More Tex and More Obscure Stuff

Yes, this blog is retired but, like the Yowp blog, it seems I end up posting periodically (Yowp will have posts once a month for the next few months).

Some things in animation caught my interest today so I’ll pass them along.


I’m pleased the Warner Archive people are coming out with Blu-rays featuring some of the old Merrie Melodies and Looney Tunes cartoons. Volume 3 of the “Collector’s Choice” (which “collector” chose these, anyway?) will be out March 12. There are 25 cartoons, and Warners fans should enjoy, well, most of them. Provided, of course, on how they look and sound.

Four of them are by Tex Avery. A Feud There Was with Egghead as Elmer Fudd, has only been released on laser disc. Cinderella Meets Fella stars Egghead (Danny Webb) and Cinderella (Berneice Hansell) as Tex and his writers made fun of the old fairy tale, ending with the pair in a theatre about to watch a newsreel. Egghead Rides Again features Mel Blanc instead of Danny Webb doing his best Joe Penner impression. And there’s I Only Have Eyes For You, with an iceman (Joe Twerp) in love with crooner crazy Katie Canary (Elvia Allman) but who gets stuck with an old crone (also Elvia Allman). “At least she can cook.” It would be great if the original titles had been found for this.

There’s an upgrade to the historic Honeymoon Hotel (1934), the first colour cartoon (Cinecolor) released by Warners. Hey! It shows a man and a woman in bed together. Okay, they’re bugs. But still...

Happily, Art Davis is represented in this release with two cartoons he directed. Davis did a good job with Daffy Duck (my favourite Davis cartoon is What Makes Daffy Duck?) and two Daffys are here: Mexican Joyride and Riff Raffy Daffy. Does anyone except Eddie Selzer and some Warner Bros. bean-counters think the Davis unit should have been disbanded?

For fans of Bugs Bunny with a weird voice, there’s Chuck Jones’ Elmer's Pet Rabbit from 1941.

There are some “eh” cartoons in this volume, and we can be thankful we’re spared the adventures of Daffy and Speedy or Cool Cat. But there’s one real stinker in this collection, and that’s Pre-Hysterical Hare (1958). I don’t know what’s worse, Tedd Pierce’s story, Dave Barry as Elmer Fudd or the Yogi Bear music (the Warners cartoons are about the only place I don’t like the Capitol Hi-Q library).

The other interesting news item comes from Devon Baxter, maybe the best and most dogged of the young animation researchers out there. Devon is working on finding out about the Daffy Dittys series of stop-motion animated shorts produced by Morey and Sutherland. Frank Tashlin left Warners after his final go-around there to work for the company. Six shorts were released by United Artists. We wrote about them a good 12 years ago.

Devon has far more patience and time than I do in hunting down information, and is willing to talk to people to find out what he needs to know. In this case, he’s been in contact with the son of Rev Cheney, an uncredited Warners animator who went to work for Morey and Sutherland in 1945. These frames are from The Cross-Eyed Bull, released before Cheney arrived. The film apparently doesn’t exist.



Cheney continued working for the company when Morey left and it became John Sutherland Productions. Rev was involved with the Harding College propaganda cartoons like Make Mine Freedom and Meet King Joe. I hope Devon will delve into that in a future post on the Cartoon Research blog. The Sutherland cartoons are probably my favourite of the industrial animated shorts.

Devon’s also acquired some other odds and sods, including artwork from Ray Patin’s commercial studio. I am anxious to read about that. He also has some cards from Five Star Productions. One of them is below.

Five Star is the answer to the question “What happened to Norm McCabe after Warner Bros?” He replaced Howard Swift in August 1952 when Swift opened Swift-Chaplin Productions.

I’m always pleased to read new information about old cartoons, even commercial and industrial ones, and I look forward to seeing what Devon has discovered.