Shishkabugs Backgrounds

Tom O'Loughlin was hired at the Warners cartoon studio by October 1957 and replaced Boris Gorelick as the background artist in the Friz Freleng unit. His first work appeared on screen in 1958. He stayed until the end of the studio, and carried on at DePatie-Freleng. O'Loughlin had been a painter before coming to the studio. We put together a short bio in this post.

The studio was running on fumes in 1962. One of his unit’s cartoons released that year was Shishkabugs. O’Loughlin provided the backgrounds. Here are some of them. They’re not terribly inspired but they do their job to give an appropriate place for the characters. I have managed to paste together the opening pan upward; it is in two pieces.

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Bugs is pretty tame in John Dunn's story. He finally shows up at the 2:15 mark. His antics include kissing the king (who has done nothing to him) and rigging a custard pie to hit the king's face. Oh, and he becomes the cook and serves the king a carrot. That's it. No sparkling dialogue. No outrageous reactions. Friz, give me Baseball Bugs or Bugs Bunny Rides Again instead.

Virgil Ross, Gerry Chiniquy, Bob Matz, Art Leonardi and Lee Halpern are the animators on this short, released Dec. 8, 1962. Freleng had resigned from the studio the previous month. Everyone knew the end was near.