwriter, and film director.-Animator:...
, are considered major figures in the art and history of traditional animation
Traditional animation
Traditional animation, is an animation technique where each frame is drawn by hand...
.
The Warner animation division was founded in 1933 as Leon Schlesinger
Leon Schlesinger
Leon Schlesinger was an American film producer, most noted for founding Leon Schlesinger Productions, which later became the Warner Bros. Cartoons studio, during the golden age of Hollywood animation.-Early life and career:...
Productions, an independent company which produced the popular Looney Tunes
Looney Tunes
Looney Tunes is a Warner Bros. animated cartoon series. It preceded the Merrie Melodies series and was Warner Bros.'s first animated theatrical series. Since its first official release, 1930's Sinkin' in the Bathtub, the series has become a worldwide media franchise, spawning several television...
and Merrie Melodies
Merrie Melodies
Merrie Melodies is the name of a series of animated cartoons distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures between 1931 and 1969.Originally produced by Harman-Ising Pictures, Merrie Melodies were produced by Leon Schlesinger Productions from 1933 to 1944. Schlesinger sold his studio to Warner Bros. in 1944,...
animated short subject
Short subject
A short film is any film not long enough to be considered a feature film. No consensus exists as to where that boundary is drawn: the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all...
s for release by Warner Bros. Pictures
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...
. In 1944, Schlesinger sold the studio to Warner Bros., who continued to operate it as Warner Bros. Cartoons, Inc. until 1963. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies were briefly subcontracted to Freleng's DePatie-Freleng Enterprises
DePatie-Freleng Enterprises
DePatie-Freleng Enterprises was a Hollywood-based animation production company, active from 1963 to 1981. They produced theatrical cartoons, animated series, commercials, title sequences and television specials. Notable among these is The Pink Panther film titles and cartoon shorts and the Dr....
studio from 1964 until 1967. The Warner Bros. Cartoons studio briefly re-opened in 1967 before shutting its doors for good two years later.
A successor company, Warner Bros. Animation
Warner Bros. Animation
Warner Bros. Animation is the animation division of Warner Bros., a subsidiary of Time Warner. The studio is closely associated with the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies characters, among others. The studio is the successor to Warner Bros...
, was established in 1980. That company continues to produce Looney Tunes related works, in addition to television shows and feature films centering around other properties. The classic Warner Bros. animation studio is sometimes referred to as "Termite Terrace", a name given to the temporary headquarters Tex Avery and his animators were assigned to during Avery's first year as a Looney Tunes director.
1930 - 1933: Harman-Ising Productions
Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising originated the Looney TunesLooney Tunes
Looney Tunes is a Warner Bros. animated cartoon series. It preceded the Merrie Melodies series and was Warner Bros.'s first animated theatrical series. Since its first official release, 1930's Sinkin' in the Bathtub, the series has become a worldwide media franchise, spawning several television...
and Merrie Melodies
Merrie Melodies
Merrie Melodies is the name of a series of animated cartoons distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures between 1931 and 1969.Originally produced by Harman-Ising Pictures, Merrie Melodies were produced by Leon Schlesinger Productions from 1933 to 1944. Schlesinger sold his studio to Warner Bros. in 1944,...
series of animated short subjects in 1930 and 1931, respectively. Both cartoon series were produced for Leon Schlesinger at the Harman-Ising Studio on Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California, with Warner Bros. Pictures releasing the films to theaters. The first Looney Tunes character was the Harman-Ising creation Bosko, The Talk-ink Kid
Bosko
Bosko is an animated cartoon character created by animators Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising. Bosko is the first recurring character in Leon Schlesinger's cartoon series, and is the star of over three dozen Looney Tunes shorts released by Warner Bros...
. Despite the fact that Bosko was popular among theater audiences, he could never match the popularity of Walt Disney
Walt Disney
Walter Elias "Walt" Disney was an American film producer, director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur, entertainer, international icon, and philanthropist, well-known for his influence in the field of entertainment during the 20th century. Along with his brother Roy O...
's Mickey Mouse
Mickey Mouse
Mickey Mouse is a cartoon character created in 1928 by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks at The Walt Disney Studio. Mickey is an anthropomorphic black mouse and typically wears red shorts, large yellow shoes, and white gloves...
, or even Max Fleischer
Max Fleischer
Max Fleischer was an American animator. He was a pioneer in the development of the animated cartoon and served as the head of Fleischer Studios...
's Betty Boop
Betty Boop
Betty Boop is an animated cartoon character created by Max Fleischer, with help from animators including Grim Natwick. She originally appeared in the Talkartoon and Betty Boop film series, which were produced by Fleischer Studios and released by Paramount Pictures. She has also been featured in...
. In 1933, Harman and Ising parted company with Schlesinger over financial disputes, and took Bosko with them to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...
. As a result, Schlesinger set up his own studio on the Warner Bros. lot on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood.
1933 - 1944: Leon Schlesinger Productions
The Schlesinger studio got off to a slow start, continuing their one-shot Merrie Melodies and introducing a Bosko replacement named BuddyBuddy (Looney Tunes)
Buddy is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes series of cartoons.-Looney Tunes:Buddy has his origins in the chaos that followed the severing of relations between animators Hugh Harman and Rudy Ising from producer Leon Schlesinger...
into the Looney Tunes. Disney animator Tom Palmer
Tom Palmer (animator)
Anthony "Tony" Pipolo, known professionally as Tom Palmer was an Italian-American animator who was active in the 1930s and worked at several animation studios. He was born with the surname of "Pipolo" but changed his name to Palmer...
was the studio's first senior director, but after the three cartoons he made were deemed to be of unacceptable quality and rejected by the studio, former Harman-Ising animator Isadore "Friz" Freleng
Friz Freleng
Isadore "Friz" Freleng was an animator, cartoonist, director, and producer best known for his work on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons from Warner Bros....
was called in to replace Palmer and rework his cartoons. The studio then formed the three-unit structure that it would retain throughout most of its history, with one of the units headed by Ben "Bugs" Hardaway
Ben Hardaway
Joseph Benson "Ben/Bugs" Hardaway was a storyboard artist, animator, voice actor, gagman, writer, and director for several American animation studios during the The Golden Age of Hollywood animation. He was sometimes credited as J.B. Hardaway, Ben Hardaway, Buggsy Hardaway, and B. Hardaway.While...
, and the other by Earl Duvall
Earl Duvall
Earl Duvall was an artist best known for his work on Walt Disney comic strips in the early 1930s and for a handful of animated cartoon short subjects he directed at Leon Schlesinger Productions for Warner Bros.-Career:...
, who was replaced by Jack King
Jack King (animator)
James Patton "Jack" King was an American comics artist and animator best known for his work at Walt Disney Productions.Born in Alabama, King began his animation career in the silent era in 1920 working at Bray Productions animation studio...
a year later.
In 1935, Freleng helmed the Merrie Melodies cartoon I Haven't Got a Hat
I Haven't Got a Hat
I Haven't Got a Hat is a 1935 animated short film, directed by Isadore Freleng for Leon Schlesinger Productions as part of Warner Bros.' Merrie Melodies series. Released by Warner Bros. on March 9, 1935, the short is notable for featuring the first appearance of several Warner Bros. cartoon...
, which introduced the character Porky Pig
Porky Pig
Porky Pig is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons. He was the first character created by the studio to draw audiences based on his star power, and the animators created many critically acclaimed shorts using the fat little pig...
. Hardaway and King departed, and a new arrival at Schlesinger's, Fred "Tex" Avery
Tex Avery
Frederick Bean "Fred/Tex" Avery was an American animator, cartoonist, voice actor and director, famous for producing animated cartoons during The Golden Age of Hollywood animation. He did his most significant work for the Warner Bros...
, took Freleng's creation and ran with it. Avery directing a string of cartoons starring Porky Pig which established the character as the studio's first bonafide star. Schlesinger also gradually moved the Merrie Melodies cartoons from black and white, to two-strip Technicolor
Technicolor
Technicolor is a color motion picture process invented in 1916 and improved over several decades.It was the second major process, after Britain's Kinemacolor, and the most widely used color process in Hollywood from 1922 to 1952...
in 1934, and finally to full three-strip Technicolor in 1936. The Looney Tunes would be produced in black-and-white for much longer, until 1943.
Because of the limited spacing conditions in the Schlesinger building at 1351 N. Van Ness on the Warner Sunset lot, Avery and his unit - including animators Robert Clampett and Chuck Jones
Chuck Jones
Charles Martin "Chuck" Jones was an American animator, cartoon artist, screenwriter, producer, and director of animated films, most memorably of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts for the Warner Bros. Cartoons studio...
- were moved into a small building elsewhere on the Sunset lot, which Avery and his team affectionately dubbed "Termite Terrace" Although the Avery unit moved out of the building after a year, "Termite Terrace" later became a metonym
Metonymy
Metonymy is a figure of speech used in rhetoric in which a thing or concept is not called by its own name, but by the name of something intimately associated with that thing or concept...
for the classic Warner Bros.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...
animation department in general, even for years after the building was abandoned, condemned, and torn down. During this period, four cartoons were outsourced to the Ub Iwerks
Ub Iwerks
Ub Iwerks, A.S.C. was a two-time Academy Award winning American animator, cartoonist, character designer, inventor, creator of Mickey Mouse, and special effects technician, who was famous for his work for Walt Disney....
studio; however, Iwerks struggled to adapt his style to the type of humor that the Looney Tunes had developed by this time, and so Clampett took over as director (using Iwerks' staff) for the last two of these outsourced cartoons. Schlesinger was so impressed by Clampett's work on these shorts that he opened a fourth unit for Clampett to head, although for tax reasons this was technically a separate studio headed by Schlesinger's brother-in-law, Ray Katz.
From 1936 until 1944, animation directors
Film director
A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...
and animators such as Freleng, Avery, Clampett, Jones, Arthur Davis, Robert McKimson
Robert McKimson
Robert "Bob" Porter McKimson, Sr. was an American animator, illustrator, and director best known for his work on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons from Warner Bros., and later DePatie-Freleng Enterprises...
, and Frank Tashlin
Frank Tashlin
Frank Tashlin, born Francis Fredrick von Taschlein, also known as Tish Tash or Frank Tash was an American animator, screenwriter, and film director.-Animator:...
worked at the studio. During this period, these creators introduced several of the most popular cartoon characters to date, including Daffy Duck
Daffy Duck
Daffy Duck is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons, often running the gamut between being the best friend and sometimes arch-rival of Bugs Bunny...
(1937, Porky's Duck Hunt
Porky's Duck Hunt
Porky's Duck Hunt is an animated short film produced by Leon Schlesinger Productions, directed by Tex Avery, and released on April 17, 1937 by Warner Bros. Pictures. Porky's Hare Hunt was the sequel to this one....
by Avery), Elmer Fudd
Elmer Fudd
Elmer J. Fudd/Egghead is a fictional cartoon character and one of the most famous Looney Tunes characters, and the de facto archenemy of Bugs Bunny. He has one of the more disputed origins in the Warner Bros. cartoon pantheon . His aim is to hunt Bugs, but he usually ends up seriously injuring...
(1940, Elmer's Candid Camera
Elmer's Candid Camera
Elmer's Candid Camera is a 1940 Merrie Melodies cartoon directed by Chuck Jones, and first released on March 2, 1940 by Warner Bros.. It marks the first appearance of Elmer Fudd Elmer's Candid Camera is a 1940 Merrie Melodies cartoon directed by Chuck Jones, and first released on March 2, 1940 by...
by Jones), Bugs Bunny
Bugs Bunny
Bugs Bunny is a animated character created in 1938 at Leon Schlesinger Productions, later Warner Bros. Cartoons. Bugs is an anthropomorphic gray rabbit and is famous for his flippant, insouciant personality and his portrayal as a trickster. He has primarily appeared in animated cartoons, most...
(1940, A Wild Hare
A Wild Hare
A Wild Hare is a 1940 Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies animated short film. It was produced by Leon Schlesinger Productions, directed by Tex Avery, and written by Rich Hogan. It was originally released on July 27, 1940...
by Avery), and Tweety Bird (1942, A Tale of Two Kitties
A Tale of Two Kitties
A Tale of Two Kitties is an American cartoon, released in 1942, notable for the first appearance of A yellow canary, who would come to be known as Tweety. It was directed by Bob Clampett, written by Warren Foster, and features music by Carl W. Stalling. It was also the first appearance of Babbit...
by Clampett). Avery left the studio in 1941 following a series of disputes with Schlesinger, who shortly after closed the studio for two weeks due to a minor strike similar to the more known one that occurred at Disney, this time Schlesinger lost nearly all of his employees of the Avery unit. By 1942, the Schlesinger studio had surpassed Walt Disney Productions as the most successful producer of animated shorts in the United States.
1944 - 1964: Warner Bros. Cartoons
In 1944, Schlesinger sold his studio to Warner Bros., which renamed the company Warner Bros. Cartoons, Inc., and Edward Selzer (who by Jones' and Freleng's accounts had no sense of humor or appreciation of cartoons), was appointed by Warner Bros. as the new head of the cartoon studio after Schlesinger retired. In 1945-46 Frank Tashlin, and more significantly Robert Clampett left, which merged on a new unit headed by Bob McKimson (although part of Clampett's unit was headed by Art Davis). Although inheriting most of their staffs, these units have been the least known among the four, apart from having lower budgets than Jones and Freleng. In 1948 the studio moved to a larger building on the Sunset Boulevard lot. Davis' separate unit was dissolved in 1949, and he became an animator for Freleng.Among the Warner Bros. cartoon stars who were created after Schlesinger's departure include Yosemite Sam
Yosemite Sam
Yosemite Sam is an American animated cartoon character in the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons produced by Warner Bros. Animation. The name is somewhat alliterative and is inspired by Yosemite National Park...
(1945, Hare Trigger
Hare Trigger
Hare Trigger is a 1945 Warner Brothers Merrie Melodies cartoon short starring Bugs Bunny directed by Friz Freleng. It marks the first appearance of Yosemite Sam, who appears as a train robber...
by Freleng), Sylvester
Sylvester (Looney Tunes)
Sylvester J. Pussycat, Sr., Sylvester the Cat or simply Sylvester, is a fictional character, a three-time Academy Award-winning anthropomorphic Tuxedo cat in the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies repertory, often chasing Tweety Bird, Speedy Gonzales, or Hippety Hopper...
(1945, Life with Feathers
Life With Feathers
Life with Feathers is a 1945 Merrie Melodies cartoon, directed by Friz Freleng and produced and released by Warner Bros. Pictures. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Animated Short Film...
by Freleng), Foghorn Leghorn (1946, Walky Talky Hawky
Walky Talky Hawky
Walky Talky Hawky is a Henery Hawk/Foghorn Leghorn animated short film from Warner Bros. released in 1946 and directed by Robert McKimson. All voice characterizations are performed by Mel Blanc.-Plot:...
by McKimson), Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner
Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner
Wile E. Coyote and The Road Runner are a duo of cartoon characters from a series of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons. The characters were created by animation director Chuck Jones in 1948 for Warner Bros., while the template for their adventures was the work of writer Michael Maltese...
(1949, Fast and Furry-ous
Fast and Furry-ous
Fast and Furry-ous is a 1949 Warner Bros. Looney Tunes cartoon, released on September 17, 1949, directed by Chuck Jones and written by Michael Maltese...
by Jones), and Speedy Gonzales
Speedy Gonzales
Speedy Gonzales is an animated caricature of a mouse in the Warner Brothers Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons. He is portrayed as "The Fastest Mouse in all Mexico" with his major traits being the ability to run extremely fast and speaking with an exaggerated Mexican accent...
(1953, Cat-Tails for Two
Cat-Tails for Two
Cat-Tails for Two is a 1953 Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies cartoon, directed by Robert McKimson and written by Tedd Pierce starring Bennie the fat cat and George. It was animated in 1952. Voices by Mel Blanc and music by Carl Stalling. It was the first appearance of Speedy Gonzales, in a prototype...
by McKimson). In later years, even more minor Looney Tunes characters such as Freleng's Rocky and Mugsy
Rocky and Mugsy
Rocky and Mugsy are animated cartoon characters in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons. They were created by Friz Freleng.-Character Biography:...
, Jones' Marvin the Martian
Marvin the Martian
Marvin the Martian is a fictional character appearing in the Looney Tunes cartoons. Marvin's likeness appears in miniature on the Spirit rover on Mars.-Conception and creation:...
and McKimson's Tasmanian Devil
Tasmanian Devil (Looney Tunes)
The Tasmanian Devil, often referred to as Taz, is an animated cartoon character featured in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes series of cartoons. The character appeared in only five shorts before Warner Bros...
have become significantly popular.
After the verdict of the United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc.
United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc.
United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc., 334 US 131 was a landmark United States Supreme Court anti-trust case that decided the fate of movie studios owning their own theatres and holding exclusivity rights on which theatres would...
anti-trust case ended the practice of "block booking
Block booking
Block booking is a system of selling multiple films to a theater as a unit. Block booking was the prevailing practice among Hollywood's major studios from the turn of the 1930s until it was outlawed by the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc....
", Warner Bros. could no longer force theaters into buying their features and shorts together as packages; shorts had to be sold separately. Theater owners were only willing to pay so much for cartoon shorts, and as a result by the late-1950s the budgets at Warner Bros. Cartoons became tighter. Selzer forced a stringent five-week production schedule on each cartoon (at least one director, Chuck Jones, cheated the system by spending more time on special cartoons such as What's Opera Doc, less time on simpler productions such as Road Runner entries, and had his crew forge their time cards). With less money for full animation, the Warner Bros. story men — Michael Maltese
Michael Maltese
Michael "Mike" Maltese was a long-time storyboard artist and screenwriter for classic animated cartoon shorts.-Career:...
, Tedd Pierce
Tedd Pierce
Tedd Pierce , was an American animated cartoon writer, animator and artist. Pierce spent the majority of his career as a writer for the Warner Bros. "Termite Terrace" animation studio, working alongside fellow luminaries such as Chuck Jones and Michael Maltese. Pierce also worked as a writer at...
, and Warren Foster
Warren Foster
Warren Foster , was a writer, cartoonist and composer for the animation division of Warner Brothers and later with Hanna-Barbera....
— began to focus more of their cartoons on dialogue. While story artists were assigned to directors at random during the 1930s and 1940s, by the 1950s each story man worked almost exclusively with one director: Maltese with Jones, Foster with Freleng, and Pierce with McKimson.
With the advent of the 3-D film
3-D film
A 3-D film or S3D film is a motion picture that enhances the illusion of depth perception...
craze in 1953, Warner Bros. shut its cartoon studio down in June of that year, fearing that 3-D cartoon production would be too expensive (only one Warner Bros. cartoon was ever produced in 3-D, Jones' Lumber Jack-Rabbit
Lumber Jack-Rabbit
Lumber Jack-Rabbit is a 1953 3D Looney Tunes animated short film directed by Chuck Jones and featuring Bugs Bunny. With a story by Michael Maltese, the short was released by Warner Bros. Pictures on September 25, 1953. It was notable as the first Warner Bros. cartoon short produced in 3-D. It...
starring Bugs Bunny). The creative staff dispersed (Jones, for example, went to work at Disney on Sleeping Beauty
Sleeping Beauty (1959 film)
Sleeping Beauty is a 1959 American animated film produced by Walt Disney and based on the fairy tale "La Belle au bois dormant" by Charles Perrault...
, Maltese went to Walter Lantz Productions, and Freleng went into commercial work). Warner Bros. Cartoons re-opened five months after its close, following the end of the 3-D craze. In 1955, the staff moved into a brand new facility on the main Warner Bros. lot in Burbank. KTLA
KTLA
KTLA, virtual channel 5, is a television station in Los Angeles, California, USA. Owned by the Tribune Company, KTLA is an affiliate of the CW Television Network. KTLA's studios are on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, and its transmitter is located atop Mount Wilson...
television took over the old studio location on Van Ness where the old Warner Sunset Studios is now called Sunset Bronson Studios.
By 1957, Selzer had retired, and veteran Warner Cartoons production manager John Burton
John W. Burton (animation)
John W. Burton was an American cinematographer and producer best known for his work at Warner Bros. Cartoons.Burton was born on August 18, 1906 in Rockford, Illinois. He was employed in Los Angeles at Leon Schlesinger Productions, which made the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons...
took his place. Warner Bros. also lost its trio of staff storymen at this time. Foster and Maltese found work at Hanna-Barbera Productions, while Pierce worked on a freelance basis with writing partner Bill Danch. John Dunn
John W. Dunn
John W. Dunn was a Scottish writer and animator for animated cartoons from 1955 to 1983.Dunn began his career at the Walt Disney cartoon studio, where his first story credit—Man in Space—received an Oscar nomination...
and Dave Detiege, both former Disney men, were hired to replace them.
During Burton's tenure, Warner Bros. Cartoons branched out into television. The Bugs Bunny Show
The Bugs Bunny Show
The Bugs Bunny Show is a long-running American television anthology series hosted by Bugs Bunny, that was mainly composed of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons released by Warner Bros. between August 1, 1948 and the end of 1969. The show originally debuted as a primetime half-hour program on...
was a package program featuring three theatrical Warner Bros. cartoons, with newly produced wraparounds to introduce each short. The program remained on the air under various names and on all three major networks for three decades, finally ending its long broadcast run on ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
in 2000. All versions of The Bugs Bunny Show included edited versions of Warner Bros. cartoons released after July 31, 1948, as all of the Technicolor cartoons released before that date were sold to Associated Artists Productions
Associated Artists Productions
Associated Artists Productions was a distributor of theatrical feature films and short subjects for television. It existed from 1953 to 1958. It was later folded into United Artists. The former a.a.p. library was later owned by MGM/UA Entertainment and then Turner Entertainment. Turner continues...
in 1956.
David H. DePatie became the last executive in charge of the original Warner Bros. cartoons studio in 1961. The same year, Chuck Jones moonlighted to write the script for a UPA
United Productions of America
United Productions of America, better known as UPA, was an American animation studio of the 1940s through present day, beginning with industrial films and World War II training films. In the late 1940s, UPA produced theatrical shorts for Columbia Pictures, most notably the Mr. Magoo series. In...
-produced feature titled Gay Purr-ee
Gay Purr-ee
Gay Purr-ee is an animated film musical produced by United Productions of America and released by Warner Bros. in 1962. It features the voice talent of Judy Garland in her only animated-film role.- Plot:...
. When that film was picked up by Warner Bros. for distribution in 1962, the studio learned that Jones had violated his exclusive contract with Warners and he was terminated. Animator Phil Monroe supervised the completion of The Iceman Ducketh
The Iceman Ducketh
The Iceman Ducketh is a 1964 Warner Bros. Looney Tunes theatrical cartoon starring Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. This cartoon short is directed by Phil Monroe and co-directed by Maurice Noble, with a story by John Dunn. This was the last Warner Bros...
, the last cartoon Jones had been working on; the remainder of the Jones unit was laid off after its completion. Most of Jones' former unit subsequently re-joined him at Sib Tower 12 Productions
MGM Animation/Visual Arts
MGM Animation/Visual Arts was an animation studio established in 1962 by animation director/producer Chuck Jones and producer Les Goldman as Sib Tower 12 Productions...
to work on a new series of Tom and Jerry
Tom and Jerry
Tom and Jerry are the cat and mouse cartoon characters that were evolved starting in 1939.Tom and Jerry also may refer to:Cartoon works featuring the cat and mouse so named:* The Tom and Jerry Show...
cartoons for MGM. Freleng left the studio in November 1962, four months after Jones' termination, to serve as story director for the feature Hey There, It's Yogi Bear!
Hey There, It's Yogi Bear!
Hey There, It's Yogi Bear! is a 1964 American animated feature film produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions and released by Columbia Pictures. The film stars the voices of Daws Butler, Don Messick, Julie Bennett, and Mel Blanc...
at Hanna-Barbera; his layout artist Hawley Pratt
Hawley Pratt
Hawley Pratt was an American film director, animator, and illustrator. He is best known for his work during the heyday of Warner Bros. Cartoons and as the right-hand man of director Friz Freleng as a layout artist and later as a director...
directed the Freleng unit's final cartoon, Señorella and the Glass Huarache
Señorella and the Glass Huarache
Señorella and the Glass Huarache is a 1964 Looney Tunes Cartoon directed by Hawley Pratt and written by John W. Dunn. The plotline is a typical Cinderella story, but set in Mexico. This was the last Looney Tunes short released before the Warner Bros. Cartoons division was shut down. It was the...
.
In mid-1962, at the height of television popularity and decline in moviegoing, DePatie was sent to a board meeting in New York, and he was informed that the cartoon studio was going to be shut down. DePatie completed the task by spring 1963. The final cartoon to be completed was the Bugs Bunny cartoon False Hare
False Hare
False Hare is a 1964 Warner Bros. Looney Tunes animated short starring Bugs Bunny and the Big Bad Wolf who had previously appeared in Now Hare This . Released on July 28, 1964, the cartoon was written by John W...
, directed by Robert McKimson, while Señorella and the Glass Huarache was the final cartoon to be released in 1964. The final project at the studio before it closed for good was the animated sequences, directed by McKimson, for the 1964 Warner Bros. feature The Incredible Mr. Limpet
The Incredible Mr. Limpet
The Incredible Mr. Limpet is a 1964 American live-action/animated film from Warner Bros. It is about a man named Henry Limpet who turns into a talking fish resembling a tilefish and helps the U.S. Navy locate and destroy Nazi submarines. Don Knotts plays the title character. The live action was...
. With the studio closed, Hal Seeger Productions
Hal Seeger
Harold "Hal" Seeger was an animated cartoon producer and director who owned his own studio the Hal Seeger Studio ....
in New York had to be contracted to produce the opening and closing credits for The Porky Pig Show
The Porky Pig Show
The Porky Pig Show is an American television anthology series hosted by Porky Pig, that was composed of uncut Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons made between 1935 and 1963....
, which debuted on ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
in 1964. This marked one of the first times that the Looney Tunes characters were animated outside of the Los Angeles area.
1964 - 1967: DePatie-Freleng Enterprises and Format Films
David H. DePatie and Friz Freleng started DePatie-Freleng EnterprisesDePatie-Freleng Enterprises
DePatie-Freleng Enterprises was a Hollywood-based animation production company, active from 1963 to 1981. They produced theatrical cartoons, animated series, commercials, title sequences and television specials. Notable among these is The Pink Panther film titles and cartoon shorts and the Dr....
in 1963, and leased the old Warner Bros. Cartoons studio as their headquarters. In 1964, Warners contracted DePatie-Freleng to produce more Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies, an arrangement which lasted until 1967. The vast majority of these paired off Daffy Duck against Speedy Gonzales, and after a few initial cartoons directed by Freleng, Robert McKimson was hired to direct most of the remaining DePatie-Freleng Looney Tunes.
In addition to DePatie-Freleng's cartoons, a series of new shorts featuring The Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote was commissioned from an independent animation studio, Herbert Klynn
Herbert Klynn
Herbert Klynn was an American animator who worked with UPA Studios.In 1959 he founded the television animation studio Format Films, best-known for producing The Alvin Show, The Lone Ranger, and other films and series in animation mostly during the 1960s.Format Productions also provided several...
's Format Films
Format Films
Format Films was a television animation studio which was founded by Herbert Klynn in 1959 with Jules Engel as vice president, Herb McIntosh and Joseph Mugnaini. It was most active during the 1960s, producing episodes of The Alvin Show, Popeye, and The Lone Ranger...
. Veteran Warner animator Rudy Larriva
Rudy Larriva
Rudolph "Rudy" Larriva was an American animator and director from the 1940s to the 1980s.Born in El Paso, Texas, Larriva worked at a number of animation studios, including Format Films, Filmation, Walt Disney Productions, but is best known for his work at Warner Bros...
, who had worked for years under Road Runner creator Chuck Jones, assumed directorial duties for these films, but even with the Jones connection Larriva's Road Runner shorts are considered to be mediocre by critics. McKimson also directed an additional two Road Runner shorts with the main DePatie-Freleng team, which are slightly better regarded than Larriva's efforts.
After three years of outsourced cartoons, Warner Bros. decided to bring production back in-house. DePatie-Freleng had their contract terminated (they subsequently moved to new studios in the San Fernando Valley
San Fernando Valley
The San Fernando Valley is an urbanized valley located in the Los Angeles metropolitan area of southern California, United States, defined by the dramatic mountains of the Transverse Ranges circling it...
), and Format Films were commissioned to produce three "buffer" cartoons with Daffy and Speedy (again, directed by Rudy Larriva) to fill the gap until Warner Bros.'s own studio was up and running again.
1967 - 1969: Warner Bros.-Seven Arts Cartoons
The new cartoon studio was to be headed by studio executive William L. Hendricks, and after an unsuccessful attempt at luring Bob Clampett out of retirement, former Walter Lantz StudioWalter Lantz Studio
Walter Lantz Productions was an American animation studio. It was in operation from 1928 to 1948 and then 1950 to 1972 and was the principal supplier of animation for Universal Studios, now part of the media conglomerate NBC Universal.-History:...
and Hanna-Barbera animator Alex Lovy
Alex Lovy
Alex Lovy was an American animator, who spent the majority of his career as an animator and director at Walter Lantz Productions, later being a producer at Hanna-Barbera, and also supervising the cartoon unit at Warner Bros...
was appointed director at the new studio. He brought his longtime collaborator, Laverne Harding
Laverne Harding
Laverne Harding was an American animator.Harding, who worked for the Walter Lantz studio for much of her half-century career in animation, is among the earliest woman animators....
to be the new studio's chief animator, and brought in Disney animator Volus Jones and Ed Solomon who also started at Disney as an assistant, which contributed to make cartoons from this era of the studio stylistically quite different from the studio's "Golden Age" (aside from the budget limitations, possibly to mirror the later introductory title cards that preceded the featurettes as well, which also could've been the source of inspiration for the transition of direction in the animation styles, and vice versa), down to being Hanna-Barbera knock-offs (though for good measure, Lovy also brought in animator Ted Bonnicksen and layout artist Bob Givens, both veterans of the original studio). Shortly after the studio opened, Warner Bros. was bought out by Seven Arts Associates, and the studio renamed Warner Bros.-Seven Arts
Warner Bros.-Seven Arts
Warner Bros.-Seven Arts was formed in 1967 and became defunct in 1970, when Seven Arts Productions acquired Jack Warner's controlling interest in Warner Bros. for $32 million and merged with it. The deal also included Warner Bros. Records, Reprise Records and the B&W Looney Tunes library...
.
Initially, Lovy's new team produced more Daffy and Speedy cartoons, but soon moved to creating new characters such as Cool Cat and Merlin the Magic Mouse, and even occasional experimental works such as Norman Normal
Norman Normal
Norman Normal is a 1968 animated cartoon short, produced by Warner Bros.-Seven Arts Cartoons. It was produced as a collaboration between musician Paul Stookey and the studio's animation department...
(1968). Despite the latter gaining a cult following after its release, Lovy's cartoons were not well received, and many enthusiasts regard them (particularly his Daffy-Speedy efforts) as the worst cartoons ever produced by the studio.
After a year, Alex Lovy left and returned to Hanna-Barbera, and Robert McKimson was bought back to the studio; for the most part though, he focused on using the characters that Lovy had created (and two of his own creation: Bunny and Claude) rather than the studio's classic characters. The new studio's cartoons remained unpopular however, and in 1969 Warners ceased production on all its short subjects and shut the studio down for good. The back catalog of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts would remain a popular broadcast and syndication package for Warner Bros. Television
Warner Bros. Television
Warner Bros. Television is the television production arm of Warner Bros. Entertainment, itself part of Time Warner. Alongside CBS Television Studios, it serves as a television production arm of The CW Television Network , though it also produces shows for other networks, such as Shameless on...
well into the 2000s, by which time it had reacquired the pre-August 1948 shorts it sold to A.A.P. in 1956.
1970 - present
With Warners' own animation studio closed, the studio had to resort to outside producers whenever new Looney Tunes-related animation was required. In 1976, Chuck Jones, by this time the head of his own Chuck Jones Productions studio, began producing a series of Looney Tunes specials, the first of which was Carnival of the Animals. In 1979, Jones produced new wraparound footage for a compilation feature of Looney Tunes shorts entitled The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner MovieThe Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie
The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie is a 1979 Looney Tunes film with a compilation of classic Warner Bros. cartoon shorts and animated bridging sequences, hosted by Bugs Bunny...
. The success of this film spurred Warner Bros. to establish its own studio to produce similar works, and Warner Bros. Animation
Warner Bros. Animation
Warner Bros. Animation is the animation division of Warner Bros., a subsidiary of Time Warner. The studio is closely associated with the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies characters, among others. The studio is the successor to Warner Bros...
opened its doors in 1980.
Under the supervision of Friz Freleng, three new compilation features were produced: The Looney Looney Looney Bugs Bunny Movie
The Looney Looney Looney Bugs Bunny Movie
The Looney Looney Looney Bugs Bunny Movie is a 1981 Looney Tunes film with a compilation of classic Warner Bros. cartoon shorts and animated bridging sequences produced by Friz Freleng, hosted by Bugs Bunny...
, Bugs Bunny's Third Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales, and Daffy Duck's Movie: Fantastic Island. Later in the decade, the concept of compilation films was revived by writer-directors Greg Ford
Greg Ford
Greg Ford is an animator, director, historian and consultant to Warner Bros. Animation. He is perhaps best known for directing the films Daffy Duck's Quackbusters and Bunny .-Biography:...
and Terry Lennon, and new short subjects were produced for theatres.
Warner Bros. Animation continues sporadic production of Looney Tunes-related specials and TV series to this day, the most recent being the Saturday morning
Saturday morning cartoon
A Saturday morning cartoon is the colloquial term for the animated television programming that has typically been scheduled on Saturday mornings on the major American television networks from the 1960s to the present; the genre's peak in popularity mostly ended in the 1990s while the popularity of...
action series Police Academy: The Animated Series and Loonatics Unleashed
Loonatics Unleashed
Loonatics Unleashed is an American animated television series produced by Warner Bros. Animation that ran on the Kids' WB for two seasons from 2005 to 2007 in the United States, Teletoon in Canada, Kids Central in Singapore, Cartoon Network's Boomerang in Australia, Cartoon Network in the UK,...
. The studio's main focus is on original and licensed television program
Television program
A television program , also called television show, is a segment of content which is intended to be broadcast on television. It may be a one-time production or part of a periodically recurring series...
ming; in this field, Warner Bros. Animation has had major successes with Looney Tunes-esque shows such as Tiny Toon Adventures
Tiny Toon Adventures
Steven Spielberg Presents Tiny Toon Adventures, usually referred to as Tiny Toon Adventures or simply Tiny Toons, is an American animated television series created by Tom Ruegger and produced by Amblin Entertainment and Warner Bros. Animation. It began production as a result of Warner Bros....
and Animaniacs
Animaniacs
Steven Spielberg Presents Animaniacs, usually referred to as simply Animaniacs, is an American animated series, distributed by Warner Bros. Television and produced by Amblin Entertainment and Warner Bros. Animation. The cartoon was the second animated series produced by the collaboration of Steven...
, DC Comics
DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. is one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment a company of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which itself is owned by Time Warner...
-licensed shows such as Batman: The Animated Series
Batman: The Animated Series
Batman: The Animated Series is an American animated series based on the DC Comics character Batman. The series featured an ensemble cast of many voice-actors including Kevin Conroy, Mark Hamill, Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., Arleen Sorkin, and Loren Lester. The series won four Emmy Awards and was nominated...
and Superman: The Animated Series
Superman: The Animated Series
Superman: The Animated Series is an American animated television series starring DC Comics' flagship character, Superman. The series was produced by Warner Bros. Animation and aired on The WB from September 6, 1996 to February 12, 2000. Warner Bros...
, and shows based upon other properties such as ¡Mucha Lucha!
¡Mucha Lucha!
¡Mucha Lucha! was an animated television series. It premiered on Kids' WB on August 17, 2002. It was created by Eddie Mort and Lili Chin and produced by Warner Bros. Animation. It is the first animated television series created with Adobe Flash, a program often used for Internet cartoons...
and Hanna-Barbera
Hanna-Barbera
Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc. was an American animation studio that dominated North American television animation during the second half of the 20th century...
's Scooby-Doo
Scooby-Doo
Scooby-Doo is an American media franchise based around several animated television series and related works produced from 1969 to the present day. The original series, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, was created for Hanna-Barbera Productions by writers Joe Ruby and Ken Spears in 1969...
(Hanna-Barbera was acquired by Warner Bros. after the 1996 Time Warner
Time Warner
Time Warner is one of the world's largest media companies, headquartered in the Time Warner Center in New York City. Formerly two separate companies, Warner Communications, Inc...
-Turner
Turner Broadcasting System
Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. is the Time Warner subsidiary managing the collection of cable networks and properties started and acquired by Robert Edward "Ted" Turner starting in the mid-1970s. The company has its headquarters in the CNN Center in Atlanta, Georgia. TBS, Inc...
merger). The studio briefly delved into feature animation production from 1994 to 2003, although Space Jam
Space Jam
Aside from Jordan, a number of NBA players and coaches appeared in the film. Larry Bird portrays a friend of Jordan who joins him for a game of golf. When the Monstars steal the NBA players' talent, they invade a game between the Phoenix Suns and the New York Knicks, causing the Knicks' Patrick...
(1996), a live-action/animation combination film starring National Basketball Association
National Basketball Association
The National Basketball Association is the pre-eminent men's professional basketball league in North America. It consists of thirty franchised member clubs, of which twenty-nine are located in the United States and one in Canada...
star Michael Jordan
Michael Jordan
Michael Jeffrey Jordan is a former American professional basketball player, active entrepreneur, and majority owner of the Charlotte Bobcats...
opposite the Looney Tunes characters, remains the studio's only financially successful feature. The abandonment of feature film animation was mainly due to the poor box office performance of the feature Looney Tunes: Back in Action
Looney Tunes: Back in Action
Looney Tunes: Back in Action is a 2003 American live action/animated adventure comedy film directed by Joe Dante and starring Brendan Fraser, Jenna Elfman, Timothy Dalton, and Steve Martin. The film is essentially a feature-length Looney Tunes cartoon, with all the wackiness and surrealism typical...
.
Studio heads
- Leon SchlesingerLeon SchlesingerLeon Schlesinger was an American film producer, most noted for founding Leon Schlesinger Productions, which later became the Warner Bros. Cartoons studio, during the golden age of Hollywood animation.-Early life and career:...
(1930–1944) - Eddie SelzerEddie SelzerEdward "Eddie" Selzer was an American film producer, most noted for been the producer of Warner Bros. Cartoons from 1944 to 1957....
(1944–1956) - John BurtonJohn BurtonJohn Burton may refer to:*John Burton , British stage and television actor*John Burton , American slalom canoer*John Burton , co-founder of the nonprofit environmental organization World Land Trust...
(1957–1961) - David H. DePatie (1961–1963)
- William L. HendricksWilliam L. HendricksWilliam L. Hendricks was a former USMCR Colonel who was the key figure in setting up the "Toys for Tots" program. Aside from his USMCR career he also worked in the film industry for many years, initially as a documentary producer for the United States Army, then as a production executive at Warner...
(1967–1969)
Film (Sound Effects) Editors
- Treg BrownTreg BrownTregoweth Edmond "Treg" Brown was a motion picture sound editor who was responsible for the sound effects in Warner Bros.' Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons starting in 1940. He also won the 1965 Academy Award for Sound Effects for his work on the film The Great Race.In the famous Warner...
- Lee GuntherLee GuntherLee Gunther was a film editor on more than 85 animated shorts in all.-Career:...
- Hal GeerHal GeerHal Geer is an American producer and filmmaker, noteworthy for his association with the Looney Tunes franchise.-Military career:...
- Joe Siracusa
Short subjects
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1929–1939)
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1940–1949)
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1950–1959)
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1960–1969)
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1970–present and miscellaneous)
Live-action features with animated segments by Warner Bros. Cartoons
- Two Guys from TexasTwo Guys from TexasTwo Guys from Texas is a 1948 musical comedy film starring Dennis Morgan, Jack Carson, and Dorothy Malone. The movie was directed by David Butler, written by Allen Boretz and I.A.L. Diamond, produced by Alex Gottlieb, and released by Warner Bros. Pictures on September 4, 1948...
(1947) - My Dream is YoursMy Dream Is YoursMy Dream Is Yours is a 1949 musical romantic comedy film starring Doris Day, Jack Carson and Lee Bowman.The film is perhaps best remembered today for an extended dream sequence combining animation and live action which featured a cameo appearance by Bugs Bunny, dancing with Jack Carson and Doris...
(1949)
TV series
- The Bugs Bunny ShowThe Bugs Bunny ShowThe Bugs Bunny Show is a long-running American television anthology series hosted by Bugs Bunny, that was mainly composed of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons released by Warner Bros. between August 1, 1948 and the end of 1969. The show originally debuted as a primetime half-hour program on...
and various spin-offs (1960–2000) - Adventures of the Road-RunnerAdventures of the Road-RunnerAdventures of the Road-Runner is an animated film, directed by Chuck Jones and co-directed by Maurice Noble and Tom Ray. It was the intended pilot for a TV series starring Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner, but was never picked up until four years later when Warner Bros. Television produced The...
- produced as a pilot, not sold (1962) - Philbert - produced as a pilot, not sold (1963)
See also
- Harman and IsingHarman and IsingHugh Harman and Rudolf "Rudy" Ising were an American animation team best known for founding the Warner Bros. and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer animation studios...
- DePatie-Freleng EnterprisesDePatie-Freleng EnterprisesDePatie-Freleng Enterprises was a Hollywood-based animation production company, active from 1963 to 1981. They produced theatrical cartoons, animated series, commercials, title sequences and television specials. Notable among these is The Pink Panther film titles and cartoon shorts and the Dr....
- Warner Bros. AnimationWarner Bros. AnimationWarner Bros. Animation is the animation division of Warner Bros., a subsidiary of Time Warner. The studio is closely associated with the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies characters, among others. The studio is the successor to Warner Bros...
- Cartoon Network StudiosCartoon Network StudiosCartoon Network Studios is an American animation studio. A subsidiary of the Turner Broadcasting System , Cartoon Network Studios focuses on producing and developing animated programs only for and related to Cartoon Network...
- Looney TunesLooney TunesLooney Tunes is a Warner Bros. animated cartoon series. It preceded the Merrie Melodies series and was Warner Bros.'s first animated theatrical series. Since its first official release, 1930's Sinkin' in the Bathtub, the series has become a worldwide media franchise, spawning several television...
- Merrie MelodiesMerrie MelodiesMerrie Melodies is the name of a series of animated cartoons distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures between 1931 and 1969.Originally produced by Harman-Ising Pictures, Merrie Melodies were produced by Leon Schlesinger Productions from 1933 to 1944. Schlesinger sold his studio to Warner Bros. in 1944,...
- List of Warner Bros. cartoons with Blue Ribbon reissues
- The Golden Age of American animationThe Golden Age of American animationThe Golden Age of U.S. animation is a period in the United States animation history that began with the advent of sound cartoons in 1928 and continued into the early 1960s when theatrical animated shorts slowly began losing to the new medium of television animation.Many memorable characters emerged...