- Born
- Died
- Birth nameArthur Gardner Rankin Jr.
- Arthur Rankin Jr. was born on July 19, 1924 in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. He was a producer and director, known for The Last Unicorn (1982), Willy McBean and His Magic Machine (1965) and The Hobbit (1977). He was married to Olga Karlatos and Elizabeth Deland. He died on January 30, 2014 in Harrington Sound, Bermuda.
- SpousesOlga Karlatos(1983 - January 30, 2014) (his death, 2 children)Elizabeth Deland(October 1947 - ?) (divorced, 2 children)
- ChildrenArthur Gardner Rankin IIITodd Fraser Rankin
- The characters in his stop motion works resemble dolls with spheroid body parts.
- Always worked with Jules Bass
- [stop-motion] Three fourths of his films and TV specials/shows used stop motion animation.
- Frequently casted Paul Frees.
- The narrators in his films would always appear on screen as a character and often do at least one song in the film.
- Son of actor/writer Arthur Rankin.
- Retired, living on Harrington Sound, Bermuda.
- He started out as an art director at ABC in the late 1940s, painting sets and doing graphic design.
- Grandson of Harry Davenport and Phyllis Franklin. Great-grandson of McKee Rankin. Half-nephew of Dorothy Davenport and Wallace Reid, half-cousin of Wallace Reid Jr..
- With Jules Bass, produced and directed 'The Hobbit (1977)(TV)' and 'The Return of the King (1980)(TV)', both of which were later remade as live-action films by Peter Jackson. Both films also feature some casting similarities. Rankin and Bass hired Orson Bean to be the voice of Bilbo, and later Frodo as well. The older Bilbo in Jackson's film is played by Ian Holm, largely on account of his having played Frodo in the BBC Radio version. The three trolls in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012) are all voiced by actors who also play one of the dwarves. Rankin and Bass's version did the same, although the actors do not play the same dwarves in both versions.
- It's hard to be good at anything. If you're passionate, the chances are that you will find a job that will make you happy.
- In all our pictures, we had an antagonist who becomes the good guy, and the underdog fulfills his quest.
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