Bugs sees Elmer come at him with a meat cleaver in the kitchen of the Mocrumbo supper club. He quickly rushes out the door and returns pretending to be a waiter. “One lemon merango pie!” he shouts at Elmer. Fudd follows the logic of the situation and assumes the role of the pie chef.
Bugs keeps picking up a freshly-baked pie, leaving with the kitchen with it, then returning and mashing it in Fudd’s face. The wabbit never breaks stride. The action has perfect rhythm. Another beauty from Friz Freleng.
Tedd Pierce and Mike Maltese wrote the story. The animation is by Manny Perez, Gerry Chiniquy, Virgil Ross and Ken Champin; Greg Duffell tells me this scene belongs to Ross.
We can all "ooh" and "ahh-h" about Chuck Jones and Tex Avery, but the simple fact is that Friz Freleng made more funnier cartoons at Warner Brothers than either of them for one simple reason: Freleng was an absolute master of timing. Better, I think, than either Chuck Jones and Tex Avery when it comes to timing. And while comedy is many things in the aggregate, one of the most important is timing
ReplyDeleteI agree 100%. Chuck jones did the later "tom and jerry's" and they were not as funny
DeleteThe kicker to the gag of course was having Dave Barry's Humphrey Bogart repeat Bugs' final order to Fudd after being smacked in the face with the coconut custard pie with whip cream that Elmer has tossed into the dining area after finally figuring out the bit. Not quite as famous as some of Bogey's lines from "Casablanca", but still memorably funny for doing a line like that in Bogey's voice.
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