Saturday Morning

"Hanna-Barbera: The Architects of Saturday Morning" exhibit
at Norman Rockwell Museum. Toy collection by Dave Nimitz.

And now for something completely different... Saturday cartoons!

I literally grew up in front of the TV set on Saturday mornings, watching Scooby-Doo, The Flintstones, Hong Kong Phooey, Laff-a-Lympics, and hours of other creative cartoons produced by Hanna-Barbera. They seriously fueled my own creativity as a kid. Today, we're opening a new exhibition at Norman Rockwell Museum on the art of the successful animation studio - unleash the flood of memories!

Hong Kong Phooey! Artwork by Willie Ito.

Last April I traveled out to Toronto to attend a huge animation festival, and interviewed two of Hanna-Barbera's original animators: Tony Benedict and Willie Ito. Tony, who wrote the script that introduced Astro to the Jetsons, will be attending tonight's opening. I have also been talking with Willie recently on the phone, and hearing more great stories about the studio and animation field; he was part of the team that brought Hong Kong Phooey to life, and was kind enough to give me a great drawing of the "#1 super guy" back in April.

Should be good fun. Scooby Doo was always my favorite... I'm tempted to dress up like Shaggy tonight, but it's been a rough week- no mask to pull off the head of the villain this time, so maybe I'll just let these great drawings take me back to a more innocent time. I'll share my video interview soon.