Showmen's Trade Review (Oct-Dec 1944)

December 2, 1944 SHOWMEN'S TRADE REVIEW 43 Terry Says Cartoons May Play Lead Role in Tel evision Sh ows Paul Terry, originator and producer of Terrytoons, in an address delivered at a recent meeting in New York of the Atlantic Coast Section of the SMPE expressed his enthusiasm over the role the animated cartoon is destined to play in home television. "Thinking in terms of youth of the world you are on very safe ground," said Terry, expounding a philosophy which has paid him dividends during his thirty year career. Illustrating with slides, his talk on the technique of animation, its origin and development, Terry traced the art from Egyptian hieroglyphics to statuary which provided the illusion of movement when charioteers drove by, to the works of Leonardo DeVinci ; to the spinning bowl, which was slotted to provide shutter action ; to the booklets of progressive drawings which, when flipped by the thumb, produced the illusion of animation, to the adoption of film and the motion picture camera and its stimulus to the screen cartoon in its present form. Terry, a former newspaper cartoonist, was a pioneer in the use of the movies for screen cartooning and obtained one of the basic patents on the process. In his thirty years of cartoon production he has turned out approximately 108 hours of screen entertainment. Terry placed the entire Hollywood output of motion pictures last year at around 1000 hours, covering an expenditure of about 275 million dollars, which contrast with eventual anticipated requirements of Television running into 5000 hours annually. Newspaper cartoon and screen cartoon personalities' popularity with the youth started their careers in both press and movies. Terry emphasized the preponderant sale of comic books on newsstands of screen cartoon characters. He recited the original inception of the comic book in Buffalo, New York, some ten years ago, when a publisher decided that if the Sunday comic section of a paper was the principal attraction responsible for sales of Sunday papers then "comics were a business in themselves." The first books published were a failure due to the fact that they were prepared by artists unfamiliar with the cartoon fans tastes, Terry said. The publisliers quickly made deals with experienced newspaper cartoon creators and success was immediate. Terry pointed to present day publication of 30,000,000 copies of about 147 different comic books monthly a'; a good barometer as to the interest on the p.irt of American youth in cartoons. As to the animated cartoon in relation to television, Terry's opinion is that for some time to come the home television broadcasters will rely upon reissues of screen cartoons, but he does not consider the production of exclusive cartoons for television use as economically out of the question. He further expressed the opinion that television is a problem for solution by the radio industry just as sound was the motion picture industry's problem. He feels that radio will have to adopt motion picture technique if television is to succeed and that the trend will be to short programs for home consumption, but with the theatres leading the way in bringing televised shows to the bulk of the people before adequate receiving sets can be constructed. 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