BUTCH HARTMAN: BIOGRAPHY, SERIES AND TV SHOWS - BIOGRAPHIES - 2024

Butch Hartman (1965) is an American actor, producer and writer who gained worldwide fame for being the creator and executive producer of The Fairly Oddparents, an animated series that aired on Nickelodeon for 16 years.

Hartman is the creator of series like TUFF Puppy, Bunsen is a beast, HobbyKids, Or Danny Phantom, among others. He also owns his own production company, whose name is Billionfold Inc. His production company is primarily responsible for producing the shows Hartman creates.

Source: Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America, via Wikimedia Commons.

He is considered one of the most important figures of the animation renaissance stage. Period that began at the end of the 80s until the beginning of the XXI century.

Biography

Early years

Elmer Earl Hartman IV is the full name of the American actor and producer, who was born on January 10, 1965, in Highland Park, Michigan. Butch was the nickname he received when he was just a child. His entire youth was spent in his home state, Michigan. A part in Roseville and already in adolescence he lived in New Baltimore.

His studies began at Anchor Bay High School in New Baltimore, an institution from which he graduated in 1983 at the age of 18. She immediately enrolled in the California Institute of the Arts, which is located in Valencia, a neighborhood of the city of Santa Clarita.

Career path

As a student at the Institute of the Arts, Hartman managed to do an animating internship in the film An American Tale. After completing his academic training, Hartman began working as an animated character designer. Soon after, he was fired for his little experience.

Despite the setback, he had more opportunities in the art world. She worked alongside Ruby-Spears on Dink the Little Dinosaur and was part of the video group in charge of the movie Pocahontas.

As early as the early 1990s, Hartman joined the Hanna-Barbera animation studio. In this company he developed different roles. He was a writer, creator, director, and storyboard artist for various shows that aired on Cartoon Networks. His works include Dexter's Laboratory or Johnny Bravo.

At the end of his relationship with Hanna-Barbera, he moved to Nickelodeon, where he participated and created a large number of animated series.

Personal life

Butch Hartman has three younger brothers: Mike, Keith, and Timothy. The names of two of them appear in two of Hartman's most important works.

Timmy Turner, a character in The Fairly Oddparents, was named after his younger brother. Mikey, is a character from Bunsen is a beast, who was named that way by his brother Mike.

The producer and creator of animated series takes advantage of his popularity in the world of entertainment to contribute in social works. With his wife, he created the Casa Hartman Foundation in 2005. The goal of this foundation is to build homes for families in poverty-stricken areas.

With his Hartman foundation he has been able to travel to different countries, including Uganda and Guatemala. She has also organized Thanksgiving dinners for low-income families in the United States.

TV shows and series

Hartman's work has been present in a large number of films, television shows and, currently, in projects with a focus more aimed at content on multimedia platforms on the internet.

He was the writer and producer of several works on The Fairly Oddparents, was part of Pocahontas, and had a role as a character designer on one of the Scooby-Doo films.

His first television job occurred in the mid-1980s, thanks to his participation in Body Language. Over the years his role as a television producer grew and gained more opportunities.

He lent his voice in several chapters of Family Guy, a series by creator Seth MacFarlane, who became his friend when the two met on Hanna-Barbera. Johnny Bravo, The Fairly Oddparents, Droopy, Tom and Jerry or Dexter's Laboratory are just some of the works he participated in over the years.

For the internet he started developing products recently. In 2017, she made a short in which she was in charge of bringing together all the characters she created during her time at Nickelodeon. In 2019 her latest work, HobbyKids, was released, the chapters of which can be found on YouTube.

Nickelodeon

Success knocked on Butch Hartman's door in December 1997. That was when he created The Fairly Oddparents. At first, Hartman's characters were only short animations that were broadcast on a program that collected several productions.

In 2001 Nickelodeon decided to release The Fairly Oddparents as an independent series. It did not take long to become a success for the television network. He was second in importance to the channel, behind only SpongeBob.

In 2006 it was announced that production of the series had come to an end, but on February 2, 2007 Hartman confirmed the production of 20 new episodes. In the end, The Fairly Oddparents became the second-longest-running show on Nickelodeon. Only surpassed, again, by SpongeBob.

Second show

Thanks to the success of The Fairly Oddparents, Nickelodeon asked Hartman for another show. The producer came up with Danny Phantom and founded his company Billionfold Inc. in 2004 to produce the project. It is considered the best work of Hartman and had very good reviews and public acceptance. It only lasted until 2007.

Next steps

Between 2008 and 2009 Hartman was asked to produce a third show for the television network. TUFF was born then in 2010. After three seasons on the air the production was canceled.

Then it was the turn of Hartman's fourth Nickelodeon show called Bunsen is a Beast. It premiered in January 2017 and its last episode aired on February 8, 2018.

It was then that Hartman announced through his social networks that he was no longer part of Nickelodeon, a company of which he was part for 20 years.

Curiosities

One of the characters in Family Guy, bears his name. This is because Hartman is close friends with the series creator, Seth MacFarlane.

Butch Hartman's character in the animated series is Dr. Elmer Hartman, the Griffin family doctor. It appears in more than 100 chapters of the series. Butch Hartman even lent his voice in some chapters of the series.

References

1. Bancroft, T. (2006). Creating characters with personality. New York: Watson-Guptill.
2. Butch Hartman. (2006). Recovered from urbandictionary.com
3. Butch Hartman. (2006). The Hollywood Reporter, (365), 39.
4. Butch Hartman. Recovered from encyclopediadramatica.rs
5. Butch Hartman. Recovered from imdb.com