Stan Freberg Presents: 100 Years

There’s a lot to like in a Freberg.
Sneakers. Glasses.
Flip-top head.

There are some things missing in that phoney jingle (to the tune of the one heard in Marlboro commercials way-back-when). There’s cartoon and puppet voice acting. There are parody and children’s records. There are two radio series from the 1950s (okay, they were hit-and-miss). And there are satiric TV commercials.

Stan Freberg did a lot of funny things. He would have turned 100 today. I don’t often post about dead celebrity birthdays, but Stan Freberg was an exceptional individual, so I am making an exception. And it's really more about satire and skittish, hidebound TV executives than Freberg himself.

He had enough of a name in 1962 to manage to land a TV special. But Freberg had some problems, much like he did with CBS censors when he convinced the network to give him a half hour comedy-variety radio show in 1957.

Something else to like in a Freberg for newspaper columnists was he was quotable and articulate. Several of them jumped at the chance to let him promote his special. Sorry Charles Witbeck of King Features, Bob Thomas of the AP, and Fred Danzig and Jack Gaver of UPI, but I’ve picked Hal Humphrey’s syndicated column to reprint. This appeared in papers on Sunday, Feb. 4, 1962.

It Wasn’t Easy, Mom!
Stan Freberg ‘Invades’ Television
HOLLYWOOD — Where else but on American TV could we see a show starring a Baptist minister's son named Freberg, sponsored by a Chinese food company, owned by an Italian by the name of Palucci?
The title for this 60-minute egg roll, which hits ABC at 6:30 p.m. today, runs almost as long as the show itself. It is "The Chun King Chow Mein Hour Starring Stan Freberg."
In case you've been remiss in keeping up with our culture, Stan Freberg is a puppeteer, raconteur, recording star and creator of funny TV-radio commercials. One of his commercial accounts is the Chun King Corp.
"I was sitting in my office one afternoon talking to myself, and I let the performer side of me sell the businessman side of me on this idea of a TV special to celebrate Chinese New Year's Eve for the year 4660," Stan explains.
It is generally conceded in TV circles that if you have a show and a sponsor (with money), you are fair bait for the networks. Stan discoverer that free enterprise is not so.
"I WENT TO NBC with my show, but they wouldn't take it because I had no big-name guest star. I'm not sure what NBC means by a big-name guest star, although I recall they used to employ Leo Durocher in that capacity frequently," says Stan with perhaps a trace of sarcasm.
"Anyway, my next call was to CBS, but I couldn't even get anyone there to listen. At ABC I got in the door and was told they might have a time for me provided they could see a script by last April."
Stan delivered the script, and it took ABC only 10 months to find him a time spot.
A more sensitive man might have got the impression that he wasn't wanted on TV, but after years of such nearsightedness by the networks where Stan is concerned, he has managed to work up an immunity to their insults.
SOMETHING ELSE STAN has is a sense of humor about himself. The theme of his TV special is hung around the fact that people usually refer to "that guy with the glasses," because they can't think of his name.
"We're working on two things in this show," says Stan. "There's my desire to be identified, and secondly we're checking to see if viewers are still hungry after watching one hour of a show sponsored by a Chinese food company."
Stan, of course, has created the commercials for his show, as well as writing the book and lyrics for it. All of the commercials are integrated into the proceedings except one in the middle. Stan finally overcame its orthodox look by misspelling the sponsor's name.
One of the entertainment segments is a special animated seven minutes built around the sale of Manhattan Island. The music and lyrics are from Stan's record album, "Stan Freberg Presents the United States of America." Network radio stations decided when it was first released that Stan's fun-poking at United States history was "not in good taste.”
Even his sponsor decided that Stan should drop his plan to include another of the album's numbers, 'Take an Indian to Lunch This Week." It revolves around a mayor running for re-election in colonial New England, and he is worried about capturing the Indian vote, so he sings 'Take an Indian to lunch this week; make a feathered friend feel fed this week, and overlook the fact he's red this week...."
Stan believes that what TV needs more than anything is honesty, he has proven it many times when creating commercials for the medium.
"My secret weapon in the commercials I do is honesty. It comes as such a shock to a public who have been lied to, that they go out and buy the product just out of appreciation," Stan analyzes.
The coming Chinese New Year which Stan is celebrating is known as the Year of the. Tiger. Maybe it also will turn out to be the Year of Stan Freberg,

Okay, I’ve changed my mind. Witbeck’s column features network idiocy that’s too good to pass up.

Freberg Does Chinese Special
By CHARLES WITBECK
TV Key Columnist
HOLLYWOOD—Not many people are aware of this but Chinese New Year's is Feb. 5th, and to celebrate it properly Stan Freberg has an hour's TV show on New Year's Eve, Sunday, Feb. 4th on ABC.
Mr. Freberg became a Chinese specialist a year and a half ago when he created commercials plugging Chun King's Chow Mein in which he stated that 95 per-cent of the country did not eat the delicacy.
"The president of the Chun King Corporation, Mr. Paulucci (you like that) was upset by those big figures," said Mr. Freberg. " 'Stan, you don't have to tell 'em the truth,' he said. I answered, why not put the truth in advertising for a change."
Mr. Freberg happened to be correct. In three months more than 5 per cent of the country gobbled chow mein. Mr. Paulucci was so impressed he told Freberg to go ahead and write an hour's TV show and he would sponsor it.
This took a little time because if he's one thing for certain, Stan Freberg is a perfectionist. Finally the script was finished and Stan called network X to learn of their interest. Network X wouldn't even consider reading the script.
Next call went to network Y, and after the opening remarks, the gentleman in charge of giving o.k.'s to shows said quickly, "Who's the guest star?"
"Saul Bass," replied Freberg.
"Who's Saul Bass?"
"Ever see 'Round The World in 80 Days'?"
"Was he in it?"
"He did the titles," answered Stan.
After a moment of silence the man said he'd have to see a script. "Maybe we could give you a little time in the summer," he added.
Freberg said he wanted to do it on Chinese New Year's Eve.
"We don't go around giving time out like that," the man said and wound up the conversation.
So in desperation Stan went to ABC, and his timing was perfect, because he walked in the day before FCC head Newton Minow made his now famous "wasteland" speech and asked for improved programming.
Ready to show Mr. Minow, ABC snapped up Stan's Chinese epic with Saul Bass, and in appreciation Freberg immediately put Mr. Minow's name in the script.
"I even wanted Mr. Minow to appear on our program," said Stan. "But if he did, the thing would get out of hand. Then Dinah would want him and Perry."
Now about the show. It mainly concerns Freberg's attempt to do a TV Chinese New Year's show amidst interruption from networks, agencies and other interest seekers. Saul Bass has designed the graphic element and features a solid five minute animated sequence about the island of Manhattan and a character: Peter Tishman. Seven-year-old Chinese star Ginny Tiu turns up, but she will not play the piano for a change and she'll be joined by meek, high-voiced Sterling Holloway and Orville, Freberg's outer space puppet.
"This is the first show I've ever done on my own," said Stan, "and I'll never do another one. It's too exhausting."
"One thing this show is going to have is the best musical sound ever," said Freberg. "That's because nobody ever took this much time with music. We've spent 8, 10 and 12 hours of just rehearsals with the Billy May Band. "People say, 'think pictures.' I say think pictures and sound.
"Why we've got a Sing Along With Freb bit that is madness. There's a bouncing coin that hops along above words the audience is supposed to sing and it jumps right into a cash register. And there I am, Freb, waving my arms, leading my singers, and we're going faster and faster. Finally my arms turn into propellers, and old Freb takes off."
It is hoped Freb will have the energy to take off. Interviewed before he began the six-day tape job, Stan seemed a hit weary. His brain was hopping, but could the body keep up.
“I've prepped for this," said writer Stan, co-producer and big-boss Freberg. "I've been running around the block in Beverly Hills and swimming four laps in the pool. And I've also been eating the good, delicious chow mein. Happy New Year."

Since you will want to celebrate the Freberg-day, why not do so in style? You can find the complete run of the 1957 Freberg radio show, including Daws Butler, June Foray and Peter Leeds, by clicking here and maybe the most famous of his parody records, St. George and the Dragonet, with Daws Butler, June Foray and announcer Hy Averback, at this link.

Coming Soon to a Screen Near You

A hiatus is defined as a pause or break in activity.

The Tralfaz blog has been on a hiatus several times, mainly because other things in life take up a great deal of time.

However, it will be coming to life again with new posts for about three weeks starting this weekend.

To hold you over, here’s a neat drawing of my favourite silent cartoon character, Felix the cat. This is from Exhibitors Herald, December 26, 1925. The first post will be about some silent cartoons, pre-Felix.

How About Hamhock Jones?

Two men got the idea in 1948 of making something new—animated cartoons for television. That was even though there was no television where they lived.

The two were Alex Anderson and Jay Ward.

Anderson was the one with animation experience. He worked for his uncle, Paul Terry, at Terrytoons. Sergeant Jay Ward was a University of California grad who served in the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War Two, then attended Harvard School of Business before returning to the San Francisco Bay area and obtaining his real estate license in July 1947.

The two of them opened a company the next year and pretty soon had some ideas for TV cartoons.

The San Francisco Chronicle of August 29, 1948 looked at their plans. Incidentally, "Troplong" was his mother's maiden name; he was using it as his given name going back at least to his days at University High School in 1937. Remarkably, while there is a drawing of Crusader Rabbit accompanying the story, Ward and Anderson's first star character is not mentioned.

Movies Are Coming From Your Radios
By Luther Nichols
EVERYONE, these days, is trying to get in on the ground floor of the television industry. It's beginning to look like the Bridge Terminal at 5:15 in the afternoon.
Let's take a look at one of the foremost of this swarm of eager opportunists who soon will be entering our homes at all hours the day via the telescreen. In his case the "ground floor" is reached by taking the elevator at 111 Sutter to the 17th floor and walking through a door marked Television Arts Production.
To the best of its knowledge and ours, TAP is the first independent professional producer of television shows for general entertainment in San Francisco.
In a sunny corner office its modest staff is currently struggling to complete three "package" programs for delivery to Eastern sponsors by September 15. (Before we go any further, a package program is one readymade for any advertiser who chooses to buy it as a unit and simply affix his commercials.) Looking further ahead, TAP also is shaping up both animated and live shows to put on the market when television makes its debut in San Francisco. That date should be around December 1, depending on who wins the current neck-and-neck race between KGO and KSFO to complete their stations, and when.
WE cornered one J Troplong Ward, a young, hustling business manager for the production company who insists there is no period after the J in his name. The affable, rather roundish Ward is swelling with enthusiasms and ideas. We asked him to voice some of them.
"Right now," said he, "like everyone else, we're still in a trial-and-error stage. For us the accent is on animated cartoons at this time. They're the coming thing in video advertising. The three we're making are for 15-minute spots. And frankly, they're sensational."
Before we could stop him, the effusive Mr. Ward, who is not one to bide his firm's light under a bushel, or even a molecule, of modest), had launched into an outline of the plot of one of the cartoon, a thing called "Hamhock Jones." It may give you a notion of what to expect when TV becomes more than a blueprint here. (Again, let's pause for term identification: video and TV are trade synonyms for television.)
Seems in the cartoon there are two main characters, Otto and Blotto, who are Siamese twins. Otto has every good quality and is a great scientist; Blotto has every bad, and turns to crime. Of course Blotto knows he can't be sent to prison, for that would mean sending his innocent twin brother to jail as well.
The complications that arise in profusion from this dilemma and the efforts of the great snoop, Detective Hamhock Jones, to resolve them will make, according to Ward, a great serial for some breakfast food sponsor.
Otto then invents a remarkable gas which has the quality of reversing one's personality and convictions. It can even convert Republicans into Democrats and vice versa, which, as anyone can see, has lively possibilities in an election year.
"Terrific, don't you think?" Ward inquired rhetorically.
THE cartoons, once drawn under the supervision of TAPS production manager, Alexander Anderson are set in frames, filmed with $600 camera and other equipment TAP owns, edited for 15 minutes running time with space for commercials, and are then ready for marketing. All three of the cartoons are slanted for “A” telecasting times; that is, from 7 to 10:30 p. m. Monday through Friday and from noon Saturday to 10:30 p. m. on Sunday. These are television's, and radio's, most costly hours.
If they have read this far, some TV set owners will doubtless have their bags halfway packed to take to the hills. Years from now they will be found as bearded hermits, who, on being interviewed, will say: ''Yep, son, I stuck it out until late '48. But when they started telecasting comic books, wal. . . .”
Television Arts also expects to do live shows soon, according to Ward, and is now lining up talent.
It might be noted that the present search for TV talent is a rather ironic reversal of the old silent films to talkies transition. In those days silent stars found they could no longer get by on looks alone. Today audio stars of radio are discovering that they can no longer get by on voice alone.
Original scripts for plays, people with specailies [sic] or "with plenty of personality," as Ward puts it, are being sought. His company—and the others that will come along—need sketch artists, cameramen, drama directors and a small army of other skilled laborers.
"That's the great thing about all this,” Ward exults. "Television is going to furnish a tremendous outlet for local artists, designers, actors and technicians—for anyone with creative instincts.
PEOPLE, says Ward, don't realise the extent of TV already in San Francisco. According to Focus, the trade news release, there will be an estimated 500 receivers in commercial places in this city by September. The average audience for each of these receivers is assumed to be 200 a night for the first 90 days of television. That means, if we haven't lost any beads from our abacus, that there will be a local audience of 100,000 nightly from the very outset.
Since TV, like radio, will be as free as the air that conveys it to anyone with a receiving set, financial support must come from someone other than John Q. Advertisers will pick up the check. Despite the promising figures quoted above, however, advertisers are jittery about sponsoring television shows at the moment.
Although careful surveys have shown that television is vastly more effective than radio in causing the viewer to retain the name of a product, sponsors do not expect to realize much return from their video programs at first. Consequently, there is an overwhelming demand for penny-ante productions. And this is where TAP and similar producers enter the picture with microphone and tripod at the ready.
"Our advantage," Strategist Ward explained, "lies in making general entertainment programs on film, which neither the broadcasting stations nor the advertising agencies are now doing. And in making them cheaply."
By virtue of some shortcutting methods employed by Anderson, a dryly humorous fellow who formerly was a top animator with Terrytoons and who knows the cartoon-on-film game from roughs to transit case, and by its willingness to work on a speculative basis for its profit, TAP hopes to shave expenses and lead in the custom-built commercials field.
TO put television shows on film before broadcasting them may seem a needless and costly step to the layman. Ward says it's really cheaper than staging live shows of equal dramatic merit. For one thing, putting it on celluloid cuts down rehearsal time, since there is no need for extensive memorising of lines, and saves studio rental costa. For another, Kinescope photography, as the 16mm film process required to shoot for TV is called, allows a retention of the programs for future distribution and display, and a more accurate using of them, just as in transcriptions for radio. The human agency, so likely to "gang aft a-gley" in a live show, is minimised in the "canned" product.
There will be three stations—KSFO’s KPIX, ABC's KGOTV and the Chronicle's own NBC affiliate, KRON-TV—in operation in the Bay Area by, or shortly after, the first of next year. Three more will be added soon after, the FCC having allotted six channels to this area.
As each station must televise a required 23 hours per week within three years (12 hours to begin with) in order to keep its permit, that will mean at least 100 hours for the six stations, or 8736 hours a year. One-third of this time, as we have seen, will probably be devoted to programs on film, such as TAP puts out. And that, in case your pencil broke, is 2012 hours at the barest minimum in which TAP and its competitors may romp around.
Considering that it takes Hollywood from 20 to 30 days to shoot an average B picture, and that television-on-film producers have to go through much the same processes, it is plain that such producers are going to be as busy as one-armed jugglers in getting out enough material to fill those 29 1/2 hours plus. Anderson estimates it will take his company about two weeks, when it gets better organised, to film a run-of-the-reel one-hour program.
What's more, Pacific Telephone and Telegraph recently announced that the coaxial cable, now being laid across country to convey nationwide network programs, probably won't stretch to San Francisco until 1951. And since even a microwave relay system probably won't be installed between here and Los Angeles until late 1949, there will be a heavy initial emphasis on locally-produced shows and a demand for local equipment, talent and technicians.
BUT enough of powder-dry facts and figures. Let's have a couple of unvarnished opinions from our man Ward, who has been doing some close-up scanning of the television field.
Ward is not one of those cringing milquetoasts who say out of fear of offending sports, movie or radio people that television won't hurt their business.
“It will," he declares flatly. “But since most radio and movie people will get into television anyway, it won't deflate their wallets much, at least not those who realize that the time for leaving slowly sinking ships is near."
While Ward and TAP are arrayed with those who feel that video is much more closely allied to the theater and movies than to radio, he doesn't bother to enter the stormy controversy on the subject.
"All three forms contribute to new medium," he says. "And as someone put it: I'm not concerned with its paternity; I'm just thankful that the child is with us."
To sum it up, the age of television is dawning at last on San Francisco. Some early birds, like Messrs. Ward and Anderson and their Television Arts Productions Company, are up to greet the dawn. Most others will just lie abed and let it get brighter before they stir themselves. And why not? You can soon have it televised right into your room and save yourself the trouble.

Ward and Anderson took their concepts to NBC in New York, which put them in touch with Jerry Fairbanks. He had signed a deal with the network in June 1947 to handle production of filmed shows. This ultimately proved to be a bad move for Ward and Anderson. Fairbanks ran into money trouble, his assets were ultimately snapped up by producer Shull Bonsall, who claimed ownership of Crusader and all his cartoons.

As you likely know, Ward went out on his own, reworking some concepts of Anderson’s to come up with Rocky and Bullwinkle. The whole story is told in-depth in Keith Scott’s fine and detailed book, The Moose That Roared, which should be in every animation fan’s collection.

Woody Builds a Car

Woody Woodpecker is too busy singing and pointing at people in the theatre watching his cartoon that he crashes his car into a telephone pole.

No matter. Woody splits into multiples of himself, some in outline drawings, and rebuilds his little convertible in about a second of screen time. The frames show how.



I like the earliest, goofy-looking version of Woody, though some of his stories were lacking a bit. This scene is from The Loan Stranger (1942), with voices by Kent Rogers, who throws in a Red Skelton voice ("You bwoke my liddle head!") and the loan-sharking fox doing Jolie ("Mammy!). Woody singing at the outset is unmistakeably Mel Blanc. Direction is by Alex Lovy, story by Bugs Hardaway and Milt Schaffer, and animation is credited to Frank Tipper.

Ala Bahma Smears

Several Chuck Jones cartoons in the first half of the 1940s featured smear animation. The Dover Boys (1942) may be the best-known example.

You can spot some in at least one scene of Case of the Missing Hare (also 1942), where Tedd Pierce’s story has magician Ala Bahma get his comeuppance from a revenging Bugs Bunny.

Here, Bahma is nailing a self-promotional poster over a hole in a tree, which is actually the entrance to Bugs’ home.



Bahma checks his handiwork.



The action is on single frames.

Ben Washam is apparently the animator in this scene, but I'll stand corrected. Ken Harris gets the rotating screen credit.

The cartoon is a forerunner of the great Bugs revenge short, Long-Haired Hare, where the rabbit crushes the performance of opera star Giovanni Jones.

Chuck Jones made some enjoyable cartoons released in 1942. Another likeable short is The Draft Horse, another one with a Tedd Pierce story and smear animation.