Additionally, Doggie Daddy is based upon comedian Jimmy Durante Snagglepuss parodies Burt Lahr (most famous for the lion in Wizard of Oz) Yogi Bear is modeled after the Honeymooners' Art Carney to name a few. It didn't seem to bother anyone that many of Hanna-Barbera's most memorable cartoon characters and shows were basically rip-offs of popular non-animated stars and shows from vaudeville, old-time radio, and even early TV – such as The Phil Silvers Show (as Top Cat) and the Honeymooners (as The Flintstones). (If you have ever watched a Hanna-Barbera cartoon you already know what limited animation is.)ĭespite the visual constraints of limited animation, Hanna-Barbera succeeded by relying on zany characters and wacky situation comedies, brought to life by seasoned voice actors such as Daws Butler (Droopy Dog, then Huckleberry Hound, Yogi Bear, Snagglepuss, Quick Draw McGraw and others), Don Messick (Ranger Smith, Boo Boo, Astro and others) and Mel Blanc (Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, then Barney Rubble and others). ![]() More importantly they were one of the first companies to boldly utilize a new simpler, and cheaper, animation technique – called "limited animation." This technique, which incidentally was pioneered by animators at the Disney Studios in the early 1950s, gave H-B Productions the means to provide an entire season of half hour cartoon shows to the networks on time - a feat that was widely believed to be financially and technologically prohibitive. They arrived with great experience – animating years of Tom and Jerry theatrical cartoon shorts for the then-defunct MGM Studios' animation division. Into the fray came Hanna-Barbera Studios. But the fast evolving media needed its own s own stars. For children's programming, old movies, shorts (like The Little Rascals, Laurel & Hardy and The Three Stooges), Saturday-afternoon serials (like the Buck Rogers and Superman), and cartoon shorts from the 1930s and 1940s filled the bill at first. In TV 's early days there was a huge shortage of content (not unlike the web not too long ago). Just a few short years earlier Hanna-Barbera Productions were just an upstart studio struggling to get a stake in the formative new media we now call Television. ![]() ![]() It made sense that Hanna-Barbera would become partners-of-sorts with another veteran leader at the top of his game, Louis Marx - the toy king. The company created and run by Hollywood veterans Joe Hanna and Bill Barbera was at the top of its game. In 1961, Hanna- Barbera Productions, not Walt Disney Studios, were the kings of primetime TV animation.
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