TOM AND JERRY have been chasing each other around on movie screens since Feb. 10, 1940, when their MGM cartoon series premiered.
The cat & mouse rivals were latecomers to the cartoon movie universe. Walt Disney’s Mickey Mouse started playing in 1928 and Donald Duck had been getting laughs since 1934. Warner Bros. launched LOONEY TUNES in 1930 and MERRIE MELODIES a year later with Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig & Daffy Duck. Universal’s WOODY WOODPECKER joined the animated pack in the fall of 1940.
Tom & Jerry was created by William Hanna & Joseph Barbera, who were at MGM when Louis B. Mayer decided to replace the studio’s CAPTAIN AND THE KIDS cartoons with something moviegoers would find funnier. Hanna & Barbera came up with a battling fox and dog concept but quickly turned it into cat vs. mouse combat. They got a green light for one cartoon from Fred Quimby, who ran MGM’s short films unit and really wasn’t very excited about their idea. That episode, PUSS GETS THE BOOT, revolved around a cat called Jasper and a nameless mouse. It unexpectedly generated great feedback. Quimby suddenly became one of the series’ producers. And the rest, as they say in Hollywood, is history.
T&J went on to star in 114 MGM shorts from 1940-58. Academy members loved them and, over the years, voted the series seven Best Animated Short Film Oscars — matching the seven wins for Disney’s SILLY SYMPHONIES series from 1929-39. MGM stopped making cartoons in 1957 but had 13 more T&J’s produced independently by Rembrandt Films in 1961 and ’62.
T&J was so popular they beat LOONEY TUNES as Hollywood’s top-grossing animated series. When LOONEY animator Chuck Jones’s career at WB ended in 1962, he started his own company and produced 34 T&J’s for MGM from 1963-to 67. In the 2000s, three more T&J’s were filmed, bringing the grand total to 164 episodes.
From 1975 – to 2021 T&J cartoons were the basis for several TV series and, in 1992, a new feature film, TOM, AND JERRY: THE MOVIE, was released. Ten years later, 13 new direct-to-video films were produced starring the slapstick duo.
Then in February 2021, T&J was back on the big screen in the live-action & animated theatrical feature TOM & JERRY. Directed by Tim Story (FANTASTIC FOUR) and starring Chloë Grace Moritz, it cost nearly $80M to produce and opened as moviegoing was finally resuming after many pandemic months. Audiences needed a little fun — and TOM & JERRY was just what the doctor ordered!