Serge Danot (7 February 1931 – 23 December 1990) was a French animator and former advertising executive. He is best known for creating the animated series, ''
Le Manège enchanté
''Le Manège enchanté'' (British English: "The Magic Roundabout", American English: "The Magic Carousel") is a popular French animated children's television series of hundreds of episodes each five minutes long, which premiered on October 5, 196 ...
'' in 1964, which became known in its 1965 English-language version, written and narrated by actor
Eric Thompson for the BBC as ''
The Magic Roundabout
''The Magic Roundabout'' is an English-language children's television programme that ran from 1965 to 1977. It used the footage of the French stop motion animation show ''Le Manège enchanté'' but with completely different scripts and characte ...
''.
Danot was born in
Nantes
Nantes (, , ; Gallo: or ; ) is a city in Loire-Atlantique on the Loire, from the Atlantic coast. The city is the sixth largest in France, with a population of 314,138 in Nantes proper and a metropolitan area of nearly 1 million inhabita ...
, France. As a young artist, he worked on the restoration of the
Eiffel Tower
The Eiffel Tower ( ; french: links=yes, tour Eiffel ) is a wrought-iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the tower.
Locally nicknamed ...
and suffered an injury; while recuperating, he began practising animation. In 1969, he established his own company, called Danot Films.
His partner in making ''The Magic Roundabout'' was a half-French, half-British animator,
Ivor Wood
Ivor Sydney Wood (4 May 1932 – 13 October 2004) was a prolific Anglo-French' animator, director, producer and writer. He was known for his work on children's television series.
Born in Leeds to an English father and a French mother, his famil ...
.
Danot died in 1990.
References
1931 births
1990 deaths
French animators
French animated film directors
French animated film producers
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