TRIBUTE TO HANNA BARBERA

Screening and Panel

Saturday, June 30

4 pm – 5: 30 pm

Northwest Film Center:  Whitsell Auditorium / Portland Art Museum

Moderator:

Jerry Beck

Panelists:

Ward Jenkins (Laika)

Michael Ouwelenn (Cartoon Network)

Kenny Scharf (Professional Artist)

When New Yorker Joseph Barbera joined MGM’s newly established cartoon studio in 1937, he found himself teamed with a genial westerner named Bill Hanna. After a short time working together with Rudolf Ising, the two were given an animation unit of their own, and from there they would rise to immortality. The promise of this team was instantly displayed when they developed a cartoon short in 1940 called Puss Gets the Boot starring a cat and mouse team that came to be known as Tom and Jerry. Hanna and Barbera expertly guided these ‘stars’ through a series of 114 theatrical cartoons, assisted by some of Hollywood’s top animators. When all was done, Tom and Jerry had won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short seven times in ten years, not to mention earning an additional four nominations.

It might have gone on forever, but the theatrical cartoon was not destined to last. Due to increased costs and the competition from television, most Hollywood studios began to close their animation divisions during the late 1950s. For Hanna and Barbera, the axe fell in March of 1957 when MGM discontinued the production of cartoon shorts. Luckily, the two men already had a plan in place – to go on with a production company of their own, using veterans hired from the many studio closings throughout Hollywood. Hanna and Barbera had targeted television from the start, proposing to cut costs by adapting the methods by which animation had been produced in its theatrical heyday.

Columbia/Screen Gems saw that, by using a more limited technique of animation, Hanna and Barbera could meet the production schedule needed for a television series. In 1957, Screen Gems bought the The Ruff and Reddy Show from the team, and on December 14, 1957 television audiences saw Hanna-Barbera’s first effort at television entertainment. They would be watching one after another for the next 45 years, and many of those were among the most popular cartoons ever made. In fact, even as Ruff and Reddy were having their earliest adventures,  Hanna and Barbera were developing Huckleberry Hound, Yogi and Boo Boo Bear, Pixie, Dixie and Mr Jinx, and the rough drafts of other characters that would entertain three generations of cartoon lovers.

There was no denying the appeal of Hanna-Barbera’s first series, or its profitability. In 1958, Kellogg’s Cereals bought and agreed to sponsor The Huckleberry Hound Show with just a phone call. It was this series that initiated lasting fame for the creative team, and showcased the strengths that made Huck and friends an unforgettable part of cartoon lore. Voice artists Daws Butler and Don Messick teamed with former Warner writers Michael Maltese and Warren Foster to give Huck, Yogi, Pixie, Dixie, and Mr. Jinks snappy, likable personalities, while the animation was handled by Tom and Jerry veterans such as Irven Spence and Ken Muse.

The result? Hanna-Barbera’s first Emmy and a viewership of over 16 million people, thanks to the show being placed in prime-time syndication. Hanna and Barbera were not slow in following up on their success; in 1959, audiences were introduced to silly sheriff Quick Draw McGraw and his sidekick Baba Looey. This Wild West tandem shared the stage with cartoons featuring Augie Doggie and Doggie Daddy, and Snooper and Blabbermouse. However, not even Hanna and Barbera were fully prepared for the triumph that lay just ahead.

It was Screen Gems vice-president John Mitchell that proposed the idea of a prime-time animated sitcom to Hanna and Barbera in 1960. The pair fiddled with various takes on middle-class life before finally settling on designs sketched by Dan Gordon and Ed Benedict that depicted human characters in animal skins. This modern stone-age family was at first called the Flagstones, but on September 30, 1960, America had its first encounter with the Flintstones, and an indelible moment in cultural history took place. The Flintstones would become perhaps Hanna-Barbera’s best-known series, and for decades it held the record as the longest-running animated prime-time show on television.

Meanwhile, Yogi Bear had become so popular that he starred in a series of his own, one he shared with a former comic villain named Snagglepuss. One success led to another throughout the 1960s, and Hanna Barbera scored another prime-time hit with Top Cat in 1961. Over the next year the H-B ensemble expanded to include such players as Wally Gator, Touché Turtle, and Lippy the Lion and Hardy Har Har. The next great milestone for Hanna-Barbera, however, would again involve humans rather than comic animals.

It would be accurate to say that The Jetsons was simply a variation on an old theme, that of depicting a middle-class family who lived in a different era – in this case the year 2062 (100 years from the show’s premiere date). However, the premise of this show was not the whole story. Vivid characterizations and funny, well-written scripts meshed with space-age designs to make The Jetsons a television landmark, one which has a special place in the memories of animation fans. Of course, even as George Jetson and family were rocketing through the cosmos, Hanna-Barbera was preparing another unforgettable production.

Any debate concerning animation’s greatest adventure series would have to include Jonny Quest, and invoking that name might even settle the argument. This 1964 offering featured a team comprised of a scientist, his aide-de-camp, a mysterious Indian youth and the title character. The rip-roaring adventures shared by the quartet were usually seen through Jonny’s point of view, making this outing irresistible to boys of all ages. Hanna and Barbera hired noted comic book artist Doug Wildey to design the show in pure pulp splendor.

There are many ways to look at the Hanna-Barbera legacy. From 1957 through 1999 the studio produced 119 animated series, seven feature films, 18 made-for-television films, five direct-to video movies, and even an animated version of the Bible. For most of the studio’s existence it was synonymous with Saturday morning television, achieving near-total ownership of the market. Numbers and ratings alone, however, only begin to tell the story. William Hanna and Joseph Barbera entertained three generations of animation fans and created dozens of beloved characters that are as familiar to most of us as our own family members are. Huckleberry Hound, Yogi Bear, Quick Draw McGraw, Snagglepuss, Fred Flintstone, Penelope Pitstop, Jonny Quest, and countless others are indelible parts of our childhood and adolescent memories, and we are amazed at how entertaining they can still be for adults.

Catchphrases such as ‘Yabba-Dabba-Doo’, ‘Jane, stop this crazy thing!’, ‘I’m smarter than the average bear!‘, ‘Rooby Roo!’ and ‘I hate meeces to pieces!’ are as recognizable now as they were to their original audiences, and so are the memorable series’ theme songs that so many of us can sing word for word. As long as there is a pic-a-nic basket to steal or a Wacky Race to be won, the achievements of William Hanna and Joseph Barbera will be forever remembered.

- Text and Program by Jerry Beck