A new feature-length documentary from director and producer Kevin Schreck, “Animation Mavericks: The Forgotten Story of UPA,” is scheduled for release later this year. The project was announced Thursday night at a panel discussing the history of the groundbreaking animation studio at Old Town Music Hall in El Segundo.
Animation Mavericks explores the origins and legacy of the innovative and iconoclastic studio that created characters such as Mr. Magoo and Gerald McEwing Boing. Founded in 1941 by former Disney animators, the studio was located in a John Lautner-designed building next to Burbank’s Smoke House Restaurant. The film introduced a minimalist form of animation that captured the mid-century style of the time, and won an Oscar for Best Animated Short Film, with three out of 15 nominations. In the 1960s, UPA produced the television classic “Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol,” the prime-time series “Mr. Magoo’s Famous Adventures,” and the theatrical feature film “Gay Pearly,” written by Chuck Jones.
Shrek worked with animation director/producer Rachel Gitrevich. Executive producer Tim Finn and producer Sylvie Bostrow, granddaughter of UPA co-founder Steve Bostow and daughter of Tee Bostow. Tee Bostow began work on the UPA documentary more than 20 years ago, but it remained unfinished and the documentary is being produced in partnership with the Bostow Estate.
“‘Animated Mavericks’ marks my return to filmmaking based on film history for the first time in more than a decade,” said Schreck. “I was interested in this subject because I felt this history was both timely and timeless. Audiences are transported back to the 1930s, ’40s, and ’50s as studios and studio chiefs collide and innovate. Labor organizing, the Red Scares, and the revolutionary modernist art movement all take center stage in this fascinating and unearthed telling of UPA’s history.”
“As both film historians and animation enthusiasts, Kevin and I are grateful to have had the blessing and collaboration of the Bostow family in the production of Animated Mavericks,” said Finn. “There has never been a major feature-length documentary that tells the story of this important chapter in cinema, so we are honored to be the first.”
More information about Animation Mavericks, its official debut, staff, and upcoming festival screenings can be found at Instagram.com/AnimationMavericks.
