Chuck Jones

Charles Martin Jones was born on September 21, 1912, in Spokane, Washington, to Mabel McQuiddy (née Martin) and Charles Adams Jones. When he was six months old, he moved with his parents and three siblings to Los Angeles, California.

In his autobiography, Chuck Amuck, Jones credits his artistic bent to circumstances surrounding his father, who was an unsuccessful businessman in California in the 1920s. He recounted that his father would start every new business venture by purchasing new stationery and new pencils with the company name on them. When the business failed, his father would quietly turn the huge stacks of useless stationery and pencils over to his children, requiring them to use up all the material as fast as possible. The children drew frequently, owing to the abundance of high-quality paper and pencils. Later, in one art school class, the professor gravely informed the students that they each had 100,000 bad drawings in them that they must first get past before they could possibly draw anything worthwhile. Jones recounted years later that this pronouncement came as a great relief to him, as he was well past the 200,000 mark, having used up all that stationery. Jones and several of his siblings went on to artistic careers.

During his artistic education, he worked part-time as a janitor. After graduating from Chouinard Art Institute, Jones got a phone call from a friend named Fred Kopietz, who had been hired by Ub Iwerks' studio Animated Pictures, and offered him a job. He worked his way up in the animation industry, starting as a cel washer; "then I moved up to become a painter in black and white, some color. Then I went on to take animator's drawings and traced them onto the celluloid. Then I became what they call an in-betweener, which is the guy that does the drawing between the drawings the animator makes". While at Iwerks, he met a cel painter named Dorothy Webster, who later became his first wife.

Warner Bros. Cartoons

Jones joined Leon Schlesinger Productions, the independent studio that produced Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies for Warner Bros. Pictures, in 1933 as an assistant animator. In 1935 he was promoted to animator and assigned to work with a new Schlesinger director, Tex Avery. There was no room for the new Avery unit in Leon Schlesinger's small studio, so Avery, Jones, and fellow animators Bob Clampett, Virgil Ross, and Sid Sutherland were moved into a small adjacent building they dubbed "Termite Terrace". In 1937, Jones' old boss Ub Iwerks was subcontracted to produce several Looney Tunes shorts for Schlesinger, with Clampett and Jones brought in to assist him. Iwerks completed only two shorts before he left, with Clampett taking his position soon after. Jones worked alongside Clampett as an animator and an uncredited co-director (or "supervisor", the original title for an animation director in the studio) before becoming a main director himself in 1938 when Frank Tashlin left the studio, a position that was initially offered to animator Robert McKimson. The following year, Jones created his first major character, Sniffles, a cute Disney-style mouse, who went on to star in twelve Warner Bros. cartoons.

Jones initially struggled in with his directorial style in his formative years. Unlike the other directors in the studio, Jones wanted to make cartoons that would rival the quality and tone to that of ones made by Walt Disney Productions. However, his cartoons suffered from sluggish pacing and a lack of any humor, with Jones himself later describing his early conception of timing and dialog to have been "formed by watching the action in the La Brea Tar Pits". Schlesinger and the studio heads were unsatisfied with his Disney-esque style and demanded him make cartoons that were funnier. Jones began to change his directorial style starting with the 1942 short The Draft Horse, but the cartoon that was generally considered his true turning point was The Dover Boys at Pimento University later that year. The short became highly regarded in recent years for its quick-timed gags and extensive use of stylized animation. Despite this, Schlesinger and the studios heads were still dissatisfied and begun the process to fire him, but because they were unable to find a replacement due to a labor shortage stemming from World War II, Jones kept his position.

Jones was actively involved in efforts to unionize the staff of Leon Schlesinger Productions. He was responsible for recruiting animators, layout men, and background people. Almost all animators joined, in reaction to salary cuts imposed by Schlesinger. The Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon studio had already signed a union contract, encouraging their counterparts under Schlesinger. In a meeting with his staff, Schlesinger talked for a few minutes, then turned over the meeting to his attorney. His insulting manner had a unifying effect on the staff. Jones gave a pep talk at the union headquarters. As negotiations broke down, the staff decided to go on strike. Schlesinger locked them out of the studio for a few days, before agreeing to sign the contract. A Labor-Management Committee was formed and Jones served as a moderator. Because of his role as a supervisor in the studio, he could not himself join the union.

During World War II, Jones worked closely with Theodor Geisel, better known as Dr. Seuss, to create the Private Snafu series of Army educational cartoons (the character was created by director Frank Capra). Jones later collaborated with Seuss on animated adaptations of Seuss' books, including How the Grinch Stole Christmas! in 1966. Jones directed such shorts as The Weakly Reporter, a 1944 short that related to shortages and rationing on the home front. During the same year, he directed UPA's second short subject Hell-Bent for Election, a propaganda campaign film for Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Jones created characters through the late 1930s, late 1940s, and the 1950s, which include his collaborative help in co-developing Bugs Bunny and also included creating Claude Cat, Marc Antony and Pussyfoot, Charlie Dog, Michigan J. Frog, Gossamer, and his four most popular creations, Marvin the Martian, Pepé Le Pew, Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner. Jones and writer Michael Maltese collaborated on the Road Runner cartoons, Duck Amuck, One Froggy Evening, and What's Opera, Doc?. Other staff at Unit A with whom Jones collaborated include layout artist, background designer, and co-director Maurice Noble; animator and co-director Abe Levitow; and animators Ken Harris and Ben Washam.

Jones remained at Warner Bros. throughout the 1950s, except for a brief period in 1953 when Warner closed the animation studio. During this interim, Jones found employment at Walt Disney Productions, where he teamed with Ward Kimball for four months. According to Kimball, Jones expected to work at Disney at a higher salary then at Warner Bros., but was instead employed at the same salary despite numerous negotiations with Walt Disney. Furthermore, Jones was not given directorial assignments but was instead assigned to assist Kimball on Sleeping Beauty (1959), which at the time was experiencing production delays.

Upon Warner Bros. Cartoons reopening, Jones was rehired and reunited with most of his unit. Despite the unsatisfying tenure, Jones still held the Disney studio in high regard, but later joked that the only job worth having at Disney belonged to Walt.

In the early 1960s, Jones and his wife Dorothy wrote the screenplay for the animated feature Gay Purr-ee. The finished film included the voices of Judy Garland, Robert Goulet, and Red Buttons as cats in Paris. The feature was produced by UPA and directed by Jones' former Warner Bros. collaborator, Abe Levitow. Jones was moonlighting to work on the film as he had an exclusive contract with Warner Bros. UPA completed the film and made it available for distribution in 1962, whereupon it was picked up by Warner Bros. When Warner Bros. discovered that Jones had violated his exclusive contract with them, they fired him. Jones's former animation unit was laid off after completing the final cartoon in their pipeline, The Iceman Ducketh, and the rest of the Warner Bros. Cartoons studio was closed in 1963.

In 1978, Jones's wife Dorothy died. He married Marian Dern, the writer of the comic strip Rick O'Shay, in 1981.