John W. Dunn

Who was John W. Dunn?

John W. Dunn was a Scottish screenwriter and animator for animated cartoons, from 1955 to 1983.

Dunn began his career at the Walt Disney cartoon studio, where his first story credit—Man in Space—received an Oscar nomination. He moved to Warner Brothers Cartoons in 1960; there, he began with The Pied Piper of Guadalupe, which was also nominated for an Oscar. He and fellow Disney man David Detiege replaced Warner Brothers top writers Michael Maltese and Warren Foster after they went to Hanna Barbera to receive higher billing in the sixties. He usually worked under Friz Freleng and Chuck Jones' units.

After the Warner's cartoon studio closed in 1963, Dunn joined DePatie-Freleng Enterprises; in 1964, he crafted the story for The Pink Phink, which earned the Oscar as Best Animated Short. Many of his DePatie-Freleng cartoons re-use plots from Warner Brothers cartoons. He was a prolific story man over the next 19 years and also did some animation work for the 1967 Spider-Man cartoon series.

Dunn died in San Fernando, California of heart failure in 1983.