Chuck Jones

At 89 years old, Chuck Jones has this physical status:

Jones joined Leon Schlesinger Productions, the independent studio that produced Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies for Warner Bros., in 1933 as an assistant animator. In 1935 he was promoted to animator and assigned to work with a new Schlesinger director, Tex Avery. There was no room for the new Avery unit in Schlesinger's small studio, so Avery, Jones, and fellow animators Bob Clampett, Virgil Ross, and Sid Sutherland were moved into a small adjacent building they dubbed "Termite Terrace". When Clampett was promoted to director in 1937, Jones was assigned to his unit; the Clampett unit was briefly assigned to work with Jones's old employer, Ub Iwerks, when Iwerks subcontracted four cartoons to Schlesinger in 1937. Jones became a director (or "supervisor", the original title for an animation director in the studio) himself in 1938 when Frank Tashlin left the studio. The following year Jones created his first major character, Sniffles, a cute Disney-style mouse, who went on to star in twelve Warner Bros. cartoons.

Jones initially struggled in terms of his directorial style. Unlike the other directors in the studio, Jones wanted to make cartoons that would rival the quality and design to that of ones made by Walt Disney Production. As a result, his cartoons suffered from sluggish pacing and a lack of clever gags, with Jones himself later admitting that his early conception of timing and dialog was "formed by watching the action in the La Brea Tar Pits". Schlesinger and the studio heads were unsatisfied with his work and demanded that he make cartoons that were more funny. He responded by creating the 1942 short The Draft Horse. The cartoon that was generally considered his turning point was The Dover Boys. Released the same year, it noticeably featured quickly-timed gags and extensive use of limited animation. Despite this, Schlesinger and the studios heads were still dissatisfied and begun the process to fire him, but they were unable to find a replacement due to a labor shortage stemming from World War II, so Jones kept his position.

He was actively involved in efforts to unionize the staff of Leon Schlesinger Studios. He was responsible for recruiting animators, layout men, and background people. Almost all animators joined, in reaction to salary cuts imposed by Leon Schlesinger. The Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon studio had already signed a union contract, encouraging their counterparts under Schlesinger. In a meeting with his staff, Schlesinger talked for a few minutes, then turned over the meeting to his attorney. His insulting manner had a unifying effect on the staff. Jones gave a pep talk at the union headquarters. As negotiations broke down, the staff decided to go on strike. Schlesinger locked them out of the studio for a few days, before agreeing to sign the contract. A Labor-Management Committee was formed and Jones served as a moderator. Because of his role as a supervisor in the studio, he could not himself join the union. Jones created many of his lesser-known characters during this period, including Charlie Dog, Hubie and Bertie, and The Three Bears.

During World War II, Jones worked closely with Theodor Geisel, better known as Dr. Seuss, to create the Private Snafu series of Army educational cartoons (the character was created by director Frank Capra). Jones later collaborated with Seuss on animated adaptations of Seuss' books, including How the Grinch Stole Christmas! in 1966. Jones directed such shorts as The Weakly Reporter, a 1944 short that related to shortages and rationing on the home front. During the same year, he directed Hell-Bent for Election, a campaign film for Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Jones created characters through the late 1930s, late 1940s, and the 1950s, which include his collaborative help in co-creating Bugs Bunny and also included creating Claude Cat, Marc Antony and Pussyfoot, Charlie Dog, Michigan J. Frog, Gossamer, and his four most popular creations, Marvin the Martian, Pepé Le Pew, Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner. Jones and writer Michael Maltese collaborated on the Road Runner cartoons, Duck Amuck, One Froggy Evening, and What's Opera, Doc?. Other staff at Unit A whom Jones collaborated with include layout artist, background designer, and co-director Maurice Noble; animator and co-director Abe Levitow; and animators Ken Harris and Ben Washam.

Jones remained at Warner Bros. throughout the 1950s, except for a brief period in 1953 when Warner closed the animation studio. During this interim, Jones found employment at Walt Disney Productions, where he teamed with Ward Kimball for a four-month period of uncredited work on Sleeping Beauty (1959). Upon the reopening of the Warner animation department, Jones was rehired and reunited with most of his unit.

In the early 1960s, Jones and his wife Dorothy wrote the screenplay for the animated feature Gay Purr-ee. The finished film featured the voices of Judy Garland, Robert Goulet and Red Buttons as cats in Paris, France. The feature was produced by UPA and directed by his former Warner Bros. collaborator, Abe Levitow.

Jones moonlighted to work on the film since he had an exclusive contract with Warner Bros. UPA completed the film and made it available for distribution in 1962; it was picked up by Warner Bros. When Warner Bros. discovered that Jones had violated his exclusive contract with them, they terminated him. Jones's former animation unit was laid off after completing the final cartoon in their pipeline, The Iceman Ducketh, and the rest of the Warner Bros. Cartoons studio was closed in early 1963.

With business partner Les Goldman, Jones started an independent animation studio, Sib Tower 12 Productions, and brought on most of his unit from Warner Bros., including Maurice Noble and Michael Maltese. In 1963, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer contracted with Sib Tower 12 to have Jones and his staff produce new Tom and Jerry cartoons as well as a television adaptation of all Tom and Jerry theatricals produced to that date. This included major editing, including writing out the African-American maid, Mammy Two-Shoes, and replacing her with one of Irish descent voiced by June Foray. In 1964, Sib Tower 12 was absorbed by MGM and was renamed MGM Animation/Visual Arts. His animated short film, The Dot and the Line: A Romance in Lower Mathematics, won the 1965 Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film. Jones directed the classic animated short The Bear That Wasn't.

As the Tom and Jerry series wound down (it was discontinued in 1967), Jones produced more for television. In 1966, he produced and directed the TV special How the Grinch Stole Christmas!, featuring the voice and facial models based on the readings by Boris Karloff.

Jones continued to work on other TV specials such as Horton Hears a Who! (1970), but his main focus during this time was producing the feature film The Phantom Tollbooth, which did lukewarm business when MGM released it in 1970. Jones co-directed 1969's The Pogo Special Birthday Special, based on the Walt Kelly comic strip, and voiced the characters of Porky Pine and Bun Rab. It was at this point that he decided to start ST Incorporated.

MGM closed the animation division in 1970, and Jones once again started his own studio, Chuck Jones Enterprises. He produced a Saturday morning children's TV series for the American Broadcasting Company called The Curiosity Shop in 1971. In 1973, he produced an animated version of the George Selden book The Cricket in Times Square and subsequently produced two sequels.

Three of his works during this period were animated TV adaptations of short stories from Rudyard Kipling's Mowgli's Brothers, The White Seal and Rikki-Tikki-Tavi. During this period, Jones began to experiment with more realistically designed characters, most of which had larger eyes, leaner bodies, and altered proportions, such as those of the Looney Tunes characters.

Jones resumed working with Warner Bros. in 1976 with the animated TV adaptation of The Carnival of the Animals with Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. Jones also produced The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie (1979), which was a compilation of Jones's best theatrical shorts, new Road Runner shorts for The Electric Company series and Bugs Bunny's Looney Christmas Tales (1979). New shorts were made for Bugs Bunny's Bustin' Out All Over (1980).

From 1977 to 1978, Jones wrote and drew the newspaper comic strip Crawford (also known as Crawford & Morgan) for the Chicago Tribune-NY News Syndicate. In 2011 IDW Publishing collected Jones's strip as part of their Library of American Comic Strips.

In 1978, Jones's wife Dorothy died. He married Marian Dern, the writer of the comic strip Rick O'Shay in 1981.

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