Felix the Cat is a popular cartoon character who first appeared in the early 1900s and became a movie star. He later rose to television fame in the 1950s and continues to appear in comic books and television shorts. The character has undergone many changes, and his early origins are somewhat obscure. The original Felix was inky black and angular, but he transformed into the plumper, jolly-looking cat people associate with him today. After fading into obscurity in the 1930s and 1940s, Felix was brought back to life as a television star in 1953 and continues to be popular today.
Felix the Cat is a popular feline cartoon character who is considered by some film historians to be one of the first movie stars. The character first appeared in the early 1900s and was very popular until the late 1920s. After a brief delay, Felix rose to television fame in the 1950s and continues to appear in comic books and television shorts. Like many cartoon characters, Felix the Cat has also undergone his fair share of metamorphoses, and the modern Felix is very different from the original.
Felix’s early origins are somewhat obscure. The animated cat came from the studio of Pat Sullivan, who claimed to have invented the cat and its characteristic style of movement. However, Felix the Cat is believed to have actually sprung from the mind of animator Otto Messmer. Messmer certainly animated most of the early Felix cartoons, and is said to have based the angular look and unsteady movement of the early cartoons on the movements of Charlie Chaplin, a popular entertainer of the period.
Felix’s first cartoon was Feline Follies in 1919. Initially, the cartoon cat did not have a name, although studio employees began to call him Master Tom. After some discussion, the name “Felix the Cat” was decided upon, referring to the Latin words for “cat” and “luck.” The original Felix the cat was inky black and angular, though in the 1920s he began to transform into the plumper, jolly-looking cat people associate with Felix today.
Both the shorts and the comics have featured Felix the Cat from the start. He quickly became a popular figure in American culture, drawing people to see his films and shorts about his cartoon star power. He is particularly associated with silent films, since Messmer drew Felix with a great deal of expressive mannerisms that didn’t require sound. In the 1920s, Felix began to be supplanted by the stars of the “talkies,” the first sound films, because the Sullivan studio initially objected to the concept.
In the 1930s and 1940s, Felix the Cat faded into obscurity, only to be brought back to life as a television star in 1953. The 1953 Felix was accompanied by a large cast of characters, along with an assortment of gags such as “Bag of Tricks.” The Felix cartoons are often found on television, and in the 1990s, the original Felix the Cat shorts also experienced a resurgence in popularity, as people became interested in the origins of the lovable cartoon cat. While more people are familiar with Mickey Mouse than Felix the Cat, it is said that the original creators of Mickey initially intended to create another cartoon cat, but felt that Mickey was no match for Felix, the superstar from the original cartoons.
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