Ed Benedict's obituary in today's Guardian

[Clinton Morgan]

The image I selected for this piece is too large but here's the link to it anyhow...
http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/uploaded_images/FRED-714896.jpg

Taken From:
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/news/obituary/0,,1921347,00.html

Ed Benedict

The Hollywood-honed Flintstones creator at the heart of Hanna-Barbera's TV success

Steve Holland
Friday October 13, 2006
The Guardian

Long before Fred Flintstone yelled his first "Yabba dabba do" or neighbour Barney Rubble muttered "Gee, Fred", Ed Benedict, who has died aged 94, knew the characters intimately. It was Benedict's job, as the leading designer for Hanna-Barbera, to create the look of the main characters for each new television show. Fred Flintstone, after a handful of preliminary sketches, soon emerged as the tousle-haired Stone Age family man, star of The Flintstones, which was first broadcast in 1960.

The slightly lopsided look to his face, the stubby fingers and tapering legs leading down to his three-toed feet were all in Benedict's model sheets, as were the looks of wide-eyed joy, open-mouthed surprise and the crooked, sometimes scheming smile. Wilma, Barney and Betty - not forgetting Dino - all emerged from Benedict's pencil sketches with fully formed personalities. All they needed were voices.
Benedict's skills lay not only in designing memorable characters, of which he created many, including Yogi Bear and Huckleberry Hound, both in 1958, and Quick Draw McGraw (1959), but in placing them in memorable settings as a layout designer. He defined the look for Hanna-Barbera's most popular cartoons in the 1960s, when the shows were breaking taboos and introducing animation to an adult TV audience.

The Flintstones was the first animated series made for primetime TV, and Fred and Wilma the first animated couple to be shown sleeping in the same bed. In the third season, Wilma had Pebbles, and the Stone Age couple spent several episodes adjusting to the new arrival. Barney and Betty alluded to infertility issues and later adopted their son, Bamm Bamm. Until part of the way through the third season, the show was sponsored by Winston cigarettes, visibly enjoyed by Fred and Barney.

Born in Ohio, Benedict was given his first break in animation at the Walt Disney studio in 1930, working on the Silly Symphony cartoon The China Plate and Blue Rhythm (both 1931), a short starring Mickey and Minnie Mouse. In 1933, he joined Oswald Lantz as an animator on the Oswald the Rabbit series for Universal, working with Lantz and producer Charles Mintz for most of the 1930s before briefly joining Cartoon Films. He set up his own studio, Benedict-Brewer, with another Cartoon Films animator, Jerry Brewer, to produce theatrical animated commercials, but the idea collapsed because the studio-owned theatres would not show their independently produced work.

Returning to Disney, Benedict worked as a layout artist on industrial and educational films before receiving his first layout credit for the Willie the Whale segment of Make Mine Music (1946).

In 1952, Benedict was hired by Tex Avery as leading layout artist and designer on a variety of cartoons for MGM. After Avery's departure, Benedict continued to work with director Mike Lah on the adventures of sad-eyed mutt Droopy as well as freelancing for Avery. It was his work at MGM that brought him to the attention of Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera. After modelling a cat character who became Ruff of The Ruff & Ready Show, Hanna-Barbera's first TV success, Benedict went on to design the company's best-loved characters, from Yogi Bear to The Jetsons (1962). He continued to work for Hanna-Barbera until retiring in the mid-1970s.

In interviews, Benedict would berate fans for loving shows he helped create. He told Animation Blast: "I never really looked at a lot of them. I suppose when they first came out I looked at a few, and pretty soon they didn't interest me. I wasn't seeing any of my work. It was somebody else's poor drawing of what I tried to do with the original model and they were just embarrassing. Somebody would say 'Oh, I just love that stuff,' for Christ's sake! There's an assumption that that's my stuff they're complimenting - but it isn't my work."

Curmudgeonly he may have been, but he was liked by the fans and his influence was recognised by many, notably John Kricfalusi, the creator of Ren & Stimpy, who has described Benedict as "an unsung hero of animation. He was one of our greatest designers."

Benedict was predeceased by his wife, Alice.

· Ed Benedict, artist, designer and animator, born August 23 1912; died August 28 2006

[swarfmonkey]

Some of the greatest cartoons of all time came from Hanna-Barbera during the time that Ed Benedict worked there, I don't believe that this is mere co-incidence.


R.I.P. Ed.