Lou Scheimer, the founder of the Filmation cartoon studio, has died at the age of 84.
Scheimer passed away on Thursday, though the cause of death has not been reported, Variety notes. Scheimer did recently have quadruple bypass heart surgery and also had Parkinson's disease.
In 1963, Scheimer founded Filmation along with Hal Sutherland and Norm Prescott. The cartoon studio would go on to produce many popular and well-known cartoon series, including Sabrina, the Teenage Witch and The Archies. Scheimer also worked with Bill Cosby on Fat Albert.
According to Los Angeles Times, Filmation was one of the few studios in the 1980s that was resistant to sending animation work overseas.
Though, the studio was criticized for not being as stellar in animation, something that Scheimer addressed in a 1981 interview. He told the Times, "Given the demands of the network schedules, it's practically impossible to take all care and love we would like to do on the technical aspects."
Scheimer added, "We'd love to do theatrical shorts, and if you can find somebody to pay for them, let us know."
Filmation's first hit was The New Adventures of Superman, which the studio barely got to make. DC Comics wanted to visit the studio first, but at that point, there were few working there. So Scheimer called up people and they "filled the place up with people doing fake drawings."
Scheimer won a Daytime Emmy for producing the Star Trek cartoon. He won the Inkpot Award in 2012 at the San Diego Comic-Con.
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