Richard Fleischer

Richard Fleischer
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Name	Richard Fleischer

Some of the information is Boop-Oop-a-Dooping full of SPOILERS. Boop-Oop-a-Doop!

Richard Fleischer

Richard Fleischer

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Richard Fleischer (December 8, 1916 – March 25, 2006) was an American film director. Richard Fleischer was born in Brooklyn, the son of Essie (née Goldstein) and animator/producer Max Fleischer.

After graduating from Brown University, he went to Yale School of Drama where he met his future wife Mary Dickson. His film career began in 1942 at the RKO studio, directing shorts, documentaries, and compilations of forgotten silent features, which he called Flicker Flashbacks.

He won an Academy Award as producer of the 1947 documentary Design for Death. Richard was chairman of Fleischer Studios, which today handles the licensing of Betty Boop and Koko the Clown.

Grim Natwick,^[1] the person who originally created Betty Boop in 1930, learned that Max Fleischer had given a license to a third party King Features Syndicate^[2] to use Betty and that he did not actually own any portion of the character. After asking about royalties, he and Richard Fleischer had a falling out.

Natwick felt he had been duped and embezzled by Fleischer Studios and the third party. Natwick was unable to prove his ownership, hence he lost.^[3]

In 1995, he hosted Betty Boop's 65th Anniversary Festival, a two-hour show, which also showcased Betty's cartoons.

In June 2005, he released his memoirs of his father's career in Out of the Inkwell: Max Fleischer and the Animation Revolution. He died in his sleep at age 89, after having been in failing health for the better part of a year. Richard's place has chairman has been taken over by his son Mark Fleischer.

Quotes

Richard Fleischer: "They encouraged my father to put his talents and skills together to make cartoons more graceful." (Betty Boop: Queen of Cartoons)

Richard Fleischer: "They were never cartoons made for children, they were always cartoons that were made for adults and of course that got them in trouble later on." (Betty Boop: Queen of Cartoons)

Richard Fleischer: "The script for Dizzy Dishes called for a female entertainer to play opposite Bimbo. Since Bimbo was a dog, Max devised a character that was half dog and half human female. In its first appearance the character was nameless, but what a character is was gross, ugly with an enormous bouncy behind. However it did have round, saucer-like eyes and shapely feminine legs." (Out of the Inkwell: Max Fleischer and the Animation Revolution)

Richard Fleischer: "Since my father's death in 1972, Grim Natwick, one of the Fleischer Studios' oldest and most talented animators as often been quoted as claiming to be creator of Betty Boop. But before his death, my father has sworn under oath, in two lawsuits that he, Max Fleischer was the sole creator of the character. He acknowledged that many animators contributed to her development, not just Natwick but Seymour Kneitel, Myron Waldman, Doc Crandall, Ted Sears, Willard Bowsky, and Al Eugster. I find it more than passing strange that, to my knowledge at least, Natwick never made such a claim when my father was alive." (Out of the Inkwell: Max Fleischer and the Animation Revolution)

Richard Fleischer: "A piece of sound film made in 1928 was dredged up proving that a black nightclub entertainer named Baby Esther was singing 'Boop-Oop-a-Doop' long before Helen Kane."^[4] (2005)

Richard Fleischer: "Judge Edward J. McGoldrick ruled that Helen Kane had failed to prove that the defendants wrongfully appropriated her technique and ruled against her." (2005)

Richard Fleischer: "Mae Questel, Betty's voice was not the only one who looked like Betty Boop. The popular singer Helen Kane looked like her too. But then so did the movie star Clara Bow, the 'It' girl. And so did many thousands of other women." (2005)

Richard Fleischer: "My father, who was an avid spectator in the courtroom, that some days of the trial were actually hilarious, especially those when the lawyers, all well past middle age, started arguing about whether the phrase in question was Boop-Oop-a-Doop, Boop-Boop-De-Doop, Boop-a-Doop-Oop, Boopy-Doop-a-Doop, or whatever." (2005)

The Betty Boop Scrapped Film (1993)

In 1993 Richard Fleischer wanted to make a feature out of his father's star character Betty Boop but those plans were later canceled.

Scrapped Betty Boop TV Series (1996)

Richard was shopping a concept for a Betty Boop television series where she was a intergalactic flight attendant at Fred Wolf Films which had been seen is a design book in France, but it never came to fruition due to a conflict in budgets and licenses. Then due to the great profits earned by Betty Boop products. Harvey Publications attempted to sue for a percentage, claiming rights based on the original Paramount sale in 1959, They lost the suit.

Betty Boop CGI (2001-2002)

In 2001-2001 plans to make a Betty Boop CGI TV Series were planned but were later scrapped. Richard Fleischer said, artistic control of the new series remains with the family of the Fleischers in addition to the long list of licensed Betty Boop items, she is the image of lottery tickets in 16 states and Bally has her revolving animated image on casino slot machines. The papers stated this headline: "Watch out J.Lo, Christina, Britney, Jessica & Madonna here comes Betty - Betty Boop.