Bugs clobbers the Sheriff of Nottingham on the head. The dazed sheriff exclaims “Odds, fish! The very air abounds in kings.” And it does, too.
If I had to name a favourite cartoon writer, that would be easy. It’s Mike Maltese.
Monday, 3 April 2017
Odds Fish
If I had to name a favourite line of dialogue from Mike Maltese, I couldn’t. But one in Rabbit Hood would be in the running.
Bugs clobbers the Sheriff of Nottingham on the head. The dazed sheriff exclaims “Odds, fish! The very air abounds in kings.” And it does, too.
If I had to name a favourite cartoon writer, that would be easy. It’s Mike Maltese.
Bugs clobbers the Sheriff of Nottingham on the head. The dazed sheriff exclaims “Odds, fish! The very air abounds in kings.” And it does, too.
If I had to name a favourite cartoon writer, that would be easy. It’s Mike Maltese.
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This one still has me laughing as hard as when I first saw it in the 1960's. Even though Basil Rathbone was Sir Guy of Gisbourne, and Melville Cooper was the Sheriff of Nottingham in the 1938 film version, our sheriff here has always reminded my more of Rathbone. Maltese is also one of my favorite writers.
ReplyDeleteThe Sheriff's design is a bit of a call-back to Chuck's design for the Pied Piper in "Sniffles and the Bookworm"
Delete.
"Rabbit Hood" could be Maltese's most verbally witty script. My favorite lines are either Bugs' various knightings of the Sheriff ("...Essence of Muir, Milk of Magnesia, Quarter of Ten...") or his line moments earlier that the king approacheth "O'er yon Chevy Chase". Maltese was likely referring to the English poem, but the fact it's also a tony suburb of Washington, D.C., creates a bit of a King/President synergy to the line, and audiences in the nation's capital probably took it that way in the theaters and when the cartoon hit TV in 1964.
I agree about Maltese..
ReplyDeleteWhen the nasty old Bogeyman fills me with fears / And my little old pinafore is all wet with tears / And my cute little pug nose is all red from crying / Who is it that saves me and keeps me from dying? / My Pa! / When my little pink cheeks are pale with fright / Who is it that lifts me and holds me tight / And says, "There, there, little man. Everything is all right"? / My Pa!
ReplyDeleteBugs Bunny and his Brooklyn accent, Mel Blanc made Warner Brother's Looney Tunes cartoons the very best. Characters a-plenty, I lived for Saturday Cartoons at Norview Theater in Norfolk County, Va. The 1940s & 1950s were spectacular.
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