Tagging Along With Howard Beckerman

Howard Beckerman is not only a veteran of the Golden Age of animated cartoons and a respected instructor, but he’s an author, too. We’re not just talking about his book at his web site. Howard wrote a column for Back Stage, a New York-based periodical.

We posted this great remembrance by Mr. Beckerman about Jim Tyer. The article below won’t mean as much to some fans, I suspect. He goes on a little tour of part of Manhattan, and talks about the commercial production studios that briefly flourished during that great period when black-and-white TV sets were filled with cleverly-designed animated commercials. While there were many small studios on the West Coast then, there were a handful based in New York. They deserve a bit of attention by cartoon fans, hence I pass it along.

This was published August 6, 1982. New Yorkers may appreciate this post more than others as they’ll know the streets named.

Mr. Beckerman has a nice, friendly style of writing. He is still around and will turn 90 next year.

Errands
It is summer, and contrary to many other summers, animation assignments have been coming to many of the studios on a hit and miss basis. Time was when summer meant beefed up schedules to meet fall deadlines and the rush to produce pre-Christmas announcements. With everyone apparently holding back this season, the small studio operator finds he’s got some extra moments on his hands. He or she can use the time to make additional calls to usual work sources or prepare some artwork for an ad to be placed in a trade journal. Back Stage for instance is receiving material its special animation issue scheduled for September 10th.

When things are a bit slow I find that it’s a good time to do errands. It gets me onto the street for some needed exercise and I get to meet some of the people that I only get to know through the less personal method of telephone calls. This morning for instance I decided to retrieve a negative from Movielab. While the many messenger services in the city are capable and dependable there’s nothing like doing it yourself and perhaps knocking off a few more errands on the way. It’s also a good way to get some bills paid in person and save a few cents on the high cost of stamps. I left my studio on 45th Street, but first stopped into:
A.I. Friedman’s art store to pay a bill and say hello to George, the manager. Then I headed over toward the Avenue of the Americas, more properly known as Sixth Avenue. As I passed 49 West 45th Street I recall that it was here that such studios as Bill Sturm Productions and Academy Pictures had once occupied the same office space at different times, and both had gone out of business in that same space.
I began to ponder how many animation studios had come and gone in the little buildings along this street and are now moved on and the buildings replaced by high rise shiny glass and metal behemouths [sic]. At 165 West 46th Street, former home of Back Stage, the studio, Animation Central once operated with such talents as Paul Kim and Lou Gifford, Pablo Ferro and Ray Favata. As I headed toward Seventh Avenue I spotted a dime on the street and picking it up I realized that one of the other benefits of doing errands, you find money. When you go home and your spouse asks if the agency sent the $10,000 check you can answer, “No but I found a dime.” It’s actually very gratifying when you realize that the 10 grand gets paid out to employees, landlords, services and taxes but the dime is all yours!
Heading past 723 Seventh Avenue I realized that this was another address for the old Bill Sturm animation studio where partners, Bill Sturm, Orestes Calpini and Bert Hecht made some of the earliest television commercials. A couple of blocks north at 49th Street the Embassy 49 is showing Disney’s “Bambi.” It struck me that this theatre had not too long ago been an X-rated movie house and here they were all nice and tidy showing Disney G-rated films. This was the same theatre that was called The World and back in the late 40’s exhibited Roberto Rosselini’s “Open City” for a year, featuring the writing skills of a former cartoonist, Federico Fellini.
At 51st and Seventh I took a moment to drop in to TR’s Gallery, which offers for sale original cels from Disney films. Here for about $175 you can get a hand inked colored cel of Winnie the Pooh or characters from “Jungle Book” or “The Rescuers.” Turning the corner and moving onto 53rd and Broadway I passed the Broadway Theater and was reminded by a plaque in the lobby that this was once the Colony Movie Theater and in September of 1928 Mickey Mouse premiered on the screen in an early synchronized sound cartoon, “Steamboat Willie.” The plaque dutifully includes the engraved likeness of Mickey for the perusal of all those arriving the [to] see the current musical production, “Evita.”

I headed down through 55th Street past the DuArt building and recalled that in the early 50’s Lee Blair’s Film Graphics was situation here and we did many spots for many of the prominent shows of the day. “I Love Lucy” was one of the hits of home television and animation director Don Towsley kept us all struggling on the openings for this series. DuArt’s administrative offices today are where Deborah Kerr once performed for a public service spot. Upstairs was a studio called Loucks and Norling which specialized in technical animation for scientific films. Continuing on top Movielab over in Potamkin Country I passed by 450 West 54th Street where you can just barely make out the faded logo of Fox’s Movietone News. On this street ABC has a sound stage and I recall that not too far away Robert Lawrence had a live action stage and an animation studio across the street in the early 1960’s.
Eventually I arrived at Movielab and picked up the material that was waiting there for me. When I started back to my office the late morning heat was beginning to settle in. I arrived once more at 45th Street about an hour from when I had begun my errand and I realized that it was here on this same street that I had also begun my career in this field working at Famous Studios at 25 West 45th Street. Here at the studio that had once belonged to Max and Dave Fleischer we produced Popeye and Casper the Ghost theatrical shorts. Next door at 34 West there had been the animation studio of Ted Eshbaugh just before the Transfilm organization took over the same building. Today the buildings, 25, 35 and 45 West 45th Street still house several studios, among them, The Optical House, John Rowohlt Camera Service and Eighth Frame Camera Service. Suddenly I realized that I had gone in a complete circle, not just from my office to the lab and back, but as it happens to everyone, I had gone on another errand between the past and the present and back again. Though the term errand boy is often used disparagingly, it must be remembered that the very nature of the film business requires that everyone become an errand boy at sometime. There is hardly a producer no matter how high in status who has never carried a reel to an editor, a lab, an optical house or a screening. Sometimes it’s the only way to get it there. We are all candidates for the errand boy’s job, and like any conscientious errand boy, we do our job with care and responsibility, we are professionals. The call comes and we pick up and deliver. The agency picks up and delivers for the client, and we pick up and deliver for the agency. We speak of art and technique, of style and moody, but what it comes down to is, can you pick up and deliver?
As I entered the welcoming air conditioned confines of my studio and even before the small beads of perspiration had dried on my forehead, the phone rang. It was an assignment. Pick up and deliver.

Tweety and the Beanstalk Backgrounds

There are three cartoons released by Warner Bros. in 1957 made by the Friz Freleng unit which have no background artist credit. One is Tweety and the Beanstalk. Irv Wyner had been painting backgrounds and was replaced in the credits with Boris Gorelick. It’s unclear when Wyner left; his birthday wasn’t listed amongst the September celebrators in the “Warner Club News” for that month in 1956. I don’t know enough about Wyner’s style to determine if he possibly worked on this short; his last credited cartoon was The Three Little Bops.

(Wyner, incidentally, was born Irving Weiner to Benjamin and Ethel Weiner, a pair of Russian emigres. He was living in St. Paul, Minnesota in 1935 when he won a scholarship to the New York Students Arts League. He arrived in California with his wife Joanne and son Richard in 1949; Richard was born in Minnesota. Wyner died in 2002; a plate with Yosemite Sam, Bugs Bunny and Sylvester is on his gravestone).

First is the opening shot; the camera trucks in on it. You can see how Hawley Pratt handled layouts involving the rising beanstalk, and Tweety in a cage with Sylvester below.



Warren Foster’s story fills six minutes and does little else; he actually wrote more fun fairy tale parodies at Hanna-Barbera.

Colourful Lift-Off

Coloured cards to augment effects were popular with a number of directors at Walter Lantz. Here’s an example from Ace in the Hole, a fairly lacklustre Woody Woodpecker cartoon directed by Alex Lovy.

A lit flare falls into Woody Woodpecker’s otherwise airtight pilot suit. The force of it makes Woody take off. The coloured cards and the effect animation are shot on twos.



George Dane is the credited animator. Woody is Kent Rogers, who was killed in a training exercise during World War Two.

Climbing the Ladder of Television

Don Pardo did more than “tell them what they won” on The Price is Right. Pardo wasn’t just the show’s announcer during its NBC days in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s. He warmed up the audience, too.

He had an unusual method, as revealed in this unbylined story in the La Crosse Tribune of January 28, 1961.

Pardo remained on The Price is Right until 1963. The show moved to ABC, but Pardo remained loyal to NBC. The following year, the network picked him to announce and warm up the New York studio audience for a new game show called Jeopardy.

Don Pardo Is High Man On The TV Totem Pole For 'Price Is Right'
Don Pardo, amiable six-footer whose well-modulated tones introduce "The Price Is Right" to over 60 million viewers weekly, has had to call upon one of man's oldest props to get the show properly on the air. So unique is Pardo's technique other professional television announcers visit "The Price Is Right" set just to watch him perform.
* * *
About 15 minutes before "Price" goes on the air, Don Pardo hauls out a 12-foot ladder, climbs same while the startled 600 people in the theater audience wonder what kind of stunt is going to be pulled. Swaying atop his perch, Pardo hooks one lanky leg over the side for natural support and proceeds to "warm up" his audience. His easy style seems to make the use of such an out-of-place prop perfectly acceptable in the maze of television cameras and assorted electronic gear spread across the set.
The fact that "The Price Is Right" is aired from an old-fashioned theater on upper Broadway in New York, makes it necessary for Don to use his tall perch . . . simply to be seen by the 3-tiered theater audience. Friends of Pardo's think he would use the unusual prop regardless of the theater set-up to crack the ice in getting the audience to be friendly and join into the atmosphere of the show.
* * *
Don and his 12-foot prop seem to fit into the easy-going atmosphere of "The Price Is Right." From Bill Cullen, popular emcee, throughout the entire man-woman cast and crew—the climate on the set is precisely what is seen by over 60 million viewers each week ... a fun group, having a good time putting together some of TV's best entertainment. Don personifies this air of informality from his opening statements to the theater audience. It is quite important to the tempo and tone of the show to have the audience relaxed and to actually become a part of the show—and, while a pro like Pardo makes it look simple—it's no easy job to get 600 strangers to join together as one interest, fun-loving unit.
One evening, while Don was in the middle of his warm-up act, a chimp being used on the show climbed up Don's ladder behind him. To make matters worse, (if not shakier), the chimp was waving a crew members hat, swiped while running through his act. Don almost fell off his tottering ladder before the crew members finally coaxed the chimp (and waving hat) down again. At one point, the front row audience gasped when they thought Don, ladder and chimp would land in their laps. It's too bad little, colorful human incidents like this can't be caught by the cameras for the benefit of the national audience. In any event, sometime when you're watching The Price Is Right—should a tall man and a very tall ladder crash down on the set . . . you'll know what happened —another chimp is loose!
* * *
Don started out to be an announcer in the first place and seems born to the job. His early start following college groomed him well for his later bigtime jobs on television. He did such early successes as Four Star Revue, Firestone Theater and Colgate Comedy Hour. Later work included the Martha Raye, Sid Caesar and Perry Como summer shows, Max Liebman spectaculars Kate Smith Hour, Arthur Murray Show, World of Mr. Sweeney, Producer's Showcase, plus many NBC special colorcasts. Don has, among other professional awards, a Sylvania TV award for top narration—winning this one for his participation in Ford's two-hour 50th Anniversary Show.
Don reflects the same easy-going personality in personal life at home his do-it-yourself projects sometimes overlap each other, but they get done, he says. Just finished a nice new patio—that was simple ... no 12-foot ladder work involved! Don lives in Demarest, N.J., with a pretty young wife and five children.

The Eyes Have It

The city wolf keeps covering the country wolf’s eyes to stop him from viewing Red and getting all excited. It’s a failure.



This is from Red’s farewell in Little Rural Riding Hood, animated by Grant Simmons, Walt Clinton, Bob Cannon and Mike Lah (the Red dance is reused Preston Blair animation).

Happy Hearts

A cartoon with bouncing, smiling hearts can’t be all bad, but there isn’t much good in The Queen of Hearts, a ComiColor short animated by Shamus Culhane and Al Eugster.

Any humour is semi-slapstick at best. Hearts and face cards come alive and enact the nursery rhyme about the Queen of Hearts. The hyper hearts make tarts but one accidentally pours soap powder into the mix. That results in all the characters blowing bubbles after being hit in the face with the tarts.



The hearts use clothes pins and bananas as weapons against the Jack of Hearts who stole the tarts (filling in for the Knave of the nursery rhyme).



This Ub Iwerks production was released in 1934. Art Turkisher supplied the score.

The Young Benny

People will always be cheap. People will always have a high opinion of themselves.

That’s the reason Jack Benny’s “character” works today. You could take Jack’s character type—someone who would go to insane lengths to save a dollar, who felt he was a great star, ladies man and musician—put it on some streaming service and people would binge-watch (if the writing and acting were good). You can’t do it with most of his variety show contemporaries. They’re singers of old songs and tellers of old jokes. (Look how Bob Hope became a sad shell on TV specials at the end).

That premise was picked up by a columnist with the Herald Tribune News Service in 1958. Granted this was before the socially-conscious ‘60s when comedians felt obligated to try to do hip routines on television and looked like someone’s grandfather embarrassingly trying to act 18. It was published on November 16th.

GOOD OLD DAYS ARE TODAY
Through Jack Benny, Fans Thumb Nose at the Years
By BOB SALMAGGI
(Copyright 1958, N. Y. Herald Tribune)
NEW YORK—Curious as it seems, TV audiences are inclined to accept Jack Benny as nothing but a latter-day comedian, even in the face of a rumor that it was he who stood by George Washington when he crossed the Delaware.
Each time Benny attempts to pass himself off as a mere stripling, audiences nod assent and laugh with him. Through him, people vicariously thumb their noses at the passing years. It's almost as if they were saying, See? Jack Benny doesn't know the meaning of the word old. . . he'll always remain young, no matter how time flies. . .there'll always be Jack Benny.
For with Benny, the chronological element is quickly dismissed. It's as if he invented the adage, "You're as young as you feel."

In effect, Benny, like so many of his contemporaries—Sophie Tucker, Fred Astaire, Ed Wynn, Ted Lewis—thinks young. He lives young, acts young, and consequently feels young. So what if there are a few streaks of gray, a wrinkle or two where they shouldn't be—Benny and his confreres laugh at the years, and point the way to bigger things with each passing century.
In Benny's design for entertaining, however, there is one notable factor that sets him apart from Durante, Cantor and the rest. He guardedly steers clear of nostalgia in his act. He shuns saccharine sentiment, doesn't glorify the "good old days," nor does he deprecate today's show business standards. He doesn't throw verbal bouquets at his contemporaries without purpose, or adhere to the old-timer's practice of "sticking together."
Benny wisely stays aloof, plays it cool, and basks in the aura of modernism. The only major concession he makes to the bygone days is his show prop, the ancient Maxwell car, but this is strictly for effect, just for laughs. His act is as modern as sliced bread, and as wholesome. Although devoted to the proposition that Benny hates to part with a nickel, his television show and his nightclub act, even his concerts, are fast-paced, stylized and strictly up-to-date.
When you think of Sophie Tucker, you think of vaudeville, one-nighters, and torchy blues of yesteryear. So too with the Jessels, the Cantors, and others of his generation. But there's no kindling of old memories or old associations when Jack Benny strides on stage in that familiar style of his.
He is regarded as a latter-day comedian, period—a comedian who came up during the early days of radio and vaudeville, to be sure, but one who made the transition to the fearsome new television medium, without so much as a dropped decimal point in his Hooper, or Trendex, if you will. Many who starred with Benny years ago tried to hurdle the obstacle of time and make a place for themselves on TV, but they weren't attuned to the times. They couldn't adapt themselves as did Benny, who has been riding high, wide and lucrative on radio and/or TV steadily since 1932.
In essence, his credo is to "keep working if you want to keep young." To this he adds: "I really hate it when I'm not busy enough. I mean that. When I'm idle it's then I begin to feel a little older. Look at Fred Astaire . .if he's not working, he's at home practicing like mad. He's better than ever these days . . but if he ever stopped working, well. . ."
It wasn't too long ago that Benny announced to a bemused world that he was going to turn forty. But these days he's feeling so chipper that he is "thinking about going back" to 39 very soon now.
"I was 36, you know, for a little over a year," mused Benny, "and then I turned 37 for a few years, but I hung on to 39 the longest. I guess I'll always be 39," he said with a sly grin.
"It's such a comfortable age."