Leo the Lion (MGM)

Leo the Lion is the mascot for the Hollywood film studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and one of its predecessors, Goldwyn Pictures, featured in the studio's production logo, which was created by the Paramount Studios art director Lionel S. Reiss.

Since 1917 (and when the studio was formed by the merger of Samuel Goldwyn's studio with Marcus Loew's Metro Pictures and Louis B. Mayer's company in 1924), there have been seven different lions used for the MGM logo; the most popular including Tanner and Leo, the current (and seventh) lion. Tanner was used on all Technicolor films and MGM cartoons (including the Tom and Jerry series), and in use on the studio logo for 22 years (Leo has been in use since January 1957, a total of 59 years and counting). However, when the MGM animation department, which had closed in 1958, reopened with the Chuck Jones-directed Tom and Jerry shorts in 1963, these shorts used Tanner in the opening sequence rather than Leo, who had already been adapted onto the studio logo and the Gene Deitch-directed Tom and Jerry cartoons from 1960-62.