Post by The Ultimate Nullifier on Dec 3, 2015 13:16:04 GMT -6
robot6.comicbookresources.com/2015/12/comics-a-m-trial-date-set-in-alleged-pokemon-gun-plot/
History | A Canadian animation empire began with two entrepreneurs buying up a collection of the World War II-era comic Nelvana of the Northern Lights and making a documentary about it; they later formed a film company, Nelvana, which went on to make some of the Star Wars cartoons. [The Star]
www.thestar.com/entertainment/television/2015/11/29/how-a-comic-book-heroine-inspired-an-animation-empire.html
How a comic book heroine inspired an animation empire
Michael Hirsh and Patrick Loubert honoured Canada’s comic book glory years when they created Nelvana
By: Martin Knelman Entertainment, Published on Sat Nov 28 2015
Michael Hirsh is one of the most successful and influential figures in the history of Canadian showbiz, having built and sold off two globally dominant animation empires. And over several decades, his films have won many Gemini, Emmy and CableACE Awards.
But there is something historic and touching about the quirky award that he and his former partner, Patrick Loubert, were given in October in London, Ont.
The pair were honoured by the Joe Shuster Awards, an organization dedicated to celebrating Canada’s comic-book glory days, a saga that goes back to the Second World War.
As a part of wartime rationing, when money was tight and the Canadian government imposed rules limiting imported goods, U.S. comic books were not allowed to cross the border.
The result, as Daniel Stoffman explained in his book The Nelvana Story: Thirty Animated Years, was that Canadians filled the void by creating comic books of our own. Featuring Canadian heroes including Johnny Canuck, Dixon of the Mounted and Nelvana of the Northern Lights, they were printed in a cost-saving way, with no colour, which was why collectors called them “the Canadian whites.”
Once the war ended, they became an endangered species. Hirsh and Loubert, then recent graduates trying to make a go in a company with the deadly name Laff Arts, were already working on TV animation ideas. They knew that a businessman named John Ezrin, who had been a key figure in the 1940s Canadian comic book industry, had a large collection, along with original art and plates.
Hirsh had also been fascinated by comic books.
“When I was a kid people would ask what I wanted to be and I would say, ‘Either Superman or Mickey Mouse.’”
So Hirsh and Loubert approached Ezrin, who took a liking to them. He felt they would take care of his collection, nurture it and keep its history alive.
Hirsh and Loubert not only bought Ezrin’s collection (with the help of a bank loan) but mounted a travelling show for the National Gallery of Canada, and produced a TV documentary for CBC’s Telescope series and a book, The Great Canadian Comic Books, which included reproductions from some of the most popular titles, including Nelvana of the Northern Lights.
“We were totally green,” Hirsh told me recently at his Wychwood Park home. “We had never made a documentary and we had never curated an art exhibition, but in a 12-month period we did all that.”
When Hirsh, Loubert and Clive Smith formed a film-production company in 1971, they chose the name Nelvana because of the comic book. It had a nice mystical ring to it, it was Canadian and it sounded a bit like “nirvana.”
It took years before Nelvana became a powerhouse factory for TV animation for children. A turning point came in 1977 when George Lucas chose Nelvana to make a 10-minute cartoon as part of a holiday Star Wars project. That led eventually to two series of Star Wars cartoons.
A key factor in the company’s success was the eagerness of graduates of Sheridan College, with the emergence of the first animation class in 1975. Many of them got their first jobs with Nelvana. By 1977, there were more than 200 people working on Nelvana projects.
Hit shows included A Cosmic Christmas, Inspector Gadget, Care Bears, Tintin, Little Bear and Babar.
“By 2000, we were producing 23 series a year and we had become the largest producer of cartoons in the world,” Hirsh said.
The company was at a peak, but to grow it needed to be part of a larger media operation. The company was sold to Corus Entertainment. Hirsh not only made a fortune on the deal but stayed for a while as CEO.
By 2004, Hirsh had left Nelvana and started another company, Cookie Jar, taking over his former rival, the Montreal-based Cinar. (By then Cinar had been tainted by scandal and was embroiled in a criminal trial).
In 2012, Hirsh made another big move: merging with DHX and becoming its executive chair.
Thriving for more than four decades after buying those old Canadian comic books, Hirsh has gone on to make Canada a capital of animated films, exported to all parts of the planet.
But one irony is that despite buying the stash of old Nelvana comics and choosing Nelvana as the name for a company that would eventually conquer the world, Hirsh and his partners never did turn Nelvana into a TV cartoon or movie. They loved the name, but they weren’t sure this very Canadian, very 1940s creation would resonate would kids around the world generations later.
mknelman@thestar.ca
History | A Canadian animation empire began with two entrepreneurs buying up a collection of the World War II-era comic Nelvana of the Northern Lights and making a documentary about it; they later formed a film company, Nelvana, which went on to make some of the Star Wars cartoons. [The Star]
www.thestar.com/entertainment/television/2015/11/29/how-a-comic-book-heroine-inspired-an-animation-empire.html
How a comic book heroine inspired an animation empire
Michael Hirsh and Patrick Loubert honoured Canada’s comic book glory years when they created Nelvana
By: Martin Knelman Entertainment, Published on Sat Nov 28 2015
Michael Hirsh is one of the most successful and influential figures in the history of Canadian showbiz, having built and sold off two globally dominant animation empires. And over several decades, his films have won many Gemini, Emmy and CableACE Awards.
But there is something historic and touching about the quirky award that he and his former partner, Patrick Loubert, were given in October in London, Ont.
The pair were honoured by the Joe Shuster Awards, an organization dedicated to celebrating Canada’s comic-book glory days, a saga that goes back to the Second World War.
As a part of wartime rationing, when money was tight and the Canadian government imposed rules limiting imported goods, U.S. comic books were not allowed to cross the border.
The result, as Daniel Stoffman explained in his book The Nelvana Story: Thirty Animated Years, was that Canadians filled the void by creating comic books of our own. Featuring Canadian heroes including Johnny Canuck, Dixon of the Mounted and Nelvana of the Northern Lights, they were printed in a cost-saving way, with no colour, which was why collectors called them “the Canadian whites.”
Once the war ended, they became an endangered species. Hirsh and Loubert, then recent graduates trying to make a go in a company with the deadly name Laff Arts, were already working on TV animation ideas. They knew that a businessman named John Ezrin, who had been a key figure in the 1940s Canadian comic book industry, had a large collection, along with original art and plates.
Hirsh had also been fascinated by comic books.
“When I was a kid people would ask what I wanted to be and I would say, ‘Either Superman or Mickey Mouse.’”
So Hirsh and Loubert approached Ezrin, who took a liking to them. He felt they would take care of his collection, nurture it and keep its history alive.
Hirsh and Loubert not only bought Ezrin’s collection (with the help of a bank loan) but mounted a travelling show for the National Gallery of Canada, and produced a TV documentary for CBC’s Telescope series and a book, The Great Canadian Comic Books, which included reproductions from some of the most popular titles, including Nelvana of the Northern Lights.
“We were totally green,” Hirsh told me recently at his Wychwood Park home. “We had never made a documentary and we had never curated an art exhibition, but in a 12-month period we did all that.”
When Hirsh, Loubert and Clive Smith formed a film-production company in 1971, they chose the name Nelvana because of the comic book. It had a nice mystical ring to it, it was Canadian and it sounded a bit like “nirvana.”
It took years before Nelvana became a powerhouse factory for TV animation for children. A turning point came in 1977 when George Lucas chose Nelvana to make a 10-minute cartoon as part of a holiday Star Wars project. That led eventually to two series of Star Wars cartoons.
A key factor in the company’s success was the eagerness of graduates of Sheridan College, with the emergence of the first animation class in 1975. Many of them got their first jobs with Nelvana. By 1977, there were more than 200 people working on Nelvana projects.
Hit shows included A Cosmic Christmas, Inspector Gadget, Care Bears, Tintin, Little Bear and Babar.
“By 2000, we were producing 23 series a year and we had become the largest producer of cartoons in the world,” Hirsh said.
The company was at a peak, but to grow it needed to be part of a larger media operation. The company was sold to Corus Entertainment. Hirsh not only made a fortune on the deal but stayed for a while as CEO.
By 2004, Hirsh had left Nelvana and started another company, Cookie Jar, taking over his former rival, the Montreal-based Cinar. (By then Cinar had been tainted by scandal and was embroiled in a criminal trial).
In 2012, Hirsh made another big move: merging with DHX and becoming its executive chair.
Thriving for more than four decades after buying those old Canadian comic books, Hirsh has gone on to make Canada a capital of animated films, exported to all parts of the planet.
But one irony is that despite buying the stash of old Nelvana comics and choosing Nelvana as the name for a company that would eventually conquer the world, Hirsh and his partners never did turn Nelvana into a TV cartoon or movie. They loved the name, but they weren’t sure this very Canadian, very 1940s creation would resonate would kids around the world generations later.
mknelman@thestar.ca