Just as Tex Avery’s Hollywood Steps Out (1941) includes a happy producer Leon Schlesinger and right-hand man Henry Binder, the shot above is of the authors of this particular cartoon, Tedd Pierce and Mike Maltese.
Pierce was a noted martini imbiber when he wasn’t writing cartoons.
The two turn up in an early Bugs Bunny cartoon, Wackiki Wabbit (1943).
Pierce and his sister were amateur stage actors in the late 1920s. Maltese was a frustrated comedian. The two of them, remembered Warners assistant animator Jerry Eisenberg, would entertain staff members during studio coffee breaks.
Maltese succumbed to Joe Barbera waving dollars in front of him in November 1958 and moved to Hanna-Barbera. Pierce left the studio around 1960 and was soon writing The Alvin Show at Format Films.
Maltese and Pierce did another fine job on this cartoon, with Leopold Stokowski conducting a juke box and Ray Milland’s typewriter scene in The Lost Weekend being parodied. Director Friz Freleng shows perfect timing in the “pick up pie” scene with Bugs and Elmer.
As a kid, all these caricatures and pop culture references flew over my head. I didn't understand why a man would pay for a drink with a typewriter! 😂
ReplyDeleteI believe Tedd Pierce also was rotoscoped a couple of times for cartoons?
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting that they depict Bogie as bending over. He wasn't actually that big. His agent once said that he got in bar fights because he would get "a couple of drinks in him and start thinking he was Humphrey Bogart."
According to Orson Welles, Bogie started those fights knowing damn well that they would be broken up before he got hit.
DeleteI don't doubt it, though Orson had a gift for storytelling.
DeleteAt least once that I can immediately recall: he's the rotoscoped audience member that gets shot by Egghead in "Daffy Duck and Egghead."
DeleteThere are several of them. I didn't want to sidetrack the post. It seems to me it's Pierce when Yosemite Sam threatens a moving audience member. I think that's the last time the gag was used.
DeleteBogie indeed was not a very tall man, but I'm sure Elmer and Bugs were even shorter.
DeleteA third cartoon where you see the duo is "Bad Ol' Putty Tat," written by Pierce. Pierce is the featured badminton player who eventually gets whacked by Sylvester; Maltese is seen from a distance returning Pierce's serve. The sequence has a superb rendition of "Freddy the Freshman."
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