The Animated Legacy of Dr. Seuss

[tonyboy85]

[ The text I wrote here is written
in rhyme (except for the facts, the film & tv timeline, & the P.S. text),
because.. well.. it's about Dr. Seuss! ]


Walt Disney, Jim Henson & Salvador Dali are masters of imagination,
& one of them is Dr. Seuss, he's a creative sensation.
A great children's book author, his books are remarkable,
his whimsical art & fantastic poetry have made these books unbelievable.
(actually, "The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins" &
"The King's Stilts" are written in prose, not poetry)
Dr. Seuss's weird & imaginative world
is beloved by many nations' young boys & girls.
But he's not just the creator of the fantasy beyond,
there's also other things he have worked on:
a comic strip, magazines, advertisements & political cartoons too,
& the WW2 Warner Bros. cartoon series named "Private Snafu".
Also wonderful in the history of Dr. Seuss, as you'll see,
is that his imagination comes to life in animated films & tv.
This toon line-up including ones from our childhood memories
begins in the 1940's & 1950's,
the early cartoons by Bob Clampett, George Pal & UPA
forshadows that Dr. Seuss will have a big animated legacy someday.
& in 1966, the legacy starts to grow enormous
when the TVs are airing "How the Grinch Stole Christmas!".
& from that year on, the world's getting more Seuss toons than before,
with well-remembered characters & make-believe regions galore.
& Chuck Jones, Ralph Bakshi, Hanna-Barbera & DePatie-Freleng
have made tv specials that leaves people with good feelings.
& the Blue Sky Studios version of "Horton Hears a Who!"
is a funny & wonderful movie adaption, it's true!
The history of Dr. Seuss toons have come a long way,
& we'll always enjoy watching the animated Seuss-ness anyday!


The Dr. Seuss Animated Film & TV Timeline

[1942] WB's Merrie Melodies: "Horton Hatches The Egg" - Directed by Bob Clampett  (4/11/1942)

[1943] George Pal's Madcap Models: "The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins" - Directed by George Pal  (4/30/1943)

[1944] George Pal's Puppetoons: "And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street" - Directed by George Pal  (7/28/1944)

[1951] UPA's Jolly Frolics: "Gerald McBoing Boing" - Directed by Robert Cannon & John Hubley  (1/25/1951)

[1966] MGM: "How the Grinch Stole Christmas!" - Directed by Chuck Jones & Ben Washam  (12/18/1966)

[1970] MGM: "Horton Hears a Who!" - Directed by Chuck Jones & Ben Washam  (3/19/1970)

[1971] DFE: "The Cat In The Hat" - Directed by Hawley Pratt, Produced by Chuck Jones,
Executive Producer: Friz Freleng  (3/10/1971)

[1972] DFE: "The Lorax" - Directed by Hawley Pratt, Produced by Friz Freleng  (2/14/1972)

[1973] DFE: "Dr. Seuss On The Loose" - Directed by Hawley Pratt, Produced by Friz Freleng  (10/15/1973)

[1975] DFE: "The Hoober-Bloob Highway" - Directed by Alan Zaslove, Produced by Friz Freleng  (2/19/1975)

[1977] DFE: "Halloween is Grinch Night" - Directed by Gerard Baldwin, Executive Producer: Friz Freleng  (10/29/1977)

[1980] DFE: "Pontoffel Pock, Where Are You?" - Directed by Gerard Baldwin,
Executive Producer: Friz Freleng  (5/2/1980)

[1982] DFE: "The Grinch Grinches The Cat In The Hat" - Directed by Bill Perez, Produced by Friz Freleng  (5/20/1982)

[1989] Ralph Bakshi: "The Butter Battle Book" - Directed & Produced by Ralph Bakshi  (11/13/1989)

[1995] Hanna-Barbera: "Daisy-Head Mayzie" - Directed by Tony Collingwood,
Studio Leadership: Fred Seibert, William Hanna & Joseph Barbera  (2/5/1995)

[2008] Blue Sky Studios: "Horton Hears a Who!" - Directed by Jimmy Hayward & Steve Martino,
Executive Producer: Chris Wedge  (3/3/2008)



(The Illumination Entertainment version of "The Lorax" from 2012 was not included in this timeline listing,
because it was not as good as the original 1971 book & the 1972 animated version.)

(There was also a motion-capture CG animated version of Dr. Seuss's "My Many Colored Days" in
"Notes Alive! : Dr. Seuss's My Many Colored Days".)

(There was also 2 Dr. Seuss TV shows, the puppet-type "The Wubbulous World of Dr. Seuss (1996)"
by The Jim Henson Company (I think puppeteering is technically "animation"), &
the flash-animated "The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That! (2010)"
by Collingwood O'Hare Productions & Portfolio Entertainment.)




Both in literature & animation,
we'll always be going in odd directions
in the world of
Dr. Seuss's unusual imagination!,
from there to here,
from here to there,
funny things
are everywhere!


P.S.
Since it's 2014, & it is March (Dr. Seuss is born in 3/2/1904),
I'am going to say this:
Happy 110th Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

[Mister Bighead]

This is a nice tribute to such a revolutionary artist and writer. I never thought about making a Dr. Seuss animated filmography.

[tonyboy85]

Does anybody want to post more discussions and opinions in here (if any of you really want to)?

anybody?

[Gasmask Ted]

http://www.cartoonbrew.com/old-brew/the-whole-seuss-120.html
"There is much information on Geisel’s Hollywood writing – including the lost 1931 Flit films Put On The Spout and ‘Neath The Bababa Tree(both released by Warner Bros.)"

[tonyboy85]

The crew responsible for the production of
the WW2 Warner Bros. cartoon series
"Private Snafu" are:
Friz Freleng, Chuck Jones,
Bob Clampett, Frank Tashlin
&... Dr. Seuss!

Here are the 2 "Private Snafu" cartoons
that Dr. Seuss have worked on.

These cartoons are
posted to YouTube by
the US National Archives.


"Spies" - Directed by Chuck Jones (1943)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ws9L-Kifjkg

"Rumors" - Directed by Friz Freleng (1943)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vaupcu2qqI

[tonyboy85]

This thread is always welcome for anyone
to discuss anything about
the animated world of Dr. Seuss!

[tonyboy85]

Here is Randall Cyrenne's 2008 retrospective
about Dr. Seuss's animation history!


Animated Views: "The Animated Seuss"
by Randall Cyrenne,
3/28/2008

http://animatedviews.com/2008/the-animated-seuss/

[VoiceTalentBrendan]

here's an article by Didier Ghez  Duck in the Hat
(or How Dr. Seuss Secretly Wrote a Book for Walt Disney)

http://www.disneyhistoryinstitute.com/2014/08/duck-in-hat.html

[tonyboy85]

Cartoon Research: Animation Anecdotes #182
By Jim Korkis
 
The Grinch In All of Us.
“Villains are easy. Take the Grinch,” remarked animator and director Chuck Jones.
“It was easy to understand someone who hates Christmas because
we all hate something about Christmas a little bit. Some of us hate it a lot. Well, the Grinch hated it completely.
The character was much easier to handle because he had that one object in life that was something we all had.”
 
“I know how to draw Bugs (Bunny), Daffy (Duck) and all of the others. It’s exactly like an actor approaching a role.
The actor knows how to act, yet he must learn what the character has on his mind.
And even though he’s doing the same character, the problems will be different for each new show.”
 
http://cartoonresearch.com/index.php/animation-anecdotes-182/

[tonyboy85]

Cartoon Research: Animation Anecdotes #184
By Jim Korkis


Cindy Lou Who.
While animation legend Chuck Jones always contended that
the design of Cindy Lou Who in “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” (1966)
was supposedly modeled after his own granddaughter, Valerie,
in 1996, he told an interviewer that “As for Cindy Lou Who,
she was appealingly small and innocent. I drew her as seeming to be
a great-grandchild of the Grinch in appearance—a diminutive Grinch,
where everything is right where the Grinch is wrong.”

Boris Triumphs.
During the taping of the narration for “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” (1966),
actor Boris Karloff was quite ill and would pass away a little more than two years later.
His emphysema had him wheezing badly and his back and legs were giving him great pain.

A friend of Ted Geisel’s (Dr. Seuss) was visiting the set that day.
He was a well known cardiologist and as he watched Boris struggle,
he went to Geisel and said, “That is a very sick man.
I don’t know how he will be able to last through this.”

As Geisel remembered, “It was an exhausting day. Everything went wrong.
At the end of the day, we were all wilted…except Boris.
As we dragged ourselves off, he left whistling.”

Karloff later received a Grammy Award for “Best Recording For Children”
after the Seuss story was released as a record.


http://cartoonresearch.com/index.php/animation-anecdotes-184/

[tonyboy85]

This thread has moved to the new IAD forums,
& You are welcome to post new replies there!

"The Animated Legacy of Dr. Seuss"
http://toonscoop.com/forum/yaf_postst34_The-Animated-Legacy-of-Dr--Seuss.aspx#post231