Rudy's Boots

Time for a tough-to-see inside joke from Tex Avery’s The Peachy Cobbler from the background art of Johnny Johnsen.

There’s a pair of boots on the top shelf with a label on it. The BluRay version allows you a better look at the scrawl. Though it’s not altogether clear, you can make out a name: J.R. Zamora.

That, of course, is none other than Rudy Zamora, who started in animation working on Felix the Cat cartoons for Pat Sullivan. Zamora told historian Harvey Deneroff he answered an ad and was given a test.

Zamora came in second to an African-American, with Eddie Salter third. He recalled that, animator Dana Parker “took the black boy [aside] and told him that they’ll call him when they needed him, [as they were] not hiring anyone that day. But they kept Eddie and I. That was lousy. Then they would have hired this black guy and myself. Ed was third.” When Zamora complained about this to Parker, he was told, “The old man didn’t want any black guys.”

He moved over to Fleischer and assisted Dick Huemer, finding himself promoted to animator in May 1930 along with Shamus Culhane, who wrote:

Rudy was animating a song cartoon that had been abandoned by Dick Huemer. Glow Little Glowworm was about half-finished when Huemer left, and in one of Max’s desperate moves, he had allowed Zamora to finish the film by himself. The result was incredible; there was no way to tell where Huemer had ended and Zamora had taken up.

Zamora jumped his two year contract and headed to Disney. Culhane related how after a sneak preview of one cartoon, the newly-arrived Zamora

...was part the group listening to Walt’s litany of complaints, grudging approvals, and plans for retakes. Apparently Rudy was not in tune with the tense feelings of the group because he plucked his one-inch cigarette stub out of his mouth and waved it at Disney. “Excuse me, Walt, could I ask a question?” Disney was startled by the interruption of his though processes. “What is it, Zamora?” Rudy, looking at him in mock perplexity, said, “Tell me, Walt, what makes these things move?” Lèse-majesté! Despite the fact that he was one of the most promising young animators at the studio, Zamora was fired the next morning.

Three jobs in about three years. As you can see, Zamora bounced around a lot. He’s spotted in a staff photo of the Charles Mintz studio around 1932. Next, he and Culhane reunited at the Ub Iwerks studio. He animated and directed at Walter Lantz then moved over to MGM (apparently after a stop in the late ‘30s working for Paul Fennell at Cartoon Films), getting screen credit on a pair of cartoons released in 1942-43. Bill Melendez was at Warners then, but the two worked together on the Peanuts specials years later. Both were Mexican. About Zamora working for Fred Quimby at Metro at this period, he told chronicler Didier Ghez:

When the union signed a contract with MGM, Quimby was of course furious. He turns to one of his production managers and says, “What do these guys animate? From now on, 25 feet a week or else out!” Rudy being a cantankerous, undisciplined guy . . . He worked for me several times and I couldn’t stand him. I would fire him all the time. He made it a point of honor as soon as a contract was signed never to be caught working. He would be there picking his teeth or smoking. You know, he smoked the way Frenchmen do [Bill demonstrates indicating the cigarette inside a cupped hand.] Quimby would come in and say, “Jeez, Rudy, what are you doing?” Rudy would say, “What do you mean what am I doing, Mr. Quimby.” Quimby says, “Rudy, you should be working. Why aren’t you at your desk?” Rudy would say, “I have done my footage. You said 25 feet a week and I have done my five feet for today.” Now Quimby was watching him. He was going to watch him. You know, you had to put in your footage every day. So Quimby would come up and say, “Rudy, you’re terrible. You should be working! I am paying you good money to be a 25-feet-a-week animator and you’re not working.” Rudy would say, “Mr. Quimby, look at your figures. I have already done my 25 feet. I don’t have to do any more. I did 25 feet; I am going to go up and practice my bowling.” This actually happened. Quimby goes downstairs furious, you know, whistling through his teeth. He goes downstairs and suddenly he hears, in a hallway bigger than this . . . [Bill points to the area in which the interview is being taped.] Rudy has his bowling ball and he rolls the ball down the hall. Quimby couldn’t believe it. He says, “Rudy what the hell are you doing?” Rudy says, “I thought I had time to practice my bowling. I’m preparing for the tournament.” Quimby didn’t know how to control him. He just didn’t. Rudy never complained when they put up a time clock. It was the fact that they said he had to do so much work. Rudy was a very fast animator. He could just rip it out.

He may have returned to the MGM in the late 40s, but tracking every move of some animators is pretty much impossible.

In 1951, he was picked up by the Jam Handy Organization in Detroit, where the coffers were loaded from assignments (animated and otherwise) from General Motors. He worked there for Gene Deitch, who wrote, quoting Zamora’s claim eating a hot pepper is a discerning qualification of an animator:

He obviously thought I was too young and green to be his boss, and he constantly let me know it. He went along with the gag of working under my direction, because he needed the job. I too went along with the gag, because I needed him [. . .] to give life to my conceptions. Rudy was probably the only first-class animator Jam Handy ever had. I was delighted to take his ribbing, as long as he would stick with me, and give me what I wanted.

It was back to the West Coast for Zamora. In 1958 he was at Playhouse Pictures before being hired as a sequence director on UPA’s Magoo feature. The next year, he found himself in Mexico overseeing Rocky and His Friends for Jay Ward, then spent part of the ‘60s at Gus Jekel’s FilmFair studio before more work for Bill Melendez and Hanna-Barbera. Along the way, in 1956, he became a naturalised American; he had been born in Mexico on March 26, 1910 and came to the U.S. with his family in 1917.

Interestingly, there was another inside joke about Zamora at a studio where I don’t believe he worked. Bob McKimson’s background artist, Bill Butler, plants his name on a poster of Mexican names (some puns) in the Warners short West of the Pesos (released 1960).

Zamora died July 29, 1989 in Los Angeles.

Harvey Deneroff recorded an all-too-brief interview with Zamora. See it HERE.