Felix
Movie 1919 · Felix the Cat (Pat Sullivan / Otto Messmer)
Wide-eyed black cat from the silent era whose surreal sight gags predated sound and predicted the entire animated-character format.
Nine years before Mickey Mouse, the world already had a famous cartoon cat. Felix the Cat first appeared in the Paramount silent short "Feline Follies" on 9 November 1919. Credit for his creation is split between studio owner Pat Sullivan and lead animator Otto Messmer; animation historians now generally credit Messmer with the design. Felix's silent-era sight gags — pulling shapes out of his own tail, walking inside his own thought-bubbles — established conventions later borrowed across the medium. In early 1928 RCA-NBC mechanical television experiments, a toy Felix figure mounted on a revolving phonograph turntable was used as the test image, making him the first widely-recognized character image transmitted by an American TV system.
116 words. Sources: see /methodology.
Tags
black-cat
animated
silent-film
historical
mickey-mouse-precursor
Names like Felix
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