Getting Tex Avery's Goat

Hurrah, I say, to the new generation of animation researchers. They deal in facts, not connecting dots based on wishful thinking. Even long-time cartoon fans like me learn something and I’m always impressed with what they find.

Some time ago, Thad Komorowski posted a list of production numbers of MGM cartoons. There are lots of items of interest here, among them are cartoons that never got made.

He has one entry that reads:

261: BILLY THE KID (rejected) – Lundy

That’s the only information. It doesn’t say why it was rejected or how far into production it got.

Enter fine young animation researcher Devon Baxter.

I’m never sure where Devon finds things, but he recently posted model sheets from this cartoon, so we know it got that far.



Unfortunately, there’s no date on this, but you can see it’s yet another Dick Lundy-Jack Cosgriff-Heck Allen short where Barney Bear has to deal with a small animal that does what it wants (like head-butting into Barney’s butt). If you’ve seen one, well, you know the saying.

But those of you who know your MGM cartoons are likely saying “Hey, that goat! Tex Avery made a cartoon with a little goat!”

Of course, you would be correct. Billy Boy was released in 1954.

Thanks to Thad, we can give you a bit of a timeline.

Lundy directed two more cartoons after Billy the Kid was proposed for production—Sleepy Time Squirrel (Production 263) and Bird Brain Dog (Production 265). Then Avery returned from a “sabbatical” in October 1951 and Lundy’s services were no longer required. His first new cartoon was Little Johnny Jet (Production 267). His next short, Three Little Pups (Production 269) featured the Southern wolf who survived when Mike Lah was hired to direct after Avery’s unit was disbanded. The wolf was borrowed (in attitude and voice) by Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera when they came up with Huckleberry Hound in 1958.

Billy Boy was Production 272. The goat’s horns and legs in this cartoon are smaller than in the proposed Lundy short. He is obviously younger than Barney’s antagonist. But is there any doubt one design is based on the other?



Heck Allen stuck around to write when Avery returned, but I can’t picture most of the gags in Tex’s cartoon being found in a Lundy cartoon. Avery, fortunately, eschewed making anything with Barney Bear. So instead of Paul Frees’ low mumble, we get Daws Butler with a bright, enthusiastic voice, which counter-balances all the crap the kid goat puts him through. The Exhibitor declared the cartoon "excellent" and "hilarious."

So, what happened? Did Avery go through a pile of story ideas and character designs left behind and figure he could salvage a good cartoon out of one?

Perhaps the new breed of animation researchers can find out the answers. They’re up to the task.

Snowy Stinking Skunk

For whatever reason, Tex Avery and gagmen Rich Hogan and Heck Allen set Rock-a-Bye Bear (released by MGM in 1952) in the winter.

It’s a typical Avery string-of-gags outing involving a character trying to sleep, while another character tries to force a third character to make noise to wake him. The third character runs out into the distance to be noisy. It’s similar to the later Deputy Droopy and my favourite late Avery cartoon, The Legend of Rockabye Point for Walter Lantz.

One sequence in Bear involves Cartoon Rule 514: All skunks smell.



“P.U,” says Spike (played by Tex Avery).



And it’s back to the house for the next gag.



Walt Clinton, Mike Lah and Grant Simmons animated this short. Pat McGeehan is the bear and dog pound officer.

What'd He Say?

Barney Bear matches wits with a silent snowshoe rabbit in The Bear and the Hare, a 1948 MGM release from the Mike Lah/Preston Blair unit.

One gag has the rabbit juggling snowballs then batting them at the bear with his ears.



Barney responds. Evidently it was not a family-friendly response as the voice has been replaced with a trombone. The last word is “you.” We’ll leave it for you to look at the mouth movements of the first two frames below to figure out the first word. (Please, no foul language in the comment section in response).



Don Patterson, Ray Abrams, Irv Levine and Gil Turner are credited with animation. There’s no story credit. I had always thought Jack Cosgriff wrote for the Lah/Blair group. Cosgriff was a UC Berkeley grad who returned to MGM after the war; he had been a chief specialist for the Navy based in San Diego.

This was the second of three cartoons completed by the Lah/Blair unit. Thad Komorowski found two other shorts were assigned titles and production numbers but not completed. Producer Fred Quimby decided it was cheaper releasing propaganda cartoons from John Sutherland Productions than paying for a third unit.

Dry Brush Wolf

Tex Avery’s first cartoon with Droopy was Dumb-Hounded (1943) and one where he pushed the boundaries of takes with the wolf (expanding even further in Northwest Hounded Police, released three years later).

Here are some random frames after the wolf (played by Frank Graham) discovers that, somehow, Droopy is already where he’s gone to hide from him.



The MGM ink and paint department should receive recognition for all the dry-brush lines as the wolf twists, turns and zooms.

No artists are credited.

Asian Avery

A cymbal is kind of the same shape as an Asian conical hat, so Tex Avery tosses that into a gag in Magical Maestro (1952).

I’m certain sure anybody reading here knows the plot of the cartoon. Mysto the magician gets revenge on opera star Poochini (who refused to hire him) by impersonating the singer’s conductor and transforming him into various things. In this case, the cymbal turns him into a jabbering Oriental stereotype.



He dances around and sings in dialect. I don’t know the name of that tune; Bob and Ray included it on one of their NBC radio shows.



Poochini snaps out of it and discards the "hat" and kimono, then carries on with his solo from The Barber of Seville.



Avery had tossed in the same kind of gag in Bad Luck Blackie (1949).

Rich Hogan is the credited story man, with Grant Simmons, Mike Lah and Walt Clinton animating the short, and Johnny Johnsen supplying the backgrounds. Keith Scott has discovered the man singing the Chinese song in this scene is a comedian named Frank Ross.