SERIOUS BUSINESS: The Art and Commerce of Animation in America from Betty Boop to Toy Story [Hardcover]

Stefan Kanfer (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 7, 1997

Acclaimed critic and historian Stefan Kanfer follows the ascent of America's most beloved and successful original art form from vaudeville sideshow to global industry, in the process holding up a mirror to the passing parade of cartoons, a mirror in which their captured reflections leave an indelible record of the changing nature of American tastes, values, and dreams. Art and commerce combine and collide again and again in Stefan Kanfer's history, with results that range from predictably dismaying to hilarious. Take Daffy Duck's signature voice: If Warner Bros. producer Leon Schlesinger hadn't been such a tightfisted employer, Chuck Jones, Tex Avery, and the rest of his legendary animation team might never have created the thputtering duck to lampoon the boss's speech impairment. (Fearing Schlesinger's reaction, the animators wrote out their resignations before his initial screening, only to watch the oblivious Schlesinger leap to his feet and exclaim, "Jeethus Christh, that's a funny voithe! Where'd you get that voithe?"). Small victories, uneasy stalemates, and defeats enough to make a cynic weep all have their hour in the story of an industry whose fortunes have swung between wild expansion and profound depression. To know the cartoons America has loved is to know America: the Jazz Age's infatuation with Betty Boop's shimmy; F.D.R.'s public embrace of Disney's The Three Little Pigs and its smash theme song "Whose Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" during the Great Depression; the adoption during World War II of brash, indomitable Bugs Bunny as an unofficial symbol of the American GI; an unself-conscious consumer culture's infatuation with an endless string of household-appliance jokes onThe Flintstones; and the counterculture's attraction to the gritty and sexually explicit exploits of Ralph Bakshi's Fritz the Cat. In the end, though, the history of animation is the story of its geniuses. "Serious Business" disperses the clouds created by decades of received wisdom.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The business behind creating and producing comics, cartoons, or, specifically, animation is nothing short of fascinating. More than a "behind the scenes" book or a "tell all" expose, Serious Business is a great find for this reason: it places an emphasis on the creative people in the industry. To quote the dust cover: "The history of animation is the story of its geniuses. Serious Business disperses the clouds created by decades of received wisdom, bogus myth-making, and corporate propaganda to reveal a cast of characters whose entertainment value exceeds that of their creations."

From Publishers Weekly

How American cartoons reflect American culture and vice versa is the subject of an entertaining and informative study by former Time staffer Kanfer. Although the sections on recent cartoon history (covering slick studio fare like Toy Story as well as MTV stars Beavis and Butt-head) are less colorful than the history of the early years, Kanfer's tone is steady throughout. From the beginning, animated shorts utilized painful stereotypes: the first real animated motion picture, Humorous Phases of a Funny Face, ends as "[t]he words Coon and Cohen become caricatures of an African American and a Jew." This tradition continued as animators struggled to find a more appropriate application for their art, with many of them switching from human subjects to animals or objects in order to spotlight special effects. Kanfer gives brief, helpful background on Walt Disney and weighs how the early efforts of Mickey Mouse's creator differed from the popular cartoons of the day, including Disney's predilection for rural farm settings while most others set their work in cities. Disney was no stranger to the use of damaging racial and ethnic caricatures, however. In "The Three Little Pigs" the wolf wore rabbinical dress and spoke with a heavy Yiddish accent. The births of many popular characters provide amusing anecdotes: Daffy Duck, for example, was given his characteristic sputtering voice as a dig at a Warner Brothers executive who conducted impromptu inspections of the animators' workplace and suffered from a terrible speech impediment, and Chuck Jones credited some of Mark Twain's writing with providing the inspiration for Wile E. Coyote. Even though Kanfer's story slows a little at the end, it is thoroughly engaging throughout.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Scribner; First. edition (April 7, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0684800799
• ISBN-13: 978-0684800790
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,518,102 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good book, but not a great one., September 5, 1997

By 

T. Dahm "burgeltz" (Plano, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: SERIOUS BUSINESS: The Art and Commerce of Animation in America from Betty Boop to Toy Story (Hardcover)

A good read, but not the great book it could have been. It could easily have been twice as long. Early chapters are strongest. Strong on Disney. Would like to have seen more on Looney Tunes

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great intro to American animation history!, July 11, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: SERIOUS BUSINESS: The Art and Commerce of Animation in America from Betty Boop to Toy Story (Hardcover)

Well written, concise survey of American animation history. The only slights are that he doesn't have much to say on non-Disney animated efforts of the past decade, especially television animation, and that too many pages praise the horrendous UPA 'toons. Otherwise, this is a great intro to a neglected sector of American culture. If you want to learn about cartoons without buying a separate book on each major company, this should be your choice

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic book on the birth and rise and fall of the great animators., April 16, 2010

By 

Daniel Burke "The Figure Coach" (Orlando, Florida) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Serious Business: The Art And Commerce Of Animation In America From Betty Boop To Toy Story (Paperback)

From the very beginning of animation, to the great rivalries, to the rise and fall of many great animation houses--this book tells it in a clear and engaging way.
Superb book to learn the history of animation and what made it tick.
A great read. Well worth the time to read.