| Type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Animation Live-action |
| Founded | 1977 |
| Founder(s) | Joe Ruby Ken Spears |
| Headquarters | Burbank, California, USA |
| Products | Television shows Theatrical films Television specials Direct-to-video films Television films Television commercials |
| Parent | Independent (1977-1978) Filmways (1978-1981) Taft Broadcasting (1981-1987) Great American Broadcasting (1987–1991) RS Holdings (1991-present) |
Ruby-Spears Productions (also known as Ruby-Spears Enterprises) is a Burbank, California-based entertainment production company that specializes in animation. The firm was founded in 1977 by veteran writers Joe Ruby and Ken Spears.
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Both Ruby and Spears started out as sound editors at Hanna-Barbera, and later branched out into writing stories for such programs as Space Ghost and The Herculoids. In 1968, they were assigned the task of developing a mystery-based cartoon series for Saturday morning, the end result of which was Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!. They were also writers and producers for DePatie-Freleng Enterprises.
The firm's credits include the animated series Fangface, Fangface and Fangpuss, The Plastic Man Comedy/Adventure Show, Rubik the Amazing Cube, the 1983 version of Alvin and the Chipmunks series, the 1988 Superman series, and the American Mega Man cartoon series.
One series, Piggsburg Pigs!, used Canadian voice talent rather than American voice talent like most of their shows. Ruby-Spears was also responsible for the animated sequence in the 1988 film Child's Play.
The Ruby-Spears studio was purchased in 1978 by Filmways Television and was sold in late 1981 to Taft Broadcasting, becoming a sister company to Hanna-Barbera Productions. In 1991, Ruby-Spears was spun off into RS Holdings while most of the original Ruby-Spears library (its post-1987 library) was sold along with Hanna-Barbera to Turner Broadcasting System, which in turn merged with Time Warner in 1996. The Ruby-Spears studio continued with other projects such as Wild West C.O.W.-Boys of Moo Mesa and Mega Man. [1] Joe Ruby & Ken Spears remained active in production for Scooby Doo.