The Beatles

The Beatles is an American
animated television series featuring the
fanciful and musical misadventures of the extraordinarily
popular British rock
band. It ran from 1965 to 1969 on
ABC in the USA.
The series consisted of short animated stories that
essentially were intended to set up the visual illustration of
Beatles songs that are played in their entirety. In addition,
there were sing along sequences with simpler imagery
complementing the full lyrics of particular songs.
The series became notorious for its static depiction of the
band in their early moptop and suit look as depicted in the
live action film,
A Hard Day's Night, despite the fact that
the band moved beyond it during the series' run.
The Beatles had nothing to do with the series' production
beyond the use of their music recordings. (American actor
Paul Frees did the voices of John and
George while Lance Percival, of the Carry On series, did the more
authentic sounding voices of Paul and Ringo.) In fact, the band
disdained the series for its poor quality which discouraged
them from participating significantly in the later
animated feature film,
Yellow Submarine. Only when the band saw and
were impressed by the film's finished footage did they realize
the film was a more ambitious creation. As a result, they
agreed to appear in a short live action epilogue for it.
Curiously, George Dunning, who would direct
Yellow Submarine, had directed the animated series as
well.
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