Margaret Nichols Dies at 82

Veteran animator and director Margaret Nichols has passed away at the age of 82, according to a report by Big Cartoon Database. An exec­u­tive board mem­ber of The Ani­ma­tion Guild from 1980 to 1985, she died Novem­ber 5.

From 1955 until 1993, Nichols worked for Warner Bros., Dis­ney, UPA, Fleis­cher, Snow­ball, Patin, TV Spots, Cre­ston, Eagle, Hanna-Barbera, Mar­vel, Uni­ver­sal and Graz Entertainment. Also known as Mar­garet Grewell, Nichols directed the TV series Trans­form­ers (1985–86); The Glo Friends, Potato Head Kids, InHu­manoids and Moon Dream­ers (all 1986); My Lit­tle Pony ‘n Friends (1986–87); and Frag­gle Rock (1987).

She served as an ani­ma­tion direc­tor for the series Mup­pet Babies (1985–88), Defend­ers of the Earth (1986), Space­cats and Bucky O’Hare and the Toad Wars! (both 1991), Tom & Jerry Kids Show and The Addams Fam­ily (both 1992), The Pirates of Dark Water (1992–93), and Droopy: Mas­ter Detec­tive (1993). In addi­tion, she was ani­ma­tion direc­tor of the TV-movies Solar­man (1986), Pryde of the X-Men (1989) and I Yabba-Dabba Do! (1993), along with the 1986 the­atri­cal films The Trans­form­ers: The Movie and My Lit­tle Pony: The Movie and the 1987 video G.I. Joe: The Movie.

As an ani­ma­tor, Nichols worked on the series The Peb­bles and Bamm-Bamm Show (1971); The Flint­stone Com­edy Hour (1972); Jean­nie and Speed Buggy (both 1973); These Are the Days and Par­tridge Fam­ily 2200 AD (both 1974); The New Tom & Jerry Show (1975); The Mumbly Car­toon Show and The Scooby-Doo/Dynomutt Hour (both 1976); The All-New Super Friends Hour and C B Bears (both 1977); Scooby’s All Star Laff-A-Lympics (1977–78); Jana of the Jun­gle, Chal­lenge of the Super­Friends and Dyno­mutt Dog Won­der (all 1978); Godzilla (1978–79); The World’s Great­est Super­Friends, Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo and Casper and the Angels (all 1979;) Trol­lkins and The Kwicky Koala Show (both 1981); Smurfs (1981–84); Joke­book, Shirt Tales and Pac-Man (all 1982); and The New Scooby and Scrappy-Doo Show and The Char­lie Brown and Snoopy Show (both 1983).

Also, she was an ani­ma­tor on the 1974 ABC After­school Spe­cial Cyrano, along with the ABC Week­end Spe­cials The Puppy Saves the Cir­cus (1981) and Miss Switch to the Res­cue and Bun­nic­ula, the Vam­pire Rab­bit (both 1982). She ani­mated the TV shorts and TV-movies Clerow Wilson’s Great Escape (1974), The White Seal (1975), A Flint­stone Christ­mas (1977), Christ­mas Comes to PacLand (1982), Is This Good­bye, Char­lie Brown? (1983) and It’s Flash­bea­gle, Char­lie Brown (1984), in addi­tion to the 1987 the­atri­cal movie Rock Odyssey.

A key assis­tant ani­ma­tor on the 1973 movie Charlotte’s Web, Nichols was an assis­tant ani­ma­tor on Who Framed Roger Rab­bit and Disney’s Oliver & Com­pany (both 1988). She was a char­ac­ter ani­ma­tor on the 1982 the­atri­cal film Heidi’s Song and a guest ani­ma­tor on Chuck Jones’ 1975 TV-movie Yan­kee Doo­dle Cricket.

Nichols was a sequence direc­tor on the TV series Robotix (1985), G.I. Joe (1985–86), Jem (1985–88), Trans­form­ers (1986–87) and The Lit­tle Wiz­ards (1987), as well as the 1985 video Big­foot and the Mus­cle Machines and TV-movie The GLO Friends Save Christmas. Her first screen credit was as a lay­out artist for the 1970 TV-movie Uncle Sam Magoo. Nichols was a back­ground and lay­out artist for the 1971 musi­cal film Shin­bone Alley.

At Dis­ney, Nichols was a key clean-up artist for the movie The Black Caul­dron (1985), and a char­ac­ter key for The Lit­tle Mer­maid (1989) and The Res­cuers Down Under (1990). She was a tim­ing direc­tor and sheet timer for X-Men (1992–94), and a tim­ing direc­tor for the 1994 TV series The Tick.

Formerly Editor-in-Chief of Animation World Network, Jennifer Wolfe has worked in the Media & Entertainment industry as a writer and PR professional since 2003.