The Fox and the Crow are a pair of anthropomorphic cartoon characters created by Frank Tashlin for the Screen Gems studio. The characters, the dimwitted and gullible Fauntleroy Fox and the streetwise Crawford Crow, appeared in a sereis of animated short subjects released by Screen Gems through its parent company, Columbia Pictures, and were Screen Gems' most popular characters. Anthropomorphism, also referred to as personification or prosopopeia, is the attribution of human characteristics to inanimate objects, animals, forces of nature, and others. ... A fictional character is any person who appears in a work of fiction. ... Frank Tashlin (February 19, 1913 - May 5, 1972) was an animator, screenwriter, and director. ... Screen Gems is an American subsidiary company of Columbia Pictures Corp. ... A short film (also short or short subject) is a motion picture that is shorter than the average feature film. ... Columbia Pictures logo, used only from 1981-1993 Columbia Pictures, now Columbia TriStar Pictures after their merger with the former TriStar Entertainment in 1998, is a film production company, and part of Sony Pictures Entertainment. ...

Tashlin directed the first film in the series, the 1941 Color Rhapsody The Fox and the Grapes, a series of blackout gags based around the popular Aesop fable. Chuck Jones acknowledges this short, featuring the Fox hell-bent on retrieving a bunch of grapes in the possession of the crow as one of the inspirations for his popular Road Runner cartoons. 1941 was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will take you to calendar). ... The Fox and the Grapes is a fable attributed to Aesop. ... Aesops Fables or Aesopica refers to a collection of fables credited to Aesop (circa 620 BC – 560 BC), a slave and story-teller living in Ancient Greece. ... Charles Martin Chuck Jones (September 21, 1912–February 22, 2002) was an American animator, cartoon artist, screenwriter, producer, and director of animated films, most memorably of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts for the Warner Brothers cartoon studio. ... Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner The Road Runner cartoons are a series of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons created by Chuck Jones for Warner Brothers. ...

Although Tashlin directed no more films in the series, Screen Gems continued producing Fox and the Crow shorts, many of them directed by Bob Wickersham, until the studio was shut down in 1946. Screen Gems had acquired enough of a backlog of completed films that its final Fox and Crow shorts were not released until 1949. By that time, Columbia had already signed a distribution deal with a new animation studio, United Productions of America (UPA), who were contractially required to produce three Fox and the Crow films, Robin Hoodlum (1948), The Magic Fluke (1949), and Punchy DeLeon (1950), before being allowed to move on to produce films starring characters such as Mr. Magoo and Gerald McBoing Boing. All three UPA Fox and the Crow cartoons were directed by John Hubley. 1946 was a common year starting on Tuesday. ... 1949 is a common year starting on Saturday. ... The UPA opening title card from How Now Boing Boing (1954) The legacy of the United Productions of America animation studio, better known as UPA, has largely been forgotten in the wake of the animation renaissance of the 1990s; it has been overshadowed by the commercialization of Warner Bros. ... 1948 is a leap year starting on Thursday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1949 is a common year starting on Saturday. ... 1950 was a common year starting on Sunday (link will take you to calendar). ... Mr. ... Gerald McBoing-Boing is a 1951 animated short film about a little boy who can only speak in sound effects. ... John Hubley (May 21, 1914- February 21, 1977) was an animator and animation director known for both his formal experimentation and for his emotional realism which stemmed from his tendency to cast his own children as voice actors in his films. ...

The Fox and the Crow fared much better in comic books, were they starred in several funny animal comics published by DC Comics, from the 1940s well into the 1960s. A comic book is a magazine or book containing the art form of comics. ... Funny animal is a cartooning term for the genre of comics and animated cartoons in which the main characters are humanoid or talking animals. ... The current DC Comics logo, adopted in May 2005. ... // Events and trends The 1940s were dominated by World War II, the most destructive armed conflict in history. ... The 1960s, or The Sixties, in its most obvious sense refers to the decade between 1960 and 1969, but the expression has taken on a wider meaning over the past twenty years. ...

External link

• The Fox and the Crow at Don Markstein's Toonopedia