Tom and Jerry is an American animated media franchise and series of comedy short films created in 1940 by William Hanna (14 July 1910 – 22 March 2001) and Joseph Barbera (24 March 1911 – 18 December 2006).
🐶 What do Scooby-Doo and Astro both have in common? These two dogs were originally designed by the late Iwao Takamoto and voiced by legendary voice actor Don Messick. Plus, there voices are almost identical to each other; however, Astro’s voice is a litttle more higher and raspier than Scooby’s voice, which was definitely apparent in the late 1980s revival season of “The Jetsons”. 🐾
Tot Watchers (1958; dir. William Hanna and Joseph Barbera)
Tot Watchers was the 114th and final Tom and Jerry theatrical short film under both William Hanna and Joseph Barbera at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Barbera would return to co-direct one more theatrical Tom and Jerry short in The Karate Guard (2005; by then, the pre-May 1986 MGM library had been purchased by Ted Turner and, later, acquired by Warner Bros.). Tot Watchers was shot in CinemaScope, as were a handful of the late Hanna Barbera Tom and Jerry shorts.
The Tom and Jerry series would resume for thirteen more installments from 1961-1962 under the Czechoslovak studio Rembrandt Films, founded by Gene Deitch. All of Deitch's Tom and Jerry films were released to theaters by MGM.The series would later be picked up by Chuck Jones' Sib Tower 12 Productions in 1963 for another thirty-four shorts. Sib Tower would be purchased by MGM the following year.
Jerry Beck, the eminent animation historian, may have had but 20 minutes or so to pull off the interview thus transcribed ... but it's well worth taking stock of.
And it might be worth knowing that I've actually talked telephonically with Messrs. Hanna and Barbera on separate occasions, howbeit as I was starting to develop the acquaintenance (around 1982, to be specific).
I made this life size Christmas decoration of Jerry Mouse as he appeared in “Tom and Jerry: A Nutcracker Tale” 2007. With an interchangeable hand he can be shown brandishing a sword or pointing the way to the mysterious “Toy Maker.”