Jack Benny is a Tattletale Grey Bunny

When sound came into theatres, animated cartoons featured piles of celebrity caricatures and parodies. So did radio shows, too. The early Jack Benny show featured imitations of, or jokes about, Garbo, Ed Wynn, Eddie Cantor, and so. It seems fair, then, that cartoons made fun of Jack Benny, too.

The climax for the animated Benny likely came in the 1959 Warner Bros. short The House That Jack Built, but there were others we detailed in this post. In several, he was depicted as a rabbit named “Jack Bunny.”

One of these was Goofy Groceries, released by Warners in 1941. It was directed by Bob Clampett, who loved tossing pop culture references into his cartoons. Early in this one, “Jack Bunny” introduces himself to us. “Hello again, folks,” he says to us (the real Benny opened his show then with “Jell-O again”), waving a Benny-esque cigar.



The cartoon harkens back to the Harman-Ising days of the early ‘30s, when a villain would grab the heroine in the second half of the cartoon, and the good guys would unite to rescue her. Here, a can-can dancer (yes, she’s a can) is trapped by a huge gorilla.

Bunny sees it and reacts, jumping on a bottle of horse radish. Off-camera, Mel Blanc shouts the name of Benny’s 1940 feature film—“Buck Benny Rides Again.” (The movie’s cast includes Carmichael the bear, voiced on Benny’s show by Blanc, but Blanc doesn’t do Carmichael in the film).



Bunny gets cornered after an axe he is carrying is shrunk by smoke from a Roman candle held by the gorilla.



The gorilla lights another fireworks stick and hands it to Bunny. A blare of trumpets. It's Superguy! He fails to rescue Bunny. Only Clampett would have a super-hero drawn with cross-eyes and buck teeth (it appears Superguy also skipped leg day in the gym).



The gorilla lights another fireworks stick and hands it to Bunny. But the gorilla is stopped by another radio reference. Shouts a female voice from off-camera: “Henry!” “Coming, mother,” shouts the gorilla. You should recognize this from the opening of radio’s The Aldrich Family which filled in for Benny as a summer replacement series in 1939. The mother gorilla is voiced by Sara Berner, who portrayed a number of characters on the Benny radio show.



None of this stops the large firecracker from exploding.



The explosion leaves Bunny blackened into a rabbit version of Jack Benny’s valet. “My, oh, my,” observes the now-Rochester rabbit to the camera, “Tattletale grey!” It’s the same ending Clampett used with a ghost in Jeepers Creepers (1939).



The “tattletale grey” is another pop culture reference.



While Blanc does Bunny-as-Rochester’s voice, Bunny is played by Jack Lescoulie, who hosted The Grouch Club on KFWB radio. In 1939, the show appeared on the Red network's WEAF at 6:30 p.m. Sundays just before Benny. His impersonation doesn’t do anything for me, but I’m in the minority as his version of Benny is heard in several cartoons at more than one studio, and even on the Benny show itself during a programme billed as Jack’s “10th anniversary” on radio.

Benny, his show, and his supporting actors provided plenty of inspiration for writers and directors when cartoons and network radio shared a golden age. You can learn much about this from the ne plus ultra of voice acting experts, Keith Scott, in his two-book set.

Banana Bugs

Bugs Bunny makes a 360-degree turn in perspective in Falling Hare (1943) as the gremlin trips him up with banana peels.

These are 17 consecutive drawings.

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Tom McKimson apparently animated this scene. The rotating screen credit for animation went to Rod Scribner.

Gangster Hideout

A streetcar carries Duck Twacy to the gangster hideout in The Great Piggy Bank Robbery (1946). Neon signs and search lights give him some directions. A quick pan across a background shows the hideout is so close, the signs and lights aren’t necessary.

Here is the scene snipped together.



Phil De Guard is the background artist in this cartoon. Layouts are by Tom McKimson.

This wild effort of the Bob Clampett unit was officially released July 27, 1946 but, as usual, it appeared on screens before then. At one theatre in Burlington, North Carolina, it was shown starting the 23rd, as advertised in the local newspaper. What’s funny about the ad is it leaves the impression Porky Pig is the star of the cartoon. He’s not. He appears in disguise in two scenes taking up less than 10 seconds.

The Showmen’s Trade Review rated the cartoon “Good” and gave as a summary: “Daffy Duck, who follows Dick Tracy with great avidity, decides to look into the mystery of the stolen piggy banks. After many horrifying encounters with macabre characters and animals like you’ve never seen before, he locates the banks in a cave. It is all a dream, but don’t worry—Daffy is as Daffy as ever. Good anywhere, although there is some doubt about it for over-impressionable children.

This was the second-last Clampett Merrie Melodies cartoon at Warners. He got through part of Bacall to Arms and left the studio. Whether he quit or was fired is something only Dick Tracy could solve.

Beany Gets His Start

Something was missing in a blurb on the radio/TV page of the Los Angeles Daily News of Monday, March 7, 1949. It reported KTLA would now sign on at 5:30 p.m., meaning expanded programming. While the story mentioned a new, five-day-a-week children’s show tabbed The Western, it did not mention another new programme dropped into 6:30 slot which had far more impact.

It was Time For Beany.

(The internet says the show debuted the week before. If it did, and it’s possible, no newspaper had it in their listings).

Likely anyone reading this blog will know this was a puppet show that was the brainchild of former Warner Bros. cartoon director Bob Clampett. Eventually, KTLA’s owner syndicated it across the U.S. It gave birth to Clampett’s Beany and Cecil cartoon show on ABC in 1962.

The Daily News loved the show, and two columns were devoted to it. The first was published June 17, 1949.

It's happy TV sailin' with Beany and the Leakin' Lena
By WALT TALIAFERRO
(Radio and Television Editor)
Are you adequately protected with accident and hospitalization insurance? Do you carry complete coverage in a life insurance policy?
If not, don't dare venture near the path leading to the nearest television receiver at 6:30 p. m.—Monday through Friday — or you're liable to be trampled under foot by a swarm of children, as they give full throat to their rallying cry, "Hey, Ma! It's Time for Beany!"
And that's not all. Close on their heels comes Dad—big brother—or Granny. For, one and all, they're "Beany" fans.
Just four short months ago "Beany" was a private in Hollywood's Army of OOWA's (Out of Work Actors.)
If the rest of this story reads line fantasy—why not? That's what "Beany" is.
He invested his last nickel in a phone call that has earned him a seven-year contract with Paramount Television Productions, where he can be seen on KTLA as the star of Bob Clampett's "Time for Beany" program.
Klaus Landsberg, West Coast director of Paramount Television, received a phone call from a little boy who related the plans he and his uncle had to visit all parts of the globe in a quest for knowledge and adventure. His uncle, "Capt. Horatio Huffenpuff" had a ship, "The Leakin' Lena," but needed funds to finance the expedition.
So impressed was Landsberg with the boy's earnestness and fortitude, that he arranged not only to finance the expedition, but also send along one of KTLA's crack camera crews to telecast a nightly on-the-spot coverage of the cruise.
Thus was born the start of an outdoor adventure that has no equal on television.
The "Leakin' Lena's" crew is comprised of "Beany;" “Capt. Huffenpuff;” "Hopalong Wong," the lovable Chinese cook; "Klowny," the mailman; "Hunny Bear," the mischievous mascot; "Mr. Crow," faithful lookout in the Crow's nest; and "Dishonest John," a dastardly stowaway.
Setting sail, accompanied by KTLA camera experts Gordon Minter, Jimmy Morris and Lloyd Bockaus, the good ship left port, and headed to open sea. Two days out they ran into a most unusual development. As the clouds rumbled, and the sea tossed their ship, who should appear from the churning waters, but a huge sea serpent.
Beany was terrified, but the monster simply laid his head on the deck, hiccupped, and introduced himself.
"Cecil's the name. Cecil, the Sea Sick Sea Serpent, that is." Again Cecil groaned.
"What's the matter, honey boy?" Beany asked, and kissed him square on the top of the head.
Ever since that day Beany and "Cecil, the Sea Sick Sea Serpent" have been the best of buddies.
Whenever Beany is threatened with danger, Cecil is always on hand to lend a hand.
And if the somewhat stupid Cecil doesn't have the answer for one of their problems, he visits Smarty Pants the Frog—otherwise known as "The Brain." He knows.
Already, the expedition has sailed down the L. A. River, and has overcome the many varied dangers of Echo Park, Sleepy Lagoon, Salty Lake, Boo Hoo Bay, Lake Ha Ho (the land of the Laughing Grass), through the Straigths [sic] of Jacket, and Turban Bay, past the Land of Milk and Honey, and is now at the LaBrea Tar Pits.
Here they hope to capture the Freep, the last living species of prehistoric origin.
Interest is running so high in what the Freep will look like that thousands of children have sent in drawings of what he may look like, as well as offers to help in his capture.
One local housewife, last week, phoned the station to say her husband didn't want to leave town on his vacation till he was sure he wouldn't miss the unveiling of the Freep.
The tremendous influx mail proves beyond a doubt that an equal number of adults and children follow the program.
The parents especially approve the inspiring way in which Beany instructs his followers in ways to do things, proper conduct, good fellowship and proper moral outlook.
"Time for Beany" is a Bob Clampett Packing Production, and stars Daws Butler and Stan Freberg, considered in the trade as the top men in their field. Butler, for years a top vaudeville and radio performer, is achieving TV fame for his expert portrayal of "Beany" and other lead characters.
Clampett, originator of the "Beany", program was formerly a director of "Bugs Bunny" cartoons at Warner Bros. Studio.
Bill Oberlin, also at Warners with Clampett, designs and constructs the sets, among the best on any Television show. Charlie Shows, former Fairbanks writer, is story head. Maurice Levy Jr., longtime associate of Clampett's, is the show's personal business representative.

Here’s the Daily News column from Dec. 27, 1949. You’ll notice it says Beany had turned one year old. It would seem the character appeared on KTLA in late 1948, though I can find no mention of him or Bob Clampett in any 1948 newspaper.

Hey, just a darn minute! Beany boy has a message
By CECIL, THE SEASICK SEA SERPENT
As told to Paul Price
Now, just a darn minute there . . . just a darn minute!
My little pal Beany boy wants me to give you a message. Beany boy and I are taking off soon on a trip to the moon and he's a mighty busy lad working with Captain Huffenpuff gettin' that ol' rocket in shape for the flight. Otherwise he'd write you himself.
Well, now, my little pal's television program, 'Time for Beany" has just celebrated its first anniversary on KTLA . . . and we want to thank you for all those swell letters.
The nice things so many people said about my little pal . . . and, well, gosh, even me, is enough to make an old sea serpent blush. And, doggone it, I'll bet that's somethin' you haven't seen very often.
Beany and me really appreciate those letters . . . especially the ones from you youngsters . . . but we'd like you to know that there are a few other people who have had something to do with it.
Our pal, Bob Clampett—he's a man—is really responsible for any success that Beany boy, Captain Huffenpuff, Dishonest John, Clownie and the rest of us have had.
That ol' Bob, he's always thinking of things for us to do, new places to go and strange lands to explore. Why if it hadn't been for him we never would have found that darn ol' Freep or the love bomb.
He does a pretty good job for a man.
Then there's Daws Butler—and do you know that sometimes when he's talking I can't tell whether it's him or Beany Boy. He sounds as much like my little pal as I sound like Stan Freberg.
Maybe it's because they're both actor fellows.
Well, Beany and I and the gang have been to some mighty strange places, and it was all arranged by Bill Oberlin. Ol' Bill says he's in charge of settings and effects, but all I know is he's the fellow that's fixing it for us to go to the moon.
You know, it's quite a job putting on "Time for Beany" five days a week, because we go a lot of places and some mighty strange adventures happen to us. Guess none of it would be possible without Charlie Shows, our writer and producer. He's a man, too.
Beany boy and I just want you to know that we're mighty happy so many people and organizations have voted us their favorite television show.
Even Dorothy Sutherland of the California Congress of Parents and Teachers says we have one of the best programs for children.
I have to be swimming along now because it's almost "Time for Beany." See you over KTLA at 6:30. I'm giving Paul Price back his column.
Your old friend, Cecil, the sea-sick sea serpent.
• • •
Thank you Cecil, and we sure hope you don't get sick traveling in that rocket to the moon.

After Beany went national, the show caught the attention of TV Guide. This article was published in the Chicago edition, Aug. 21, 1954.

Beany from the Back
...AND WHAT MAKES SEASICK CECIL TICK
“Kukla, Fran & Ollie,” explains Bob Clampett, creator of Time for Beany and an admirer of K,F&O’s Burr Tillstrom, “is a puppet show—pure and simple—which uses television merely as a means of reaching its audience. Beany, on the other hand, uses television. It could be done only on TV. We use connected stages, not just one; painted backdrops whose illusion would be lost in a theater, camera tricks. Anyone who tries to compare the two shows has rocks in his head.”
An award-winning favorite in Los Angeles, Time for Beany is now building a national following. Clampett, a youngish-looking man in his late thirties was a movie cartoon director and artist. He brought the show to TV almost six years ago.
Beany backstage, to the untrained eye, is a helter-skelter of organized confusion. Between stage and backdrops is four-by-six-foot space in which actors doing the voices of the characters must maneuver without barking shins or jamming an elbow into someone’s mouth. Scripts are attached to a roller device, turned when a puppet manipulator gets a hand free.
“For the first five years,” Clampett says, “two boys, Stan Freberg and Dawes Butler [sic], did practically all the voices. When they finally decided to leave the show, a lot of potential sponsors were scared off because they thought these two boys could never be replaced. But we’d had other actors doing the voices, on the air, for weeks before Dawes and Stan publicly announced they were leaving. Nobody noticed the difference.” Beany now has a staff of six voice artists—each of whom can, and does, voice every character on the show at one time or another.
Clampett’s forte, like Tillstrom’s, is satire, which he tries to keep on a broad enough level to snare both the children and their elders. (A loyal viewer: Lionel Barrymore.) Clampett’s more recent satirical characters have included Jack Webbfoot; the Connecticut Sea Serpent in King Arthur’s Court (a take-off on Godfrey); the Double Feature Creature with the Wide Scream and the Scareophonic Sound; Marilyn Mongrel; Tearalong the Dotted Lion; Louie the Lone Shark; Dizzy Lou the Kangeroo (Desilu), Moon Mad Tiger, a mustachioed character voiced by Jerry Colonna, another fan. And there’s always Cecil the Seasick Sea Serpent.

There are a few episodes of the puppet show circulating on the internet. Clampett managed to pull off a season of the cartoon series. Unfortunately, his Snowball Productions never managed to get other ventures off the ground, and the Beany and Cecil cartoons remain on wish lists of fans who would like to see a restored, full set.

Bell, Book and Wood

The “books come to life” cartoons at Warner Bros. always gave the opportunity for the background artist to sneak in a reference to cartoon studio staff. We’ve mentioned this about Bob Clampett’s Book Revue in this post. There’s a name we didn’t catch until now. Observe the author(ess) name on the fifth book from the left.



Raynelle Bell worked under Clampett at the “Katz” division in the 1930s (making a sojourn to Florida and the Fleischer studio before returning to the West Coast), and was his ink and paint supervisor when he opened Snowball and made the Beany and Cecil cartoons in 1962. Bell was a cousin of inker Dixie Mankameyer, who later married animator Paul J. Smith.

Raynelle was born January 21, 1916 in Kansas City, Missouri; her father was named Ray and her mother was named Nelle. The family moved to Tulsa in 1920 where her father ran Bell's Cafe on Third Street until 1927. The Tulsa papers in the ‘20s report she and Dixie were pupils of Rose Arnott Littlefield and took part in her recitals.

The Bells arrived in Los Angeles between 1928 and 1929. Raynelle was a graduate of Hollywood High School (where she led the volleyball team) and USC. While in the land of the Trojans, she received honourable mention for a poster in an “Art in America” contest. In 1935, she won a suntan contest sponsored by the Long Beach Chamber of Commerce.

She was remembered fondly by the wonderful inker and painter Martha Sigall in her autobiography, who said Warners hired Raynelle in August 1936.

When she got married in June 7, 1944 to Cpl. Franklin Eugene Day, she was employed by Walt Disney; Day had been a singer and employed at MGM before enlisting in 1941. She was back at Warners by early 1945, judging by the company's Club News photoshoot published in April that year. Evidently, she got out of the animation business to raise her two young children as she has no occupation next to her name in the 1950. Martha worked for her at Snowball, and later at Kurtz and Friends. Raynelle moved to Eugene, Oregon after retiring and died there on November 9, 2002.

The backgrounds in this cartoon were painted by Cornett Wood. A native of Indianapolis, Cornett Francis Wood was born September 12, 1905. He was a member of Troop 43 of the Boy Scouts as World War One was winding down. He attended Shortridge High School, where he was on the art staff for the high school annual. He entered a number of art contests and in 1925, he won a $130 winter scholarship given by the Indiana Poster Advertising Association.

Wood had the unfortunate situation in 1932 of testifying in the juvenile delinquency trial of his 17-year-old sister Vera who, it was claimed, held up either nine or eleven people with a toy pistol, was obsessed with crime novels, got angry easily and was addicted to cigarettes. “I think she is subnormal,” he told the court.

The Indianapolis Star of Sept. 8, 1933 gives a short biography in connection with a painting demonstration at the state fair art gallery:

Wood [was] a graduate of the [John] Herron art school in 1927 and later a student for one semester in the Pennsylvania academy under Daniel Garber and George Harding.
For two years Cornett Wood has been doing commercial art for the Bemis Brothers Bag Company. He designs pictures and lettering that are printed on the front of flour bags and coffee bags. In spare time he paints pastel portraits that are unusually artistic He had months experience as a sailor, following the period of advanced study in the Pennsylvania academy, when he shipped on a freighter with the American Export Line and went to Italy, remaining on the boat while it put in at ten or twelve Italian ports.

The Star reported on Sept. 15, 1936 that Wood was now in Los Angeles working for Walt Disney. A story in the Santa Barbera News-Press of Apr. 1, 1945 about a demonstration and lecture he was conducting about making animated cartoons said:

Wood is considered one of the outstanding artists in the field of animations. He worked at the Disney studio for nearly seven years, and during the past three years he has been made Warner Brothers’ cartoons. At present he is designing backgrounds, which is the stage for the characters.

Book Revue was the first Warners cartoon where Wood got a screen credit. After one more cartoon with Clampett, he was moved to Bob McKimson’s unit to handle layouts. He left the studio after making Dog Collared (released Dec. 2, 1951) and was replaced by Pete Alvarado.

He had an interesting distinction at Warners, at least according to the Dec. 23, 1949 edition of the Palm Springs Limelight-News, which called him the “well known creator of Bugs Bunny.”

In 1959, his name is found on two film strips made for the Girl Scouts of America.

Wood died May 16, 1980. He had been living in La Canada.

Clampett's name can be found on various books in the background of this cartoon. Perhaps the most interesting one is to the right of a comic book.



“Invisible Man” aptly describes Clampett at this point. The cartoon was released on January 5, 1946. The Warner Club News of June 1945 announced Art Davis had replaced Clampett as a director. Considering it took months to have Technicolor prints struck for completed cartoons, it’s likely Clampett was still at Warners when Wood painted the backgrounds. But it’s a neat coincidence.

Escape From Clampett

Bob Clampett’s Book Revue is an energetic tour-de-force of perspective animation, huge open mouths with curly tongues, and stretch in-betweens that are worth stopping the film just to look at.

Below are 24 frames—one second of animation. The Big Bad Wolf is breaking out of jail. He races up “past the camera.”



Here is the animation slowed down.



Clampett loved radio and pop culture references. There are plenty of them here, with a send-up of The Whistler and The Aldrich Family, and caricatures of Gene Krupa, Harry James, Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey, Bob Burns, W.C. Fields, the inevitable scrawny version of Frank Sinatra, and Daffy Duck impersonating Danny Kaye. (See E.O. Costello's comment; this cartoon pre-dates the radio show Escape; I was thinking of Suspense).

Rod Scribner, Manny Gould, Bill Melendez and Bob McKimson are the credited animators.

My favourite drawing in this cartoon is Daffy turning into an eyeball. You can see the frames in this post.

Tomorrow, we'll have a hidden gag from this cartoon for you.