Stupid Guest Tricks

http://movies.yahoo.com/mv/news/ap/2008 ... 88000.html

The only person Shulz authorized to animate his "Peanuts" characters...

And an animator for everyone from Disney to WB...



Wow....

Bill Melendez was simply one of the best animators in the industry. He worked on Fantasia and Bambi (and several shorts) for Disney, more classic shorts with Warner Bros (credited as C.Melendez),and UPA.
But it is his association with Charles Schulz's beloved "Peanuts" characters where he will be best remembered.
It started off as advertising work for an ad agency. (At the moment I can't remember which agency it was.) This agency had the account for Ford and Ford wanted to use the "Peanuts" characters to advertise the Ford Falcon. Schulz liked Bill Melendez's approach to animating the characters. He was faithful to strip and didn't try to take them out that world.
This led to the opening bumpers to the Tennessee Ernie Ford show and then to a little Christmas special that made network programmers nervous (because of the religious aspect) and advertisers balk. That program was "A Charlie Brown Christmas".
Bill Melendez and his production company was (and continues to be) the sole animation company for the "Peanuts" characters. From commercials to feature films,they have done it all.
Bill Melendez was also the voice of Snoopy and Woodstock. He was the only adult voice for many years in the "Peanuts" specials. I will miss that wonderful Snoopy laugh.
I had the fortune of meeting Bill Melendez a few years ago at the Chuck Jones Gallery in Newport Beach (now in Old Town Orange). He was so warm and loved my choice of a "Peanuts" cell (of Snoopy laughing as he is putting a hapless Woodstock in a copy machine). He even signed a small coin purse- an old promo item of his company- that was found buried in a file cabinet at where I work.(Knott's)
You were a good man Bill Melendez. :snoopy3: