Gerald POTTERTON

GERALD POTTERTON March 8, 1931 - August 23, 2022 Filmmaker, Gerald Potterton, died at the Brome-Missisquoi-Perkins Hospital in Cowansville, Quebec, on the evening of Tuesday, August 23, 2022, at the age of 91. A native of London, England, and student of the Hammersmith Art School, Gerald immigrated to Canada in 1954 to work alongside the pioneers of NFB animation. He created animation for NFB films in the fifties before directing his own classic shorts, including the Stephen Leacock adaptation My Financial Career (1962) and Christmas Cracker (1963, co-directed with Norman McLaren, Jeff Hale and Grant Munro), both nominated for Academy Awards. Gerald also made his mark in live-action comedy with The Ride (1963) and the multi-award-winning film-without-words The Railrodder (1965), starring the great Buster Keaten in one of his last film roles. Gerald returned to England to work on the animated Beatles feature Yellow Submarine (1968), followed by a collaboration with Harold Pinter on the innovative NBC TV special Pinter People, during which he began a lifelong friendship and collaboration with actor Donald Pleasence. Back in Canada, he formed Potterton Productions, a prolific independent production house for film and TV projects, including his Oscar Wilde adaption The Selfish Giant (1972), an animated short that netted him his third Oscar nomination. Gerald directed the feature The Rainbow Boys (1977) and the animated cult classic Heavy Metal (1981) for Columbia Pictures, supervising the work of more than 65 animators in Canada, England and the U.S. He also collaborated with the NFB again on his second Leacock adaptation, The Awful Fate of Melpomenus Jones (1983), and co-created the animated children's series Smoggies (1987-1990). In later years, he took up painting and was known for his historically accurate aviation painting and extraordinary skies. He remained active and prolific into the 21st century, continuing to develop film and TV projects as well as pursuing other artistic endeavours from his farm in Knowlton, Quebec. In 2020, he wrote and illustrated a popular children's book about Joseph-Armand Bombardier, L'homme des neiges, published by Éditions Québec Amérique. A member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts, Gerald was selected by the World Animation Celebration in 1998 as one of "Ten Men Have Rocked the Animation World". There have been over a dozen retrospectives and lifetimes honours for his work in recent years. Gerald is survived by his wife, Karen Marginson; his sister, Audrey Carney; ex-wife, Judith Merritt; sons, Richard and Oliver Potterton and Sam Christey; three grandchildren, Daniel, Charlotte and Kleio; as well as many nephews and a niece. He was predeceased by his brother, Reginald Potterton. Resting at the Desourdy Funeral Home, 318 ch. Knowlton Knowlton, QC J0E 1V0 450-243-5568 www.desourdy.ca on Wednesday, September 7, 2022, from 2 to 5 p.m. and 7 to 9 p.m. The funeral service will take place on Thursday, September 8, 2022 at 11 a.m., at the Creek United Church in West Bolton, QC, followed by the interment at the Hillhouse Cemetery. There will be a reception at the church hall following the service.