In today's world of instant information everyone knows everything about cartoon voices. Animation is a huge business, and Voice Actors are respected. But it wasn't always so.
For thirty years before the TV age, countless "Classic Era" cartoons from 1928 to 1970 were seen in movie theatres before the main feature. During that Golden Age, virtually every cartoon voice actor (with the notable exception of the great Mel Blanc), was resigned to being totally anonymous. Despite creating immortal voices like Droopy, Popeye, Elmer Fudd or Betty Boop, the actors' names simply didn't appear on screen.
This book is the first to explore the development of voice artistry from the birth of sound movies to the dawn of TV cartoons, when "voices" finally got screen credit.
Documented in this exhaustively researched history is the full story of how acting for cartoons slowly changed from squawks and grunts into an art form. From the earliest days when animators themselves were the only voices, through the gradual hiring of professional radio actors, this book finally names the many artists who were unknown for four decades.
Illustrated with rare mugshots of hitherto unknown voices, Volume One is the studio-by-studio saga of how cartoon voice acting took off. Volume Two is the reference section, with insanely detailed voice credits for thousands of cartoons from top animation studios of the Classic Era. Animation fans can finally learn the full story in Cartoon Voices of the Golden Age, with never before told insights into one of the most undocumented areas of film history.
Keith Scott has spent over forty years as an internationally recognized cartoon voice actor and impressionist. He narrated two George of the Jungle movies, and was the voice of both Bullwinkle J. Moose and the Narrator in The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle. He is the author of The Moose That Roared and many articles on animation and Hollywood radio history.