Ron Merk has been an independent producer, director, writer and distributor of animated and live action features and television specials since 1967. His extensive background in merchandising, product design and licensing included seven years as Supervising Art Director for The Tooniversal Company's limited edition animation art publishing division. In this position he worked on licensing famous animated characters from Warner Brothers, Speed racer Enterprises, MGM and King Features. His career has also seen him work on Broadway, designing short films, slides and animation for the long-running musical Oh Calcutta! He has been involved with the Czech Film Studio (Looking for Lennon and Lebensborn) and been active in numerous film restoration projects, notably Arnold Schwarzenegger's first film, Hercules in New York (1970). In 2002 he directed the animated feature, Marco Polo Jnr: Return to Xanadu (q.v.), which is a re-working (using animation and dialogue) of the 1973 animated film, Marco Polo Jnr Versus the Red Dragon (q.v.).
Ron Merk's company, Premiere Pictures International, which now includes The Tooniversal Company as one of its divisions, also owns and operates a substantial stock footage library called Footage-To-Go. It includes The Western Electric Company industrial films, animation footage, Eastern European collection, Sports and Lifestyle footage, and one of the most significant collections of footage about the City of New York. The company licenses this material to producers of TV programs, feature films, documentaries and commercials.
As an author Merk has been published in a number of film-related magazines, including Animation Magazine, Animation World Network (online magazine), Film Festival Today and Release Print.
