Another broad array of studio representation today, the absentees being MGM, which was nearing the end of the trail as to cartoon production, and UPA, who was not often known to break the fourth wall. Disney presents a charmer, while the laughter is well-provided by Warner Brothers, Terrytoons, and Walter Lantz, whose pacing and timing were picking up during a brief renaissance in the days following the retirement of Tex Avery. Magic pencils and paintbrushes abound, while others continue to provide savvy interaction with audience, and backstage stories of studio politics among the toons.
Gee Whiz-z-z-z (Warner, Road Runner, 5/15/56 – Charles M. (Chuck) Jones, dir.) – The Road Runner and Wile E. are up to their old – and new – tricks again. Wile E’s skills in communicating with signs have improved, now allowing him not only to address the audience, but the powers that dictate the production of the cartoon as well. In the introduction (where collision between Wile E. and a truck is integrated into the opening credits), the coyote reacts to the Road Runner’s extra burst of speed that sends him off over the horizon, by raising a pair of signs to the audience. The first reads, “Egad”, while the second sign merely adds several exclamation points! Gag sequences include the popular Batman suit clip (reused in the pilot “The Adventures of the Road Runner”). with Wile E. crashing into the opposite canyon wall just as he is getting the hang of flying. Also, painting of a backdrop depicting a bridge out over a ravine. However, the Road Runner runs right through the painting as if made of the paper it’s painted on, while the coyote enters the work of art, falling straight into the illustrated ravine. Finally, a rocket jet is ridden by the Coyote off a cliff, running out of gas just before it can reach the opposite side of the canyon. As the inevitable fall begins, the Coyote again resorts to a pair of signs, this time directed to whoever is in charge of this picture. The first reads, “How about ending this cartoon before I hit?” In response, an iris starts to slowly close, and before it fully removes our view, Wile E. replies with a second sign, reading “Thank you.”
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The Talking Dog (Lantz/Universal, Maggie and Sam, 8/27/56 – Alex Lovy, dir.) – First, a word about the film’s director. If anything might be said of Alex Lovy, it would be that he was considerably flexible, and a quick study. He had made his way up in the ranks of Lantz animators, achieving director status in the early 1940’s. His original style was cute but deliberate in pacing. His timing improved considerably during a brief stay at Columbia, under the production supervision of the Katz-Binder regime, picking up a bit of Warner-style influence along the way. In the early 50’s, he would return to the re-formed Lantz units, and appears to have been fortunate enough to understudy and follow closely the methods and modes of Tex Avery during the latter’s brief 4-cartoon run at Lantz. Like Michael Lah whom Avery left behind at MGM, Lovy learned the ropes of quick, tight timing, well-defined poses, and the general look and movement of Avery productions, and when Tex left, Lovy was the obvious heir apparent to what creations Avery had left behind. Two assets had been bestowed upon Lantz by way of Avery’s pen – a completely redesigned and redefined penguin who would provide steady income to Lantz right up to the closing days of the studio (Chilly Willy), and a frustrated wife and Milquetoast husband suitable for domestic comedies (Maggie and Sam, created for the Avery one-shot “Crazy Mixed-Up Pup”). Lovy would be placed in charge of both properties, helming series of the shorts until his departure for Hanna-Barbera. His work seldom reached the heights of the Avery originals, but still provided for considerably enjoyable action – perhaps more frequently scoring than Lah’s corresponding follow-up product at MGM. While the Maggie and Sam’s didn’t catch on to any great degree, spawning only a handful of follow-up episodes, the short in particular discussed below is an obvious attempt to homage the legacy of Avery, not only reviving a third principal character from “Crazy Mixed-Up Pup”, but incorporating a brief opening setup (often missing from television prints) that harkens back to Avery’s days at Warner Brothers.
The titular dog (originally Sam’s dog in Avery’s episode, who baffled everyone when he acquired human traits and speech abilities from a mistaken transfusion of human plasma) opens the film by standing in the screen foreground before the title of the picture, and engages in the old Bugs Bunny bit from Avery’s “Tortoise Beats Hare”, reading the title aloud. Then, the dog reacts with surprise. “Wha….?” In close shot, the canine turns to the camera, and tel;s the audience, “Heh…I don’t believe it!” (One of those circular illogical remarks that will make a computer blow up trying to figure it out in the old sci-fi epics.) The remainder of the film contains little in the way of cartoon self-consciousness, but still a supply of reasonable laughs. Erasing memory of the first cartoon, here Sam and the dog have never met. Maggie places Sam in charge of depositing money in the bank for payment of the mortgage. On the way, Sam (and his wad of cash) are spotted by a fast-talking street-hawker. The quick-pitch man starts suggesting purchases of such varied items as a skunk-fur coat, little gem money-maker, and a line of Davy Crockett reject coonskin caps. But leaning against a fire hydrant is our canine friend, who casually asks, “Hey, bub, you wanna buy a dog?” Sam, who has resolutely passed every other temptation by, freezes in his tracks. “You talked!” The hawker chimes in, taking control of negotiating the sale. “But if he’s a talking dog, why do you want to sell him?”, asks Sam. “Well, uh…he talks too much”, ad-libs the salesman, visually wincing at his own fib.
Oddly, there is no clue of mere ventriloquism here. It appears the dog can really talk. However, he seems to share an obstinate tendency with Michigan J. Frog (who would soon appear at Warner Brothers) of talking only when he wants to, and only to those he wants to. When irate Maggie hears that Sam has squandered the mortgage money to purchase him, she flings a series of insults at the mutt, then challenges him to say something. After that greeting, all the dog will say to her is “Bow wow”. Sam and the fido are tossed out on their ear, with orders not to come back without the mortgage money. Apparently having no idea where to find the street hawker for a refund, Sam takes his chances in seeking fame, bringing the dog to a theatrical booking agency. The agent, however, has a strict policy of taking on no dog acts. Sam can’t complete the sentence that his dog talks, and receives such greetings from the agent as a sock from a boxing glove on a telephone extender, with the inscription upon the glove of the words, “I said NO!!” Only when an effort by the agent to wait for Sam’s entrance at the door, armed with a baseball bat, backfires by the bat hitting a lighting fixture, bringing the agent and the fixture down together with a crash, does the dog himself speak up, reflexively asking. “Are ya hurt, Mac?” “A talking dog!”, shouts the agent, now eager to book the dog into the big time.
The dog is booked into a one-night-only sellout performance at the Met. (Who knew the dog could sing as well as talk?) Maggie and Sam wait in the wings, anxiously awaiting the money that will pour in from the evening’s receipts, and making plans for use of what will be left over after paying off the mortgage, “Next week, Las Vegas”, remarks Sam. The dog makes a stage entrance dressed in Musketeer garb, and at the conductor’s cue, opens his mouth as if to sing. All that is heard is “Meow”. A stray cat is brushing up against the curtain at stage right. The dog tries to sing again, but is interrupted by another “Meow”. That’s all a canine can stand, and all hope for the performance disappears, as instinct takes control. The chase is on, as the dog pursues the kitten up staircases, ramps, and into the rafters, knocking loose every curtain, lighting fixture, and scaffold they encounter. Everything comes crashing down upon Maggie and Sam, who pop out of holes in the fallen curtain, allowing Maggie to remark, “You and your talking dog”, and produce a rolling pin from nowhere to sock Sam repeatedly over the head. The final sequence dissolves to a night shot of the lot where Maggie and Sam live, but with a major change. The home that once stood there has been physically removed from the lot, leaving only a foundation in the ground, and in its center, Maggie, sitting among what remains of their furniture – one chair, and a television set. “Sam, are you in bed?”, she calls to the back yard. There, a small dog house has been constructed. Sam appears in the doorway, responding “Yes dear, good night.” Also inside is the dog, who completes the sentence to Maggie: “You disagreeable wench.” Still believing only Sam can talk, Maggie throws her rolling pin once more, scoring a direct hit upon Sam’s dome, so it’s lights out for Sam for the evening, as the scene fades out.
A Star is Bored (Warner, Bugs Bunny, 9/15/56 – Friz Freleng, dir. (Note that the studio decree about using formal names on credits ended about this time, allowing Friz and Chuck to use their own distinctive monikers)) – Another tale of backstage life for the toons. Bugs is giving another interview to a reporter on the Warner lot, while Daffy, currently holding down the position of studio janitor, is as usual revolted by what he hears through the dressing room door. If a long-eared rabbit can be a star, so can a duck. Daffy barges in at the head office, who just happens to have an opening – for Bugs’s stunt double. Thus, Freleng takes a whack at a story-line first approached in Bob Clampett’s “It’s a Grand Old Nag” for Republic Pictures, then in the follow-up Walter Lantz semi-remake, “A Horse’s Tale.” Daffy, costumed like a rabbit by the wardrobe department, gloats to himself that he could be arrested for the scenes he intends to steal. But a double’s life is not that easy by a longshot. His first call from the director is to substitute just after Yosemite Sam announces he is going to blast Bugs with his six-shooters. Daffy nearly forgets his one line, “I dare you”, having to glance at the script before delivering it – then gets a face full of lead delivered to him. As Daffy’s beak falls to the ground, he disgustedly calls for “Make up!” Next scene has Elmer Fudd sawing away at a limb of a tree on which Bugs is seated. Daffy is not even called by the director for this one, but barges in anyway, by calling Elmer behind the tree trunk, and knocking him unconscious. Daffy appears in Bugs’s hunting outfit, while Bugs, thinking it is still Elmer, reminds that the limb is not to be sawed through all the way. Daffy ignores this, severing the branch. He fails to notice that the tree is a prop fake, supported by the limb Bugs is sitting on, which is nailed to a wall support. The tree trunk thus falls, leaving Daffy in a heap again, and another call for “Make up.”
Next set calls for Bugs to fish off a pier. Daffy, believing Bugs gets all the easy assignments, grabs the fishing pole away, insisting that he’ll handle this one. Daffy drops his line in the water, and is immediately swallowed by a huge shark which leaps into the air at pier height. More make-up. A favorite Freleng gag is next reused, in a sequence where Elmer inserts the barrel of a gun into a tree trunk, yet seems to get a matching barrel poked into his rear end from Bugs’s rabbit hole. Daffy barges in to show Elmer how it should be done, and ties a red ribbon to the barrel of his gun. The gun from the rabbit hole displays a polka-dotted ribbon. Sure that it’s not his own gun aimed at him, Daffy fires – yet gets blasted. He pulls his own gun out of the tree – to find the polka-dotted ribbon tied to the barrel instead of his original red one. Make-up! Finally, a jet pilot sequence for Bugs, with the plane going into a steep dive. When the plane is only a short distance from the ground, the director calls for a cut, stalling the plane in mid-air, and to bring in the double. Daffy swallows hard in anticipation of what comes next. Via helicopter, an exchange of duck for rabbit s made in the cockpit, and the inevitable crash occurs. Make up again. Daffy has finally had it, and returns to the front office, demanding to star in his own picture. He’s in luck, as the studio has just approved a new script entitled “The Duck.” Shooting commences immediately, finding Daffy in a set resembling a duck pond. Again consulting script before reading his line, Daffy emotes, “I wonder where all the hunters are today?” A volley of bullets from behind two duck blinds answers his question. Bedraggled and nearly nude, Daffy shouts. “I demand to know, who wrote this script?” Behind the lights and cameras, Bugs Bunny coyly remarks to the audience, “I’d like to tell him, but modesty forbids.”
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A Cowboy Needs a Horse (Disney, 11/6/56 – Bill Justice, dir.) – One of Disney’s “modern”-style cartoons, adapting to the flat perspective of UPA product. It is a gentle tale, built around a good song, of a young boy’s dreams of his TV and movie cowboy heroes, and what it would be like to be one. The boy lies asleep in his bed, which begins to rock back and forth to the sounds of a horse’s hooves. The background fades away, and the bed is transformed into a live wooden hobby-horse, roaming the prairie. A chorus begins to discuss in song what a cowboy needs to keep “ridin’ along”, as an artist’s pencil enters the frame, drawing in one-by-one the necessary ingredients for the boy – he already has the horse, so we add a hat, a rope, fancy boots and spurs, and a song (depicted by musical notes). Now fully equipped, scenic backgrounds begin to appear vegind the boy – as well as arrows. An Indian attack is under way. Our little cowboy retaliates with pistol shots, but arrows plug up the barrels of his guns. Then, he runs out of ammunition. A scout Indian listens with glee at the clicks of the empty guns. Then, the whole tribe rises in lines from behind the ridges of the mountains, also with the same fiendish grins. (This scene is modified from animation in Goofy’s “Californy ‘er Bust”, as the Indians swarm down the hill toward the boy.) Soon, the tribe circles the boy and his horse, performing a war dance. The boy thinks fast, and pulls out his lariat. Swinging it around as a lasso, the boy extends the rope out to full length, into a circle wider than the diameter of the circling tribe. Then, he pulls on the rope, while he and his horse quickly leap out from the center of the circle. The rope settles neatly around the waists of the entire circle of Indians, pulling them together into the center of the circle in a struggling mass. The boy grabs the end of the rope and tightens the loop, squeezing out from the center of the tribe their chief. The chief offers a peace pipe, taking a puff from it himself, then giving the boy a chance to blow bubbles through it.
As the boy receives the chief’s headdress as a good-will gesture, another peril reveals itself. A bandit is holding up a nearby stagecoach. The boy pursues the bandit through a maze of canyons, then finally leaps upon the bandit, leading to a rough-and-tumble fight down a rocky hillside slope. By the time they reach the canyon floor, the bandit is so exhausted, you can blow him over with a breath. The stage’s money sacks are returned, and, as any good Western hero should, our boy declines the posted reward for the bandit’s capture. More skullduggery is just around the bend, as two saboteurs plant a keg of TNT atop a train trestle. The boy and horse gallop at full speed, outracing the oncoming train to the trestle. A precision toss of the lasso allows the boy to swoop hundreds of feet in mere seconds with the rope, up to the top of the trestle from the canyon floor – but too late. The dynamite explodes, leaving a small gap in the trestle bridge. Heroically, and in a feat that could only be accomplished by Superman, the boy grabs onto both ends of the severed track, completing a bridge with his own person for the train wheels to cross safely (and doesn’t even wind up with wheel tracks etched across his back). A conductor waves a thank-you from the caboose. But one more good deed needs doing. A villain has kidnapped a young girl, tying her to a cactus, then producing a dagger to do her in. The boy jumps him, knocking the dagger away, then sends the villain dancing off amidst a hail of bullets aimed around his feet. The girl offers a kiss, but the boy refuses this favor too, instead accepting a slurp from his horse. The girl is escorted back to her ranch aboard the boy’s horse, and everyone waves goodbye. Well, dreams can’t last forever, and the theme song rises again, with lyrics reversed to take away one-by-one the cowboy equipment, each object removed by pencil eraser, with the boy finally restored to his sound sleep in his own room, and the camera pulling back to an exterior view of the boy’s modern house, where we iris out and say goofnight too.
There They Go-Go-Go (Warner, Road Runner, 11/10/56 – Chuck Jones, dir.) – Another round for Wile E. He begins this one modeling a roast turkey out of clay from a nearby pit, and heating it up in a kiln. When he sits to dine, and busts a tooth on the roasted faux-bird, he takes the time to fashion out of clay a trash can, just to dispose of the chicken in. As pursuit of the Road Runner commences, the bird’s extra burst of speed burns up the pavement, setting Wile E’s feet afire. Wile E. stomps out the flames between his toes, but still smells smoke – then turns around to find his tail on fire. This being the desert, Wile E. is forced to break a branch off a dead tree, then use it as a divining rod to search for water, before he can find a cooling pool to put the fire out. The final sequence places a set of steel trap doors between two ridges on either side of the road below, atop which doors the Coyote has piled a large supply of boulders. As the Road Runner passes underneath, the Coyote opens the trap doors – but the rocks stay solidly wedged in place. The furious Coyote climbs out atop the rocks, forcefully jumping upon them, but still nothing. He then approaches from below, poking at the bottom of the rocks with a 20 foot pole. After countless pokes and taps, a few small pebbles begin to fall upon the Coyote. Wile E. suddenly stops, and, with a look of dismay, holds up a sign to the audience: “In heaven’s name – What am I doing?” The avalanche drops upon our never-victorious villain, and out of the rubble pokes the end of the pole, as a white flag is run up it, upon which appear the words, “The End”.
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Arts and Flowers (Lantz/Universal, Woody Woodpecker, 11/19/56 – Paul J. Smith, dir.) – Woody’s tree neighbors the home of a French artist, who makes a living painting pretty girls on men’s novelty neckties. Woody “shares” the morning delivery of a trade paper, “Art News”, by hopping down to read it first before the painter can take it from the porch. Woody spots an ad for a contest, awarding a big prize for the best painting of a desert flower. The artist emerges, grabbing away the paper, and spots the same ad. He boasts that “I am the big artist around here.” But Woody has other ideas, emerging from his home with beret and artist’s smock, loaded down with paints, easel, canvas, etc. Woody slides down a small tree trunk like a fire pole – only the artist moves the pole, so that Woody falls into a chasm from the bottom. The artist heads for his car, but gets nowhere when he hits the starter, because Woody has jacked up his rear wheels and stolen a tire. The two play tug of war over the tire, but Woody lets go, allowing the tire snap back and leave the artist suspended with it from a tree limb. A race ensues in autos to the desert, where the cars of the protagonists zig and zag across the sands, until they both arrive at the same point, facing a single flower. “A desert daffodilly!” both combatants exclaim in unison.
Various wars are waged between Woody and the artist. First, where to set up the easels? Each tries to set their equipment in front of the other to block the view. The two play leapfrog in front of each other with their setups, until they run out of land, and the artist places his easel (and himself) over the edge of a cliff. Woody spreads out five paint tubes, then stomps upon them, squirting out a ragged image of the flower on canvas. The artist smashes the finished masterpiece over Woody’s head. Woody counters by substituting paint remover for one of the artist’s cans of paint, causing his rendition of the flower to fade away to a blank canvas. Then things start to get weird, as Woody demonstrates that his own brushwork has that certain animated “magic” touch. He paints a painting of a cactus, then lays it down upon the seat of the artist. YEOWW!!! – those needles are sure realistic. Woody paints an oasis and lake on the side of a large boulder. The artist shrugs it off, insisting it is only a mirage, until Woody dons a bathing cap, and takes a leisurely swim around the illustrated lake. The artist tries the same, performing a graceful swan dive through the air, only to be flattened to a foot tall when his head hits the solid rock. Woody composes an outline sketch of a seductive babe holding a jug above her head. The artist knocks him away from the canvas to admire the sketch, and for fun uses his paintbrush to tickle the drawing in the armpit. The babe comes to life, giggles from the tickling, but stops it by smashing the jug over the artist’s head. Woody paints an image of a bulldog, then a bone on the seat of the artist’s pants. CHOMP!, as the bulldog leaves the canvas to dine upon the bone. Finally, Woody enters the frame around the artist, singing, “I’ve Been Working On the Railroad”, and paints outlines of a small, isolated section of train tracks around the artist’s feet. The artist again shrugs it off as mere insanity – until a real train comes along to use the tracks. The result of the collision leaves artist, supplies, tracks, and the real desert flower all mangled together, flattened upon a canvas. Woody takes this work of modern art to the museum where the contest is being conducted, and it wins the grand prize. However, the prize is not what Woody expected. Instead of his visions of a sack of cash, such a sack is awarded – in a mere painted depiction within a frame. Woody dismisses the whole affair by smashing the worthless prize over the curator’s head, then hopping wildly toward the exit of the building, giving out with his usual laugh.
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Gag Buster (Terrytoons/Fox, Spoofy, disputed dates ranging from 2/57 to 7/10/57 – Connie Rasinski, dir.) – Spoofy the Fox makes his one and only return to the screen, a sequel to “Foxed By a Fox”. This time, Spoofy, to his pleasure, finds himself cast in a Western, as an artist’s brush paints him in against a scenic background on the drawing board. Associating Westerns with blazing guns, Spoofy declares, “I need some artillery”, and grabs up another paintbrush from the artist’s supplies. He paints himself an ammunition belt, holster, and firearm. Spoofy passes a wanted poster for a desperado known only as “Killer” on the side of a cactus. Spoofy plays with his newly-drawn six shooter, threatening the poster not to try anything funny, or “I’ll load ya full of lead, and use ya for a paperweight.” As Spoofy proceeds ahead, the real Killer emerges from behind the cactus, and shadows Spoofy closely, treading in his footsteps directly behind him. Spoofy enters a small Western town, where the townsfolk’s reactions are not what Spoofy expected. Seeing only the Killer treading tall behind the tiny fox, the townspeople disperse rapidly, one ducking completely inside his own boot and hopping away. “Hey, what’s everybody scared about? I’m the marshal”, states Spoofy, finding no one sticking around to listen. Spoofy enters the saloon, and receives the same treatment as the patrons dive away in terror at the sight of the outlaw. Even the upright piano comes to life and darts away, its keys following a split-second later. “What’s the matter with everybody? Am I so repulsive?” Spoofy pulls out a hand mirror, and instead of his own reflection, spies the image of the Killer’s face within it. “I AM repulsive!”, reacts Spoofy.
A faithful Indian scout appears, and in sign language begins to play a game of charades to fill Spoofy in on the situation. He feigns receiving a shot to the headt, prompting Spoofy’s utterances of the words “dead”, then “kill”. The scout applauds at getting the first syllable right, then points to a poster of a beautiful girl. Various guesses are spoken by Spoofy, incluing “babe”, “she”, and finally “her”. Put the latter together with the first syllable, and you get “kill her – Killer!” Having served his purpose, the scout darts out of the picture. “Killer?”, questions Spoofy, turning around to observe with terror the bad guy, nose to nose with him. “I ain’t no beauty counselor, but I could improve that face”, states Spoofy to the camera. He pulls out a pencil, and erases the villain’s scowling jawline, then sketches in a lipsticked pair of feminine lips. The disgusted Killer literally wipes that smile off his face, restoring his original fierce countenance, then reaches for his gun. “Don’t draw, Killer. I’ll do the drawing around here”, says Spoofy, drawing lines from the end of the Killer’s revolver deep into his holster. In a reworking of a gag from the original “Foxed By a Fox”, the Killer finds himself unable to draw out his gun, as Spoofy has extended the length of the gun’s barrel to infinity. Tossing the useless holster and weapon aside, Killer pulls Spoofy’s Stetson hat down over his body, imprisoning him within it as Spoofy’s head pops through the top. Killer sets Spoofy on a saloon table, then pulls out a single bullet, which Killer clenches between his teeth. Killer pounds one fist atop his own head, biting down on the bullet and causing it to fire. Spoofy barely ducks his head out of the way, as the errant bullet sinks a ship in a painting on the saloon wall behind him. Spoofy declares that’s pretty good, and asks Killer to do it again. He extends one arm out of the hat, supplying Killer with another bullet – but this time turns the head of the bullet inwards instead of outwards. Killer pounds on his head – but is too tough to be phased by the explosion. Instead, the blast merely escapes from his puffed jaws like the deflating of a toy balloon. Spoofy, now free of the hat, draws a light bulb in the middle of the room, then calls for “Lights out.” He flicks off the light, plunging the saloon into darkness, long enough to escape out the front door while Killer’s gun (he had another one?) blazes in the dark. Spoofy races across the desert terrain, arriving at a cliff. He pulls out his drawing pencil, and sharpens its point with a whittling knife for heavy-duty use. Spoofy charges forward, drawing a straight line off the cliff and over to a faraway ridge on the other side of a canyon – a do-it-yourself tightrope. When Killer crosses and is about to reach the opposite ledge, Spoofy snips the line with a pair of scissors. Killer races back to his own side of the canyon, staying a mere single step ahead ot the falling end of the line. But Killer’s not licked yet, as he makes good use of the line, transforming it into a lasso to snag the trunk of a tree on Spoofy’s side, then repeats Popeye’s old feat of pulling Spoofy’s canyon wall over to Killer’s side by sheer brute strength.
Spoofy proceeds ahead, and draws a faucet on the side of a rock, then a hose connected to it. He opens the faucet valve, blasting Killer with a stream of water. The fluid washes Killer’s paint away, leaving him in bare outline form, the paint puddled around his feet. Spoofy takes the opportunity to pluck at the bare outlines, producing the musical sounds of an electric slide guitar (an unusual luxury, heavily featured in this unique Phillip Scheib score, foreshadowing his later wide use of the instrument in the arrangements of underscore for the “Deputy Dawg” series), and playing a few bars of “Oh Susannah”. Spoofy charitably produces a large house-painter’s paintbrush, sucks up the paint puddle within it, and restores Killer’s full colors with a few broad brush strokes. Spoofy runs to an open stretch of desert, and draws two parallel lines to horizon on the ground. “Cross that line, Killer, and I’ll flatten ya.” Killer steps boldly into the center of the screen, then stands his ground, waiting for retaliation from Spoofy. Spoofy provides same, by painting the area between the parallel lines pavement gray, then posting a sign alongside reading “Route 1″. A sedan immediately arrives, mowing down Killer in its path. Spoofy then rips a section of the drawn background down the middle from left to right, rolling up the portion of the image containing the flattened Killer, and tosses the roll of paper over a cliff. He fails to notice Killer slipping out from within the roll just before the paper is tossed. Killer tries to take Spoofy at gunpoint behind a cactus to do him in, but somehow the characters keep emerging on the other side of te cactus with Spoofy having the drop on Killer. Spoofy darts offscreen, and as Killer searches for him, Spoofy plays a one-man version of Phillip Scheib’s orchestra, underscoring Killer’s every movement with plucks on a bass fiddle or scale-runs on a pennywhistle. Spoofy takes off at full run, carrying a pencil and sketchpad. “I just love to draw funny pictures”, he states, tossing completed sheets of drawing paper back towards the pursuing Killer. The first sheet depicts a boxing glove, which rises from the paper surface to sock Killer in the face. The next depicts a hand holding a custard pie – you can guess what happens. The third sheet, a lit stick of dynamite! Spoofy finally uses his pencil to draw a hole in the ground in the path of the staggering Killer. Killer falls in, and as Professor Calvin Q. Calculus might have remarked at another studio, “My, that was a deep one.” Spoofy returns to his role as band leader again, providing drum roll and cymbal crash to accompany Killer’s fall and impact at the bottom of the hole. Then, Spoofy reverses the process, turning the hole upside-down and placing it in mid-air, causing Killer to fall back up the hole and land on the desert floor, with the same drum roll and cymbal crash. Spoofy draws a pair of handcuffs upon Killer, making his arrest. “And so, law and order once again rules the West”, says the strutting Spoofy, as an iris out begins to close. “Hold it, HOLD it!”, yells Spoofy, preventing the iris’s closing. “The hero always gets the girl in these Westerns”. Spoofy thus draws himself a young maiden, so as to claim his just reward. However, the female runs right past him, and picks up the Killer in her arms instead, disappearing with him over the horizon, as Spoofy hollers for her to come back, insisting “I’m the hero. I get the girl!”
Gaston Is Here (Terrytoons/Fox, Gaston Le Crayon, 5/57 – Connie Rasinski, dir.) – Gene Deitch’s new character, Gaston Le Crayon, is introduced – a diminutive French artist, who seems to live in semi-poverty like most struggling stereotype artists tend to do, finding shelter where he may. Here, Gaston has taken up residence in an abandoned mine shaft, hanging signs around the shaft entrance to advertise his presence (and the name he has chosen for the place – Maison de Crayon), and setting out a garbage can at the door as a mailbox. Inside, Gaston spends his time creating masterpieces, striking standard artist’s pose with thumb extended to get his perspective, then revealing to the camera the subject of his work of art – a painting of his own thumb. (Old joke.) As a watch with a French cuckoo bird inside announces “Le coffee break”. Gaston demonstrates that his brush can create more than just thumbs. Painting in mid-air, Gaston creates a steaming glass pot of coffee, then pours its liquid contents into a cup nearby, and lounges on a lounge chair as he sips. Even the coffee here is somewhat magical, as, after a sip, Gaston exhales a comforting small cloud of smoke, pointing out it also has the qualities of a cigarette. Suddenly, Gaston’s quiet life becomes complicated, as a flock of massive steel girders descends from all sides into the sanctity of the mine shaft. Outside, a construction crew works fecerishly, instantly creating a movie set/studio. Gaston emerges to have his say abut it, but is booted out of the head office, finding the persons un charge highly non-receptive.
A later design for Gaston LeCrayon
Gaston checks out the next adjoining set. An actor portrays a pilot, stranded by a plane crash in the frozen arctic. “Is frozen feet to be my frozen fate?” Gaston is here again, and paints around the actor a giant pop-up toaster. The actor is ejected, transformed into the shape of a warmed piece of toast. The director reappears, and pursues Gaston, right through a hole made in the slice that is now the actor. Gaston returns to his mine shaft entrance, and when the director follows, Gaston halts him at the door. Gaston’s watch again announces time for another coffee break, so Gaston paints two cups of coffee in mid-air for himself and the director, then informs the audience that the chase will resume after the coffee break. Gaston enters his home to relax, leaving the frustrated director outside. Suddenly, the director’s attention is caught by an object from the prop department resting nearby – something obviously intended for a war picture. A guided missile and launching mount. The director picks up a small sign resting next to the weapon, depicting the circles of a bulls-eye target. He raises and lowers the target before the missile head, and the missile pivots to keep its direction focused upon the target. “This can’t miss”, remarks the director. He presses a button to activate the missile, then plants the target sign directly in front of Gaston’s tunnel. As he turns to flee, he fails to see Gaston reappear at the tunnel entrance, and pull a quick switch, hanging the target sign upon the director’s back. The missile takes off, at first headed straight for the mine, but at the last second performs a quick turn before Gaston, veering off to seek out the director. The director sees it coming, then spots the target on his back. He races back to the mine entrance, tossing the sign upon Gaston’s chest. Gaston speeds after the director, while the missile makes another quick turn to follow the action. In a tracking shot in perspective, the missile keeps shifting paths, as Gaston and the director race down a desert road, performing repeated lateral passes of the sign at intervals from one to the other. All disappear down the road and over the horizon, and the scene fades out. Then, we fade in again upon the same background, now with the words, “The End” superimposed thereon. Suddenly, an explosion erupts from over the horizon, charring the projection screen to black, but leaving the “The End” letters in center, with a large hole in the center of screen through which a small portion of the desert background can still be seen. Gaston’s head pops up within the hole. He whispers to the audience, “Do not tell anyone how this picture ends.” A strip of the charred screen below the hole then falls away, peeling back under its own weight, to reveal a full view of Gaston’s torso – with a large circular hole through it where the missile hit! We fade out entirely, to the Terrytoons credit.
NEXT WEEK: More late ‘50’s action.
Charles Gardner is an animation enthusiast who toils by day as a member of LA Law – but by nights and weekends indulges in classic jazz and ragtime as a performer; and studies classic Hollywood cartoons… maybe a little too much.
May I suggest ‘Northwest Hounded Police’ Droopy 1956.
Northwest Hounded Police was produced in 1946. It was already covered in a previous chapter. As I mentioned above, by the time period covered by this article, Tex Avery was already retired from theatrical cartoons.
Curiously, Arts and Flowers was remade as one of the King Features Popeye TV cartoons, “Take It Easel”. No writer’s credit, but it has the same plot, same desert setting, a lot of the same gags, and almost the same ending. Talk about “appropriation art”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUR0rQhQZJI
An intriguing afterthought. With all the things that a cowboy needs mentioned in the Disney song, no one thought to mention a cow – or he’d be out of a job!
The magazine Art News, to which Woody’s artist neighbour subscribed in “Arts and Flowers”, was an actual publication (and for all I know still might be). My mother used to subscribe to it. Clarence Wheeler’s clever score to that cartoon is derived entirely from the piano music of Frederic Chopin, though considerably jazzed up, turning polonaises and waltzes in triple time into marches and foxtrots in duple.
I agree with your assessment of Alex Lovy. While he might not make anyone’s Top Ten List of All-Time Greatest Cartoon Directors, he consistently turned in solid, professional work throughout a long and distinguished career, and he never stopped improving. I read somewhere that Lovy won a lottery just before he died. Too bad his timing wasn’t better on that occasion.
Long live Spoofy!
I have a bit of a fondness of Lovy (I forgive him for the final Daffy and Speedy shorts at Warners which I don’t think he like doing either) and I felt Lantz wasn’t quite the same once Alex left the second time (although both Hannah and Marcus did a good job on their respective shorts). After all, Lovy helped create Andy Panda and was there when Woody was “born”. Heck, I think he may have actually directed “Knock Knock”.
Of course, after leaving Lantz, Lovy had a long and respected career at Hanna-Barbera (with the aforementioned brief break at Warners in the late ’60’s) and was part of the original team that helped launch “The Flintstones”. Between 1989-90 (I don’t know what year), he received the Winsor McCay Award at the 18th Annies.
The reason UPA didn’t do a lof of breaking-the-fourth-wall gags was probably that everyone else was doing them, and UPA was all about not doing what all the other cartoons were doing. That being said, there are a couple of such moments in the Mr. Magoo series, aside from the punchline of “When Magoo Flew” mentioned earlier in this column.
In his very first cartoon, “The Ragtime Bear”, Magoo is introduced crashing his car into a tree. He then turns to the camera and asks, “Which way to Hodge Podge Lodge?” A voice – not sure if it’s supposed to be a narrator, an audience member, ore someone who happens to be there (maybe the cameraman?) – asks back “Can’t you read the sign?”, referring to the six-foot-tall sign that reads “Hodge Podge Lodge”. “Certainly, I can read the sign!” bellows Magoo, pulling a pair of glasses for one of only a few times in his career, and scanning the sign, which appears blurred out to the audience. “What does it say?” “Straight ahead”, answers the voice, and Magoo thanks him and sets back on his way. Perfect introduction to Quincy Magoo, quickly telling the audience what he’s all about.
A few years later, on “Hotsy Footsy”, Magoo wanders away from a Rutgers alumni dance and into the gymnasium next door, where a wrestling match is under way. Passing one of the losing combatants being carried away unconscious, Magoo leans towards the audience to make the comment “Loaded!”, as in passed out drunk.