Tuesday 17 October 2017

Cue(t) Gag

Yet another butt-piercing gag from Joe Barbera can be found towards the end of Cue Ball Cat (1950) when Jerry ties a pin to the end of a cue stick. Tom has shoved it down a hole to get Jerry, but somehow it’s defied the laws of physics and has curved up through the hole behind him.

Down the cue is plunged. Skyward goes Tom in pain. Here are some random frames. Even the in-betweens at MGM are pretty expressive.



The bite-lip/face-turns-red bit was also used the same year in Casanova Cat.

Irv Spence, Ken Muse, Ed Barge and Ray Patterson are, as usual, your animators in this cartoon.

3 comments:

  1. This is all Ken Muse animation, but Tom's red face sort of echoes Ray Patterson.

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  2. I always loved Bill Hanna's screams when Tom got hurt. I read somewhere that he recorded a scream, and then the sound editor made it funnier by chopping off the very beginning and end of it.

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    Replies
    1. I thought Hanna mentioned the voice in his autobiography. Someone told me they once asked Hanna to replicate it and he happily obliged.

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