| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Animation |
| Founded | 1959 |
| Founder | Treadwell D. Covington W. Watts Biggers Chester "Chet" Stover Joe Harris |
| Defunct | 1969 |
| Successor | Library: DreamWorks Classics |
| Headquarters | New York, New York, USA |
| Products | Television shows Television commercials |
| Owner | Dancer Fitzgerald Sample |
Total Television was an American animation studio founded in 1959 by Buck Biggers, Chester "Chet" Stover, [1] Joe Harris, [2] [3] and Treadwell D. Covington. [3] They were executives in the advertising agency Dancer Fitzgerald Sample who had the account for the General Mills food corporation. Total was formed to create cartoon characters encouraging children to buy General Mills breakfast cereals and other products. The company mostly created cartoons for television networks such as NBC. Underdog , King Leonardo and His Short Subjects , and Tennessee Tuxedo and His Tales were among the most popular series made by the studio.
Animation for Total Television was originally sourced from TV Spots, but would switch to being produced by Gamma Productions as King Leonardo and His Short Subjects entered its second season (around 1961). [4]
Notable works under the Total Television banner include:
Much of Total Television's library for post-network syndication was handled by The Program Exchange, until the company shut down in 2016. The rights are currently owned by DreamWorks Classics/DreamWorks Animation (via Universal Pictures and NBCUniversal).
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Events in 1918 in animation.
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