Genndy Tartakovsky

Genndy Tartakovsky (born Gennady Borisovich Tartakovsky; January 17, 1970) is a Russian-American animator, director, producer, screenwriter, storyboard artist, comic book writer and artist. He is the creator of the Cartoon Network animated television series Dexter's Laboratory, Samurai Jack and Star Wars: Clone Wars.

He is also known for co-creating Sym-Bionic Titan and directing the animated Hotel Transylvania film trilogy. Additionally, Tartakovsky was a pivotal crew member of The Powerpuff Girls, and worked on other notable series such as Tiny Toon Adventures and Batman: The Animated Series.

Although his Russian name Геннадий is normally transliterated as Gennady or Gennadiy, he changed its spelling to Genndy after moving to the U.S.

Early life
Tartakovsky was born January 17, 1970, in Moscow, to Jewish parents. His father, Boris, worked as a dentist for government officials and the Soviet Union national ice hockey team. Genndy felt that his father was a very strict and old-fashioned man, but their relationship was very special. His mother, Miriam, was an assistant principal at a school. He also has a brother, Alexander, who is two years older and a computer consultant in Chicago. Before coming to the United States, his family moved to Italy. There, Tartakovsky was first drawn to art, inspired by a neighbor's daughter. Tartakovsky later commented, "I remember, I was horrible at it. For the life of me, I couldn't draw a circle".

Tartakovsky's family moved to the United States when he was seven due to concerns about the effect of antisemitism on their children's lives. The family originally settled in Columbus, Ohio and later moved to Chicago. He was greatly influenced by the comics he found there; his first purchase was an issue of Super Friends. Tartakovsky began attending Chicago's Eugene Field Elementary School in the third grade. School was difficult because he was recognized as a foreigner. He went on to attend Chicago's prestigious Lane Technical College Prep High School, and says he didn't fit in until his sophomore year. When he was 16, his father died of a heart attack. Afterwards, Genndy and his family moved to government-funded housing, and he began working while still attending high school.

To satisfy his ambitious family, which was encouraging him to be a businessman, Tartakovsky tried to take an advertising class. However, he signed up late and had little choice over his classes. He was assigned to take an animation class, and this led to his study of film at Columbia College Chicago before moving to Los Angeles to study animation at the California Institute of the Arts (with his friend Rob Renzetti) and there he also met Craig McCracken. At CalArts, Tartakovsky directed and animated two student films, one of which became the basis for Dexter's Laboratory. After two years at CalArts, Tartakovsky got a job at Lapiz Azul Productions in Spain on Batman: The Animated Series. There, "he learned the trials of TV animation, labor intensive and cranking it out". While he was in Spain, his mother died of cancer.

Career
Craig McCracken acquired an art director job at Hanna-Barbera for the show 2 Stupid Dogs and recommended hiring Rob Renzetti and Tartakovsky as well. This was a major turning point in Tartakovsky's career. Hanna-Barbera let Tartakovsky, McCracken, Renzetti and Paul Rudish work in a trailer in the parking lot of the studio, and there Tartakovsky started creating his best-known works. Dexter's Laboratory grew out of a student film with the same title that he produced while at the California Institute of the Arts. Tartakovsky also co-wrote and pencilled the 25th issue of the Dexter's Laboratory comic book series, titled "Stubble Trouble". Additionally, he helped produce The Powerpuff Girls, co-directed several episodes, and served as the animation director and a cinematographer for The Powerpuff Girls Movie. Both projects were nominated repeatedly for Emmy Awards, with a third project, Samurai Jack finally winning "Outstanding Animated Program (For Programming Less Than One Hour)" in 2004 – the same year he would win in the category for Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming One Hour or More) for Star Wars: Clone Wars.

Star Wars creator George Lucas hired Tartakovsky to direct Star Wars: Clone Wars, a successful animated microseries taking place between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith. The series won three Emmy awards: two for "Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming One Hour or More)" in 2004 and 2005, and another for "Outstanding Individual Achievement in Animation" (for background designer Justin Thompson in 2005). Tartakovsky was not involved in the follow-up series, and has no plans to work on future Star Wars projects.

In 2005, Tartakovsky was appointed creative president of Orphanage Animation Studios. In 2006, he was chosen as the director for a sequel to The Dark Crystal, but was replaced, and the film was later scrapped. Tartakovsky served as animation director on the pilot episode of Korgoth of Barbaria, which aired on Adult Swim in 2006 but was not picked up as a series. He also directed a series of anti-smoking advertisements, one for Nicorette in 2006 and two for Niquitin in 2008. In 2009, Tartakovsky created a pilot entitled Maruined for Cartoon Network's Cartoonstitute program, which was not picked up.

In 2009, it was announced that Tartakovsky would write and direct a Samurai Jack film from Fred Seibert's Frederator Studios, and J. J. Abrams' Bad Robot Productions. In June 2012, Tartakovsky said that he had a story to conclude the series, but the project had been shelved after Abrams moved on to direct Star Trek. In 2010, Tartakovsky created storyboards for Jon Favreau's Iron Man 2. He created a new series for Cartoon Network, Sym-Bionic Titan, between 2010 and 2011. He had hoped to expand on the initial season, but it was not renewed. On April 7, 2011, an animated prologue by Tartakovsky for the horror movie Priest premiered online.

In early 2011, Tartakovsky moved to Sony Pictures Animation, where he made his feature film directing debut with Hotel Transylvania (2012). In July 2012, he signed a long-term deal with Sony to develop and direct his own original projects. In June 2012, Sony announced that Tartakovsky was slated to direct a computer-animated Popeye feature. On September 18, 2014, Tartakovsky revealed an "animation test". In March 2015, Tartakovsky announced that despite the well-received test footage, he was no longer working on the project. He moved onto directing original story Can You Imagine?, announced in 2014, but it too was cancelled.

Tartakovsky directed a sequel to Hotel Transylvania, released in 2015. In December 2015, Adult Swim announced that Tartakovsky would return for a final season of Samurai Jack, during which he stepped away from Sony Pictures Animation. When the series finished airing in 2017, Tartakovsky returned to Sony and directed Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation (2018). After its financial success, two original projects were announced: an R-rated comedy called Fixed, and an action-adventure entitled Black Knight.