UPA (animation studio)
United Productions of America was an American production company for animated films.
History
Foundation
The UPA was created in 1944 from the Industrial Film and Poster Service, founded in the year. The wordenen dismissed following a strike in 1941 former Disney employee Zack Schwartz, David and Stephen Bosustow Hilberman had the 1944 animated film Hell- Bent for Election produced and directed by Chuck Jones, who campaigned for the reelection of President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Under the new name UPA they initially received some government contracts, with the beginning of the McCarthy era, these jobs failed to materialize, however. However, it was in the late 1940s to close a contract with Columbia Pictures. The very first produced for Columbia cartoons Robin Hoodlum and The Magic Fluke have been nominated for an Oscar. In 1949, the figure of Mister Magoo, the biggest success of the UPA. Two Magoo films received Academy Award; When Magoo Flew and Magoo's Puddle Jumper. Another Oscar received the based on a story by Dr. Seuss cartoon Gerald McBoing - Boing. Between 1949 and 1959, the productions of the UPA received a total of fifteen Oscar nominations.
1956 a contract to produce an animated television series by CBS was closed, among other things, to cooperate in the Ernest Pintoff and Jimmy T. Murakami. Due to financial difficulties sold Bosustow the UPA 1960 Henry G. Saperstein. Under Saperstein Mr. Magoo was adapted into a television series, film production, however, was completely set. 1964, the animation studio was closed but the UPA retained the rights to the successful figures Mr. Magoo and Gerald McBoing - Boing, while the rights to the resulting films at Columbia remained until 1959. In the 1970s and 1980s, the UPA was active only as a distributor for the Japanese Toho Studios.