In an interview in 1971 with Michael Barrier, McKimson explained when Rod Scribner returned to his unit after an absence, he had to “calm” his animation.
Another animator McKimson inherited when he became a director was Manny Gould, who was responsible for exaggerated open-mouths and other fun drawings for Bob Clampett, after a tame career at the Mintz studio going back to the silent era. Gould didn’t have a chance to be “calmed.” He left for Jerry Fairbanks Productions in September 1947. The last cartoon he was credited on was The Windblown Hare, released August 27, 1949.
In one Gould scene, the Big Bad Wolf was priming himself to religiously follow the book “The Three Little Pigs” by rehearsing lines from it while walking. The scene is animated on ones. Here’s my favourite drawing.
The wolf strolls into the scene where background artist Dick Thomas has rendered a straw house based (I presume) on Warren Foster’s story sketches and Cornett Wood’s layouts. He delivers his famous line. Here are random frames by Gould and the studio’s in-betweeners.
Why would anyone want to “calm” this type of animation? And why are characters out of the frame in McKimson cartoons?
This is one of McKimson’s cartoons I really like. Foster’s story is solid. It’s so solid, he remade it with Yogi Bear (Oinks and Boinks, 1960). Chuck McKimson, Jack Carey and Phil De Lara are the other credited animators.
It’s a little sad, but a hunt through available copies of Daily Variety has resulted in less than a treasure trove about McKimson. There’s a June 1965 story about him directing the Road Runner series on CBS for DePatie-Freleng. But there’s also this story from July 28, 1969.
Hendricks, Blount Are Documenting ‘Space’ For W7
A two-planet space documentary, “Who Needs Space?”, currently is in production at Warner Bros.-Seven Arts.Recounting progressive steps in American space exploration culminating in the Apollo 11 moon landing, “Who Needs Space?” is being produced by the studio’s animation-commercial division in collaboration with North American Rockwell Space Division.
William L. Hendricks and Earl Blount are producing the film, scripted by Jay Dresser, with Bob McKimson directing animation sequences. Hal Geer is editing with Buddy Eyanson coordinating film coverage.
Whether this was completed, someone may know, but McKimson spent the rest of his career at DePatie-Freleng. He was having lunch at the Smoke House with Freleng and others from the studio when he had a coronary and died, September 29, 1977. He was 66.
Jim Korkis spoke with Bob Clampett about McKimson and you can read the interview here. And Mark Nardone’s 1980 with McKimson from the Peary brothers' “The American Animated Cartoon” can be found here with an Internet Archive subscription.
I believe “Who Needs Space” probably became 1970’s “One Giant Leap“. It doesn’t seem to be available online and I’m not 100% sure if “Who Needs Space” later became “One Giant Leap” but both were produced by Hendricks at WB, had involvement by Earl Blount and NASA and Rockwell both had involvement in production of the short (side note but there’s a LOT of obscure history of the WB 7Arts cartoon shorts stuff that really should be uncovered).
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