Maurice Noble - MGM and Dr. Seuss

MGM and Dr. Seuss

In 1963, after Chuck Jones was fired from Warner Bros., Noble left Warner Bros. and joined Jones at Tower 12 Productions (also called Sib-Tower 12). This new company had a contract with MGM, and eventually became the animation unit of MGM.

The bread-and-butter work for the first couple of years was producing cartoons starring MGM's Tom and Jerry characters, but there were an assortment of other projects. One was The Incredible Mr. Limpet (1964), a combined live action & animation feature. Noble co-directed The Dot and the Line (1965) which won the Oscar for short subject (cartoon). He also designed the 1969 feature The Phantom Tollbooth.

Noble started working again with Ted Geisel for the first time since the war, doing the design for the TV feature How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (1966). He later did design and layout work on a number of other Dr. Seuss features, first at MGM (Horton Hears a Who! (1970)), and then at the DePatie-Freleng studios (e.g. The Cat in the Hat (1971), The Lorax (1972), Dr. Seuss on the Loose (1973)).