I’m off this week to a visit back east. I’ll be in both New York and Toronto over the next few days – doing what I like to do best, watching (old and new) cartoons with friends (old and new). Feel free to join us.
First up, I’ll be in Toronto Friday and Saturday at the Toronto Animation Arts Festival International (aka Taafi). David Silverman (The Simpsons) will be there as well. They will be be screening tons of great new shorts, tributes to Ray Harryhausen and Saturday morning cartoons – and I’ll be showing some “censored” cartoons late night (10pm) on Friday at the TIFF Cinema 1. Check out the whole schedule here.
I will be ducking out on Sunday to get to Brooklyn’s Animation Block Party. If you live in the New York area, you must try to get there over the weekend. Tons of great new shorts will be screened – but even better, Tom Stathes has one of his Silent Cartoon Classics screenings on Saturday afternoon at 4:30pm.
As for me I’ll be presiding over a screening of Oscar winning animated shorts from the 1960s; 7pm at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) in the Peter Jay Sharp Building, BAM Rose Cinemas, at 30 Lafayette Avenue in Brooklyn, NY. This program includes 35mm prints of:
Munro / Gene Deitch / 8:20 min / 1960
Ersatz (The Substitute) / Dušan Vukotić / 10 min / 1961
The Hole / John Hubley and Faith Hubley / 15 min / 1962
The Critic / Ernest Pintoff / 4 min / 1963
The Pink Phink / Friz Freleng and Hawley Pratt / 6:38 min / 1964
Dot and the Line / Chuck Jones & Maurice Noble / 10 min / 1965
Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass Double Feature / John Hubley / 6 min / 1966
The Box / Fred Wolf / 9 min / 1967
After the screening I’ll discuss these films with J.J. Sedelmaier, Michael Sporn and Emily Hubley. Be there – it’s gonna be a lot of fun.
Jerry Beck is a writer, animation producer, college professor and author of more than 15 books on animation history. He is a former studio exec with Nickelodeon Movies and Disney, and has written for The Hollywood Reporter and Variety. He has curated cartoons for DVD and Blu-ray compilations and has lent his expertise to dozens of bonus documentaries and audio commentaries on such. Beck is currently on the faculty of CalArts in Valencia, UCLA in Westwood and Woodbury University in Burbank – teaching animation history. More about Jerry Beck [
I actually remember seeing “Ersatz”! I don’t remember where or when, except it was about the time it came out and I was very young. I do remember somebody explaining the title (“Ersatz” is German for substitute or replacement). About the only lingering impression I have of the cartoon was that it was kind of weird and I much preferred Bugs Bunny. A little too much “it’s strange and foreign so it’s good for you!” in the introduction, maybe, that put me off. Since it won an Oscar, would it have been shown on TV on some program where I would have seen it?
I recall an oddball 1960s children’s TV special hosted by Bill Dailey, more or less in his character from “I Dream of Jeannie.” It included several Zagreb cartoons (the more harmless ones) and a standup comic who had a briefly popular routine of miming bad magic tricks while scatting his own variety show music (Da da DAT da, da DA da DA . . .”).
Beyond that, there were some PBS shows that served up non-studio shorts, ending with a weekly series hosted by Jane Marsh.
Funny that the Pink Panther and “Ersatz” are on the same program, as the PP short, “Come On In! The Water’s Pink” (1968) has the exact same concept (strange inflatables at the beach).
Dwight, “Ersatz” has appeared on those PD dollar store DVD compilations.
In 1957 Don Martin did a gag in MAD Magazine:
Three guys emerge from a bathhouse on the beach carrying inflatable toys.
The first inflates his — an inner tube — and runs into the water.
The second inflates his — a standard cartoon horsey — and runs into the water.
The third inflates his — a sexy girl — and runs back into the bathhouse with an evil grin and beads of sweat.
DBENSON
The comic doing the bad magic tricks (like making his fingers jump from one hand to the other) was probably Art Metrano.
Munro is a brilliant 9 minutes. Just brilliant.
The comedian Dwight is thinking of is Art Metrano, who suffered paralysis falling off a ladder several years ago.
I really want to go to the Oscar show, but I can’t because neither of my parents can’t make it.
I am going on Saturday to Tom’s thing.