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IMDbPro

Otto Messmer(1892-1983)

  • Director
  • Additional Crew
  • Animation Department
IMDbProStarmeterSee rank
Cartoonist Otto Messmer was born in Union City (then known as West Hoboken), NJ, on Aug. 16, 1892. He showed an aptitude for drawing as early as grammar school, and his teachers encouraged him to follow that path. After graduating he took a correspondence course in art and attended the Thomas School of Art in New York City. He took a job with an advertising agency, illustrating fashion catalogs, but never lost his passion for drawing. One day his brother took him to a vaudeville act that showed the films of pioneering animator Winsor McCay and Messmer knew what career path he was going to follow. He began drawing his own comic strips and submitting them to newspapers. He also applied to several animation studios in New York for work as a set painter. Producer Jack Cohn at Universal saw Messmer's comic strips, however, liked them and hired him as an animator.

Messmer devised a character called "Motor Mat", a daredevil race driver, and brought it to Cohn. Cohn showed it to well-known animators Pat Sullivan and Henry 'Hy' Mayer, who were so impressed with it that they both asked Messmer to work with them. Messmer chose Mayer and helped him animate his series "The Travels of Teddy", based on the exploits of Mayer's friend Theodore Roosevelt. After Messmer finished that project he went to work for Pat Sullivan. Unfortunately for both of them, Sullivan was arrested for rape in 1917, convicted and sentenced to two years in prison. Messmer went back to Hy Mayer, but was soon drafted into the army and fought in World War I, returning to the US in 1919. By that time Sullivan was out of prison, and the two went back to making animated films.

Later that year Sullivan and Messmer received an order from Paramount Screen Magazine, which made news, travelogue and cartoon shorts, to create a cartoon character (the animator it had originally contracted with was late turning it in) and Sullivan told Messmer to do it on his own. Messmer made the character a sassy, all-black cat and called the cartoon "Feline Follies". It was quite successful and Paramount ordered an entire series of the cat's adventures. Messmer originally called the character "Master Tom" but by the third entry in the series the name had changed to Felix (a combination of "feline" and "felicity").

In 1921 Paramount Pictures decided to close down its Screen Magazine division, and Sullivan managed to get back the rights to Felix the Cat, which had actually belonged to Paramount (even though Sullivan's studio had created it). He then went to Warner Bros. to try to get a distribution deal, but the studio wasn't interested. However, M.J. Winkler, the secretary to Harry Warner, was interested and she and Sulivan eventually signed a production/distribution deal for the Felix the Cat series.

The first entry under the deal was Felix Saves the Day (1922), and it wasn't long before the series was an even bigger hit than it was under Paramount, even managing to secure distribution in Canada. The Messmer/Winkler Felix cartoons were praised for their imagination, humor, puns and intelligence. The success of the series resulted in the company securing an international distribution deal in 1922 that required more than double the number of entries from the previous year, with the resultant expansion of the studio.

Felix was a huge hit with the public, which took him to heart. In 1923 the company turned Felix into a comic strip, which ran until 1943. The strip was popular, but never achieved the status of the cartoons. In addition, the international distribution made the character a worldwide hit.

Felix's popularity began to wane with the coming of sound. Rather than jump wholeheartedly into sound cartoons, as Walt Disney did, Sullivan simply added sound effects to some new Felix films (and went back and did the same to some older entries). The result was shoddy and not up to the standards of the Disney sound cartoons. By 1931 Felix had been eclipsed by a new character, which incorporated both sound effects and dialogue as integral parts of the film, and not just add-ons: Mickey Mouse.

Television revived Felix's career, and new cartoons were created especially for that medium. This time he didn't carry the films alone--he was accompanied by his bulldog Rock Bottom, the eccentric Professor, his somewhat nerdy nephew Poindexter and his "Magic Bag of Tricks".

Otto Messmer died on October 28, 1983, in Fort Lee, NJ, at 91 years of age.
BornAugust 16, 1892
DiedOctober 28, 1983(91)
BornAugust 16, 1892
DiedOctober 28, 1983(91)
IMDbProStarmeterSee rank
Add photos, demo reels
  • Awards
    • 1 win total

Known for

Woos Whoopee (1928)
Felix in Hollywood
6.5
Short
  • Director
  • 1923
Felix Finds Out (1924)
Felix Finds Out
6.1
Short
  • Director
  • 1924
Felix the Cat Flirts with Fate
5.7
Short
  • Director
  • 1926
Felix Gets the Can (1925)
Felix Gets the Can
6.1
Short
  • Director
  • 1925

Credits

Edit
IMDbPro

Director



  • Los comienzos de la animación (1995)
    Los comienzos de la animación
    Video
    • Director (segment "Felix in Fairyland", uncredited)
    • 1995
  • Backyard Serenade
    Short
    • Director
    • 1931
  • Tee Time (1930)
    Tee Time
    5.5
    Short
    • Director
    • 1930
  • April Maze (1930)
    April Maze
    4.7
    Short
    • Director
    • 1930
  • Skulls and Sculls (1930)
    Skulls and Sculls
    5.1
    Short
    • Director
    • 1930
  • Oceantics (1930)
    Oceantics
    6.1
    Short
    • Director
    • 1930
  • Hootchy Cootchy Parlais Vous
    4.4
    Short
    • Director
    • 1930
  • Forty Winks (1930)
    Forty Winks
    6.1
    Short
    • Director
    • 1930
  • False Vases (1929)
    False Vases
    5.5
    Short
    • Director
    • 1929
  • One Good Turn (1929)
    One Good Turn
    6.1
    Short
    • Director
    • 1929
  • Woos Whoopee (1928)
    Woos Whoopee
    6.4
    Short
    • Director
    • 1928
  • The Last Life
    Short
    • Director
    • 1928
  • Jungle Bungles (1928)
    Jungle Bungles
    7.2
    Short
    • Director
    • 1928
  • Astronomeous (1928)
    Astronomeous
    6.2
    Short
    • Director
    • 1928
  • Woos Whoopee (1928)
    Futuritzy
    5.7
    Short
    • Director
    • 1928

Additional Crew



  • Felix the Cat (1958)
    Felix the Cat
    6.7
    TV Series
    • original creator
    • 1958–1961

Animation Department



  • Bold King Cole (1936)
    Bold King Cole
    6.0
    Short
    • animator (uncredited)
    • 1936
  • Oceantics (1930)
    Oceantics
    6.1
    Short
    • animator (uncredited)
    • 1930
  • Felix the Cat Dines and Pines (1927)
    Felix the Cat Dines and Pines
    6.0
    Short
    • animator (uncredited)
    • 1927
  • Felix Gets the Can (1925)
    Felix Gets the Can
    6.1
    Short
    • animator
    • 1925
  • Felix Finds Out (1924)
    Felix Finds Out
    6.1
    Short
    • animator
    • 1924
  • Felix Goes West (1924)
    Felix Goes West
    5.7
    Short
    • animator
    • 1924
  • Felix Doubles for Darwin (1924)
    Felix Doubles for Darwin
    6.0
    Short
    • animator (as Otto Messner)
    • 1924
  • Woos Whoopee (1928)
    Felix in Hollywood
    6.5
    Short
    • animator
    • 1923
  • Felix Win's Out (1923)
    Felix Win's Out
    5.6
    Short
    • animator
    • 1923
  • Charley on the Farm (1919)
    Charley on the Farm
    4.4
    Short
    • animator
    • 1919
  • Charley at the Beach (1919)
    Charley at the Beach
    4.7
    Short
    • animator
    • 1919
  • Charley Out West (1919)
    Charley Out West
    4.5
    Short
    • animator
    • 1919
  • Charlie Treats 'Em Rough
    Short
    • animator
    • 1919
  • Charlie in Turkey (1919)
    Charlie in Turkey
    5.0
    Short
    • animator
    • 1919
  • Over the Rhine with Charlie (1918)
    Over the Rhine with Charlie
    Short
    • animator
    • 1918

Personal details

Edit
  • Alternative name
    • Otto Messner
  • Born
    • August 16, 1892
    • Union City, New Jersey, USA
  • Died
    • October 28, 1983
    • Fort Lee, New Jersey, USA(undisclosed)
  • Spouse
    • Anne Mason1912 - 1971 (her death)
  • Publicity listings
    • 1 Biographical Movie
    • 2 Articles

Did you know

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  • Trivia
    Daughters Doris and Jeanne.

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