Brenda Banks, One Of The First Black Women Animators In America, Dies At 72
Brenda Banks, who has died aged 72, blazed a quiet trail through the animation world, building up an impressive résumé in an industry where few Black women had succeeded before. As an animator, she worked with directors such as Ralph Bakshi who claimed, erroneously, to have discovered her and on iconic characters like the Looney Tunes and The Simpsons. Known as a private person, Banks shied away from the spotlight, but her talent spoke for itself.
Although Banks passed away on December 31, 2020, the industry is only now learning of her death. This is largely thanks to historian and animator Tom Sito, who shared the news via Facebook, noting that he’d learned of her passing through the Animation Guild. It’s in this post particularly the comments left by others that we are now seeing a much clearer picture of the artist Banks was.
Bugs Bunny is trying to evade capture from Willoughby the hound in the 1941 cartoon
The Heckling Hare when the two end up falling off an impossibly tall cliff together. Plummeting towards the ground, a patchwork of farms below, they put their hands over their eyes, grab one another for support and desperately look for something to break their fall. They both seem doomed to end the episode in an animated splatter. Instead they land gently on their feet. With his carrot still in hand Bugs breaks the fourth wall: Fooled you, didn t we?
Australian businesses are facing a Bugs Bunny-style cliff hanger.