Duelling Shakespeareans

It's not clear why Alex Ignatiev and Paul Carlson are pictured below the fold in Shakespearean garb ...

At the time of this drawing in 1956, Alex Ignatiev, who had started in animation at Disney in 1937, had just returned to the studio after over a decade at other houses, including Warners, Cascade, UPA and Walter Lantz. In the 1960s he animated and did layouts for Hanna-Barbera, and later worked for Bakshi-Krantz, Fred Calvert, Ruby-Spears and Filmation, before retiring in 1981. He picked up a Golden Award in 1987, and died in 1995.

Paul Carlson had started at Disney as an inbetweener two years previous, and had worked on the "spaghetti kiss" from Lady And The Tramp. He also assisted "Nick" Nichols in the studio's commercial unit. During this time he also illustrated six How to Draw books for Disney. Paul worked with UPA, Quartet Films and Chuck Jones Productions throughout the 1960s. After incorporating as Paul Carlson Cartoons he did Disney film strips, science and flight instruction films and over one hundred TV commercials featuring Mr. Magoo as a spokesman for various products. Since 1998 Paul has been giving cartoon drawing lessons at art schools and galleries throughout the United States and Australia. Last year he picked up his Golden Award, in the same "graduating class" class as our artist, John Sparey.