Tuesday 26 July 2016

Miss X Appears

Walter Lantz’s “Abou Ben Boogie” (1944) owes an awful lot to Tex Avery but its success is due mainly to animator Pat Matthews. He does a great job with the sensual Miss X and he’s responsible for a wonderful solo dancing scene involving a camel.

Here’s how director Shamus Culhane handles the arrival of Miss X into this cartoon, carried by two burly servants/slaves. These are consecutive drawings.



Culhane wasn’t too concerned about matching cuts. These are consecutive frames.



Since Bugs Hardaway co-wrote this, I’d better say “The eyes have it.” He’d appreciate the hokey pun.



Lantz planned to have Miss X co-starring in the first of the Musical Miniatures, “Poet and Peasant” (Variety, Sept. 12, 1944), but the character ran afoul of the censors. Lantz never made another cartoon with her.

3 comments:

  1. Averyesque reactions to Miss X, combined with character motion and designs Culhane seems to have brought over (along with Art Heinemann) from his brief stay in the Chuck Jones unit at Warners.

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  2. Sounds reasonable, JL.
    Interestingly, Blair and Matthews handle the girl characters a little differently. Blair's animation seems more fluid but Matthews moves around Miss X more than Red, even drawing her in perspective. They're both great artists. Matthews is shamefully underrated.

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  3. I like to think she's related to Princess Salami from Woody Woodpecker.

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