Waltzing With Leon Schlesinger

Surely you remember seeing Griff Jay’s name in the credits of a Warner Bros. cartoon. Or Peter Gaenger’s. Or Art Loomer’s. Or Elmer Plummer’s.

Well, no, you don’t. All of them were background artists for Leon Schlesinger. All of them put their stamp on cartoons in the days before background painters got screen credit.

There’s another one to tell you about.

At this point, we interrupt our post to thank Steven Hartley. You’ll recall he was the author of the fine Likely Looney, Mostly Merrie blog which he, unfortunately, doesn’t have time to continue. Steven sent me a photo of a gentleman named John Waltz, who I had never heard of. Waltz was one of the background artists at Schlesinger’s in the mid-‘30s, the period when the studio was making cartoons with dancing bugs (not Bugs) and suddenly found itself in the presence of genius—someone named Tex Avery.

How long Waltz worked at the Schlesinger studio, I do not know. The Los Angeles City Directories are absent of information, and the 1940 Census only says “motion picture studio” (he earned $2500 in 1939). By the end of the ‘40s, he was a staff artist for a North Hollywood newspaper and painted murals. He died in Los Angeles on April 17, 1984.

As Steven isn’t posting any more, allow me to send you what he sent me. This photo and article appeared in the Indianapolis Star of November 8, 1936. It gives a list of his Warners credits to date.

Behind him, you’ll see some paintings from “Sunday Go To Meetin’ Time” (released 1936). There is an excellent use of colour in parts of this cartoon, and Norman Spencer’s score (wood block fetish aside) is pretty good, but fears over racial clichés removed this short from TV screens ages ago.

Hoosier Artist Makes Rapid Strides as Designer Of Comic Animated Cartoons for Motion Pictures
JOHN A. WALTZ, native Indiana artist, who had much of his training in Indianapolis, is one of the younger group who is making good as a designer for the movies. Starting in at the Walt Disney studio about a year ago--in November, 1935—he worked on three of their pictures, "Elmer Elephant," "Mickey's Opera" and "Three Little Wolves."
Immediately following this first experience, in which he had taken advantage of every opportunity to learn each phase of the work, he went over to the Leon Schlesinger Productions at Warner Bros. studio. The sixteen pictures with whose design he has been connected as working artist since he became a member of the Warner Bros. organization are as follows: "Let It Be Me," "Bingo Crosbyanna," "Sunday Go to Meeting Time," "At Your Service, Madame," "Toy Town Hall," "Westwood Whoa," [sic] "Fish Tales," "Shanghaied Shipmate," "Porky's Pet," "Porky the Mover," [Porky’s Moving Day] "Porky the Rainmaker," "Porky's Poultry Plant," "Don't Look Now," "Milk and Money," "Boulevardier From the Bronx," and "Little Beau Porky."
Excellent Year's Work.
A year's total of nineteen sets of funny animated cartoons for the cinema, upon which an artist has helped in the art creation, is a record of which to be proud. And it is quite possible, before the year is wholly rounded out, the total will be somewhere in the twenties.
It was in June, 190l, that young Waltz left New York to join his mother, Mrs. C. A. Waltz and his sister, Ida, for residence in Los Angeles, Cal. There were several commissions and art jobs and work as a free-lance artist, for the first. few years, that led up to his present responsible position an background artist for Merry Melodies and Looney Tunes, produced by Leon Schlesinger for Warner Bros.-First National Pictures, Hollywood, Cal.
Carolyn Ashhrook Given Credit.
Carolyn Ashbrook, on the art staff of Shortridge High School for a number of years, was responsible for John Waltz's good start in drawing, painting and design. A scholarship from Shortridge, upon his graduation in 1927, took him to the John Herron Art School, where he studied with William Forsyth, Clifton Wheeler and Myra Reynolds Richards. While working as designer and illustrator in the school annual department of the Indianapolis Engraving Company, he studied life drawing in the night classes conducted by Elmer Taflinger.
After one year with Taflinger, he studied for a year with George Bridgman and Kenneth Hayes Miller. While a scholarship student during the second year, he was an assistant to Mr. Miller and also did free-lance work for Lordley and Hayes, the American Medical Association and for the International Dental Society. For the last-named organization young Waltz designed and painted fifty large panels that illustrated the development of dentistry from 600 B. C. to modern times. These panels were exhibited in New York and were afterwards displayed in Paris.
Good Background for Success.

With such a background of study, zeal for work, and recognition from those with whom he has been associated, it is no wonder that the efforts of the young Hoosier bring success.
George C. Calvert, Indianapolis art connoisseur and art collector, has been watching the career of John A. Waltz ever since his sister, Marjorie, Waltz (for many years Mr. Calvert's secretary in the office of the Indianapolis Clearing House Association, and now Mrs. O. P. Rush of Kansas City), brought to the office some pen and ink illustrations that John had made for the Shortridge Annual. And when Mr. Calvert attended a bankers' convention in San Francisco this fall, he stopped in Los Angeles to see John and his latest work.
The twelve large panels that depict California sports in a landscape setting were viewed by Mr. Calvert in the A. G. Spalding building in downtown Los Angeles. Forming a frieze eighty-eight feet long and three feet high, the mural decoration is painted on the fascia of the mezzanine floor.
Correct Handling Makes Appeal.
The anatomically correct handling of the figures in various athletic poses, which were painted about three-quarters life size, made special appeal to Mr. Calvert. "The figures are well drawn and the anatomy is good, but there is no sense of restlessness for the beholder," said Mr. Calvert. Keyed rather low, with tans and warm greens predominant in the color scheme, the mural was designed and executed as a commission from the A. G. Spalding firm in April, 1935.
Earlier commissions in Los Angeles had meant the creation of ten package designs for the California Milling Corporation, work that brought favorable comment in many national exhibitions, Mr. Calvert said, while later work included drawings of the San Diego Exposition, made for a San Francisco client.
The artist gave Mr. Calvert twelve small paintings from his work for the movies series. Done in gay colors on rectangles of celluloid, these pictures were made while Mr. Waltz was doing figure designs in which little pig and dogs and roosters and ducks and other fowls and animals play a leading part, as well as a humorous one, in baseball games and orchestra concerts.
Studied With Best Instructors.
In discussing with Mr. Calvert the various periods of his work, from the time he sold his first efforts when he was only 13 years old, Mr. Waltz said: "Since that time I have worked in almost every field of art and have studied with the best instructors. This experience has given me a feeling of respect for the art profession that will not allow me to sell work that I am ashamed of, or live in a garret atmosphere painting stuff for mv own selfish interest.
"I think there is a place for everyone to do the best work he is fitted for and is capable of doing. That work must have a definite patronage and appreciation, otherwise the worker is a parasite, living off the efforts of others. During the depression I learned the relationship of the artist to the economic structure. That is why I turned my back on easel pictures for several years. People were not interested in looking at pictures, much less in buying them, when they didn’t know where their next meal was coming from."
In referring to his work for the California Milling Corporation. Mr. Waltz said that his twelve package designs so increased the sales of flour and cereal products that it meant the employment of more than one hundred additional workers.
Tells of Experience.
"I had the same practical idea in mind when I painted the mural decoration for the A. G. Spalding building,”continued the artist. “In painting it I hoped to make golf, tennis, swimming, football, basketball, baseball, track and badminton interesting enough that those who saw my paintings would want to buy the equipment to participate in those games.
"After finishing the Spalding decorations I thought I had at least reached the goal for which I had been working . . . that of being a mural painter. I soon realized that such commissions do not come every day, so I became interested in painting backgrounds for animated short subjects, hoping to be able to apply my knowledge of color and design and gain knowledge to apply to mural decoration. The opportunity for doing the latter has far exceeded my expectations, because painting a background is like doing the sketch for a mural decoration. You have to think of its enlargement to the size of a motion picture screen and design the color and form to carry on that large area.
Studies Exposure Sheet.
"While working in Walt Disney's studio I learned the history of the animated cartoon from its source in Egypt in the Temple of Rameses II and on through the years to its present development, action analysis in relation to animation, the use of a single line to design a form with weight and volume, perspective for camera angles and a study of the exposure sheet which is a technical graph laid out by the director and used by all departments of the studio in the production of a cartoon.
"I have found the work fascinating in every way . . . each day learning something new and, incidentally, doing work that has a definite patronage and appreciation. If you don’t believe that ask any theater manager how much an animation short subject contributes to his program.
“About mural decoration? Well, there is a big one waiting for me and when I think I have learned enough, I will start work on it.”
John A. Waltz was born in Franklin, Ind., May 26, 1909. His present home address is 152 South Serano street, Los Angeles, Cal. Two sisters, Mrs. J.H. Bell and Mrs. Margaret Houghton, and a brother, Ray Waltz, are residents of Indianapolis. It is recalled that Miss Ida Waltz was the first nurse in the original school for crippled children in Indianapolis. She is now a nurse in the Los Angeles county clinic.—LUCILLE E. MOREHOUSE.

In several interviews, Chuck Jones looked back and looked down on the background artists at the studio in the ‘30s as a bunch of old, hack artists. Waltz was neither old nor, it seems, a hack. By around 1940, things were changing. Jones was working with Paul Julian, Bob Clampett with Dick Thomas, Tex Avery with Johnny Johnsen and Friz Freleng with Lenard Kester; there may have been others who moved from unit to unit. By the mid-‘40s, the background people were finally getting screen credit at Warners. It’s too bad it never happened earlier so we could know about the contributions of artists that, today, are obscure or unknown.