Tuesday 25 February 2014

A Quick Trip to the Stork Club

The Stork Club was one of New York City’s most famous night spots, and it makes an appearance in “A Hare Grows in Manhattan,” the great Bugs Bunny biographical cartoon directed by Friz Freleng.



Oddly, either layout man Hawley Pratt or whoever drew the final storyboard that Pratt worked from didn’t use the correct address of the real club on the awning. The actual Stork Club was at 3 East 53rd Street. Here’s a great photo of the front entrance.



The club’s appearance in the cartoon is quick. A thug bulldog chases Bugs through it. Naturally, since it is the Stork Club, it’s populated with storks.



The club is no more. On the site are a few trees cut into a cement slab with cement bowls of greenery, known as Paley Park. If you want to learn about the fascinating history of the club, read about it at this web site.
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5 comments:

  1. J Lee25 February 2014 at 12:21

    The park's adjacent to the Museum of Broadcasting/Paley Center for the Media (IIRC, part of the deal for putting up the block-length building the Paley Center is located in was the creation of a block-length park just to the west, on the site where the Stork Club was located, though the Club was long gone by the time the building was demolished in the 1970s).

    Famous Studios also made use of the Stork Club gag just after Friz's cartoon was released, with 1947's "The Baby Sitter" (this still being the period where Famous' cartoons had some creativity, they expanded on the idea, with Lulu in a dream sequence chasing after a party-going infant Alvin, who naturally as a baby would end up at the Stork Club).

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  2. Yowp25 February 2014 at 13:40

    Thanks, JL. I must admit I haven't watched the Lulus; I don't believe (due to rights issues) Harvey had them in their syndication package year ago.

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    1. J Lee26 February 2014 at 00:58

      Yowp:

      Here's the Stork Club dream sequence in question, handled by the Dave Tendlar unit. You'd assume the Famous Studios staff would be more familiar with the club itself, since their offices were just eight blocks away.

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    2. Chris Sobieniak26 February 2014 at 15:21

      At least the storks in this cartoon are using their wings as arms logically. It always seems odd noting how they use their legs in the cartoon above just noticing the screenshot with one of them far in the background having to raise it's leg above it's torso for a toast.

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  3. Eric O. Costello25 February 2014 at 16:25

    Clampett's "Baby Bottleneck" also refers to the Stork Club as well.

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