FELIX THE CAT
By Ava Wentworth
The Beginnings
One of the first most popular cartoon characters was Felix the Cat, created originally by Patrick Sullivan. After opening his own studio, Sullivan hired Otto Messmer who helped create the Felix the Cat we know today, which launched in 1919. Originally, Powers was publishing Sullivan’s Felix the Cat through Universal Studios, but switched to Paramount Pictures in 1919 when the character was launched with Messmer’s design changes. (Furniss, M. 2016) Felix made his first appearance in Feline Follies (1919) under the name “Master Tom” (Felix the Cat) and became so loved and popular that Sullivan and Messmer decided to give him his own show called Felix the Cat, which ran skits up until 1930 (Felix the Cat).
The Early 1900s
The 1900s was a transformative time in the United States. Though slavery ended in 1865 (National Geographic Society, 2013), the country was still struggling with accepting African Americans as “real people” despite their skin pigment. Racism was running rapid during this time, which influenced a lot of the characters we see in early animation. Felix the Cat was no exception, since we see a lot of racist commentary throughout the episodes. For example, during Felix’s debut in Feline Follies in 1919, he is presented under the name “Master Tom,” the word Master being heavily used during slavery to denote a power imbalance. Felix was always portrayed as very happy and go-lucky, despite the underlying, maybe even unintentional, undertones of the time period. Obviously, Felix is a black cat. The female cat he falls in love with in Feline Follies is a white cat. Him being called “Master Tom” and having the love interest be white and the main character be black can be a signal to the viewers that there was racism going on during the time of creation. Some may argue that they had no choice since color pigment was not introduced until at least ten years later with Walt Disney (Furniss, M. 2016), but I think it can be interpreted either way. Additionally, Felix himself is not the only way we can see racism in the cartoons. There is a specific scene that I will show a picture of down below where all of the townspeople, again silhouetted in black, are saying mean things because they are upset. The phrase that stood out to me was “Git outer that!” because of the dialect. It seems to me that they are trying to show that those people are different from the average because of how they talk, making them almost sound stupid or below that of the audience viewing, to get a laugh out of it. During this time, it was very common to belittle other races and ethnicities in order to be perceived as funny, and I think that is what is going on here too. (silentfilmhouse, 2012). Even at the end of Feline Follies, Felix sees that he is the father of a few litters of kittens from the white feline he is courting during the film. Upon realizing they are his, he runs away and sucks on an exhaust pipe until he inevitably kills himself. Again, during this time there was a stereotype that men of color would get a female pregnant and then leave because they would not want to be a father. Again, this does not represent how I feel or what I think in any way, just what was happening at the time. Felix does the same thing at the end of this cartoon and sees no other way out than to die. The goal was for it to obviously be funny, but it does exhibit some harsh stereotypes at the expense of laughter of the audience.
Another episode that shows racism and harsh stereotypes is the one they did called “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” I do not feel the need to go into too much detail concerning why, because I think it is evident through the screen cap I have shown below. The way the black characters are depicted are just not the same as the way the white characters are. They are goofier and almost uglier on purpose, which was deliberate.
Animation Techniques
A huge reason Felix the Cat was so loved and popular was because of the way he was animated. At the time, there was not much diversity in the way animators animated their characters. Especially after Felix, who served as a prototype for other animators, many of them animated their characters using the rubber-hose technique and did not give them much personality. Felix, on the other hand, was so loved because Messmer and Sullivan used personality animation to give Felix a developed sense of character. The audience loved him so much because they could relate to how he felt and enjoyed seeing the different ways Sullivan and Messmer displayed all the emotions he went through each skit. These two were some of the first to implement personality animation, which is why it was such a success. They were using techniques others were not, paired with the cutest character at the time, it created bounds unimaginable when they first started creating (Felix the Cat).
Moreover, Felix was a multifaceted character with depth that the audience, and maybe even the creators, were shocked to see. The audience quickly liked the Felix cartoons even more because many episodes would display different social issues present at the time, making it more relatable.
On top of that, the animation style was different than anyone had done previously, too. Aside from the emotion and personality animation technique, Messmer and Sullivan were known for morphing. In many, if not all, of the Felix cartoons there are objects that get morphed into other objects seamlessly, which was never before done. It made the illusion that the skit just kept going and going, which brought even more personality to Felix.
The Downfall
Since all good things must come to an end, Felix the Cat’s official downfall was in 1930 with the introduction of sound in cartoons. Sullivan did not want to compete with people like Disney, who entered the field in the 20s and were having massive success with implementing both color and sound into their cartoons (Moma Learning). Sullivan did not want to distribute Felix any longer, so he gave it to Copley Studios in 1929 (Felix the Cat) who kept creating cartoons with Felix for a year with sound. Inevitably, they flopped because they were not as good as the other sound cartoons coming out at the time. So, Sullivan officially ended production of Felix the Cat in 1930. Three years later, Sullivan died and no one resurrected Felix until about 20 years later with Joe Oriolo.
Fandom TV. (n.d.). Felix the cat. Felix The Cat. Retrieved February 4, 2022, from https://felixthecat.fandom.com/wiki/Felix_the_Cat
Furniss, M. (2016). A New History of Animation. Thames & Hudson.
MoMA. (n.d.). Moma Learning. MoMA. Retrieved February 4, 2022, from https://www.moma.org/learn/moma_learning/walt-disney-ub-iwerks-steamboat-willie-1928/#:~:text=Less%20than%20a%20decade%20after,cartoon%20and%20another%20smashing%20success.&text=Walter%20Elias%20Disney%20was%20born,a%20family%20of%20modest%20means.
National Geographic Society. (2013, November 8). Slavery is Abolished. National Geographic Society. Retrieved February 4, 2022, from https://www.nationalgeographic.org/thisday/dec18/slavery-abolished/#:~:text=Slavery%20is%20Abolished-,Dec%2018%2C%201865%20CE%3A%20Slavery%20is%20Abolished,people%2C%20from%20Kentucky%20to%20Delaware.
silentfilmhouse. (2012, March 7). Felix the cat - feline follies (1919) first felix film. YouTube. Retrieved February 4, 2022, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HskWL82GeQ
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