From Laurel and Hardy to Joi and Lois

Not all of Hollywood shuddered in fear over the rise of television in the late ‘40s. The makers of feature films short-sightedly shunned the new medium into the ‘50s, but it was embraced early by producers of short subjects. And for good reason.

The bottom was falling out of the shorts business in the ‘40s. In 1948, the court-ordered end of block booking—where theatres were forced to take short subjects released by a studio along with features—was only one problem for producers of one and two-reelers. They had been complaining, independent producers especially, it took too long to see profits from their films. The war had cut off overseas markets, and then post-war currency freezes kept film profits from leaving foreign countries to the U.S. It’s no wonder veteran producers of shorts saw television as a land of opportunity.

Everyone thinks of early television—and in this post, we mean 1948 onward—as a time when the radio networks tippy-toed into the industry, pushing its stars (and their sponsors and ad agencies) along with them. But besides network programming, there was a large syndication business, too. And that’s where the shorts producers hoped to cash in. True, there were more than enough networks to go around for stations in most cities to pick from (there were 59 TV stations in the U.S. by June 1, 1949). But networks weren’t able to fill a lot of time in the late ‘40s so filmed syndication programming was appealing to stations that didn’t, or couldn’t, rely on live shows the rest of the broadcast day.
Here’s an Associated Press story from 1948 that is a follow-up to developments from a month earlier. At that time, Billboard announced Hal Roach was getting into the television. The producer best known in the sound era for Laurel and Hardy features and the Our Gang shorts was casting his lot with the small screen. He cancelled a six-picture deal he had signed with MGM in the spring.

Video Gets a Shot In Arm From Roach
By BILL BECKER
HOLLYWOOD, Dec. 22 (AP)—Television—the baby whose bounces have been followed by many worried Hollywood eyes, is getting ready to take bigger steps.
Hal Roach, for more than 30 years a producer of motion picture comedies, today begins the first of a series of television productions. And from now on, says Roach, all his work will go into the television field.
If, as video insiders say, films are the lifeblood of the new industry, Roach’s entry into the field might be regarded as a major transfusion.
And producers already in the hectic field are inclined to welcome the old comic master openly. Despite the dozens of small video production companies which have mushroomed up here in this talent mecca, there seems to be plenty of room for competition.
LOOKS TO FUTURE
As Jerry Fairbanks, who has a video producing contract with NBC puts it:
“We feel we are pioneering an industry that will eventually be many times larger than the movies. The time is not far off when films will provide at least 50 per cent of all television programs.”
Fairbanks and other major video producers claim too that the break with the movies—reshowing old Westerns and other films on television—is not far distant. Production costs are averaging nearly $10,000 per half-hour program so far, but the television producers say they’re determined to make good original shows for the fireside trade.
For example:
Fairbanks has completed “Public Prosecutor,” a series of 26 shows each 20 minutes long, and “Television Closeups,” five-minute oddity featurettes for NBC. He has three other series in production.
The first 13 shows of another detective-type series, “The Cases of Eddie Drake,” have been completed for CBS by IMPHO (Independent Motion Pictures Releasing Organization).
FINISH SIX PICTURES
Marshall Grant-Realm Productions has finished six of a “Great Stories” series for American Tobacco Company that will start next month. Slated for NBC release January 21 in New York and about the same time here, the weekly show will run at least six months.
Dipping into the public domain for stories available without copyright the series includes
“The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant, “Sire Maletroit’s Door,” “Mademoiselle Fifi,” “The Mummy’s Foot,” “The Invisible Wound,” and “The Substitute” for starters.
Production costs ran slightly higher than $10,000 for each of these 30-minute shows, General Manager Norman Elzer of Grant-Realm said. The talent lineup included Arthur Shields as narrator, John Beal, Robert Alda, Reginald Denny, Maria Palmer, Hurd Hatfield and J. Edward Bromberg.
Hollywood talent—for the most part held in leash by the big movie producers—is also represented in “TV” shows by John Howard, Anne Gwynne, Patricia Morrison and Don Haggerty. Among those toying around the experimental fringes of the industry are Joseph Cotten, Rudy Vallee, Frank Albertson and Designer William Cameron Menzies.
Many others are itching to get in on the ground floor of the business, even though the foundations are just beginning to harden.
Roach’s announcement tipped the current mood:
"Following the entertainment-seeking trend the public mind has been a lifework of mine since the inception of motion pictures. I am thoroughly convinced that the insatiable desire to be entertained will find its greatest satisfaction through television.”
Roach plans six half-hour shows at his Culver City studio. “Sadie and Sally,” a comedy show starring Joy [sic] Lansing and Lois Hall, will be the opener.

As a side note, Fairbanks had his hands in many pies. Besides producing shorts like the “Unusual Occupations” and “Speaking of Animals” series for Paramount, he also made industrial films into the 1960s.

Television history is littered with projects that never were and that seems to have been the fate of almost all of Roach’s first TV efforts. Billboard of January 1, 1949, announced Roach was filming six pilot shows to shop around to agencies and sponsors. Besides “Sally and Sadie,” the others were “The Brown Family,” a sitcom starring John Eldredge, Ann Doran, Carol Brannon and Billy Gray; “Botsford’s Beanery,” a slapstick comedy, “Foo Young, a Chinese comedy whodunit; “Puddle Patch Club,” an Our Gang ripoff and another sitcom called “Our Main Street.” 12 additional shows were in various stages of planning. Roach was still peddling them in 1952, along with a TV version of “Myrt and Marge” through the International News Services television department., though it appears none made it past the pilot stage.

Oddly, one show that’s not mentioned was revealed in the Billboard article of the previous November and it did get on the air almost two years later. It was “The Stu Erwin Show,” subtitled “The Trouble With Father.” General Mills was its sponsor and the show was one of the early successes of television syndication.

Cat Fishin’

Lots of brush work in this scare take by Tom in “Cat Fishin’”.



There are only three credited animators in this one—Ken Muse, Ed Barge and Mike Lah. This looks like Lah to my untrained eye; I’ve seen similar jagged teeth in Pixie and Dixie cartoons he worked on. There are other spots where Jerry’s mouth is animated at the side of the face, much like Lah’s work at the Hanna-Barbera studio.

Corny Gag

Yeah, Bob Clampett used this gag in ‘Baby Bottleneck’ and re-used it in ‘The Great Piggy Bank Robbery’ (both 1946), but Dave Monahan put it in a Tex Avery cartoon in 1941 (if Avery didn’t think of it on his own). This is from ‘Tortoise Beats Hare.’



The background is by Johnny Johnsen, who moved over to MGM and the Avery unit not long after Tex left Schlesinger’s. He never received billing on a Warner’s cartoon but his full name appeared near the end of his Metro career.

We’ve mentioned before on this blog that Johnny was an artist with the Los Angeles Express by 1909 before going to the Schlesinger cartoon studio. But he was also an inventor, receiving a patent in 1917 for a process to make colour-printing plates. You can read it HERE.

Ringing in The New Year in Comics, 1905

January 1, 1905 was a Sunday and the Atlanta Constitution published its usual Sunday comics that day. All of them had a new year flavour. Most of them are long forgotten.

Jimmy Swinnerton got the majority of the space. His “Jimmy” took up a full page and had its own masthead. “Katy” was yet another of Swinnerton’s comics.




I would hope the Katzenjammer Kids need no introduction. Remarkably, it is still being drawn today.



Frederick Opper wrote “And Her Name Was Maud!” No, this isn’t a comic starring Bea Arthur. The title character is a donkey. This may be Opper’s least-known comic. He was the creator of “Happy Hooligan” and “Alphonse and Gaston.” You see Happy below.




“Foxy Grandpa” was from the pen of Charles E. Schultze. He used “Bunny” as a pen name, probably to avoid confusion with Charles Schulz, whom he psychically knew would be born 17 years later and become a cartoonist.



Lulu and Leander was drawn by H.M. Howarth.



You can click on any of them to enlarge them.

Happy New Year

One of my favourite Bugs Bunny scenes ever since I was a kid is when he dupes Elmer Fudd into thinking it’s midnight on January 1st in “The Wabbit Who Came to Supper.” The gag comes out of nowhere and the confetti comes out of nowhere. It builds nicely and lasts just long before before Elmer realises it’s July and he’s been conned.






Bugs is beautifully expressive here. Dick Bickenbach gets the only animation credit. Manny Perez, Gerry Chiniquy and (as far as I know) Gil Turner were animators in the Freleng unit at the time.

Show Biz Stars Look Back at the Past Year

No doubt gossip web sites will be filled right about now with a year in review of the bon mots of Hollywood’s salacious train-wrecks. We, of course, prefer to look back to those happier days of Tinseltown, in an era before criminal stars, before infidelity, before scandal, before...

Oh. Right. I haven’t found those days yet.

Well, let’s look back at the years 1949 and 1950 anyway, and bring in the Associated Press’ movie writer of the day.

My favourite is the Tallulah quote.

Quotes of the Year From Hollywood
By BOB THOMAS
HOLLYWOOD, Dec. 23 (AP)—What are the deathless quotes of the year in Hollywood?
Maybe some of these won’t live into the second half-century, but they seemed out of the ordinary to me. Here are some of the bright, pointed or inane sayings that I have collected from the 1949 news:
Robert Mitchum, commenting on his sentence at the county detention farm: “It’s an experience every taxpayer should go through.”
Laurence Olivier, after winning the academy awards: “I always did say Shakespeare was a good script writer.”
Actor Paul Valentine, divorcing strip-teaser Lili St. Cyr: “Everybody in the country could see more of her than I did.”
Fred Allen on the FCC ban on giveaway air shows: “They have taken radio back from the scavengers and given it back to the entertainers.”
Milton Berle, answering an attack on him by Allen: “Allen still has the first penny ever thrown at him.”
James Mason: “Hollywood is filled with frustrations, but not uninhabitable.”
Claudette Colbert, disapproving French bathing suits: “Of the many features of a woman’s anatomy, one of the least attractive is the navel.”
Mae West: “I’m still looking for the right man. My trouble is I find so many right ones it’s hard to decide.”
Clifton Webb: “There’s no use pretending I’m a modest fellow. Some day I shall write a song called ‘I Fascinate Me.’”
David Niven, on the end of his Goldwyn contract: “For the first time since I was 17 years old, I am able to do what I want. During all that time, I either was in the British army or under contract to Goldwyn.”
Bette Davis: “Hollywood tries to combine entertainment for both kids and adults in the same picture. The result is a movie which isn’t suitable for either.”
Shelley Winters, after returning from a blustery location: “I was so cold I almost got married.”
Description of the “shimmy” in Gilda Gray’s suit against the picture, “Gilda”: “A rhythmical shivering and shaking of parts of the body, synchronized and performed in a personalized syncopated musical rhythm and accompanied with appropriate songs.”
Linda Darnell, decrying the “boyish look” in fashions: “Why can’t women look like women and men look like men? That’s what makes life more interesting.”
Jimmy Durante, telling about rubbing elbows with socialites at the opera opening: “I had to rub elbows—nobody would shake hands with me.”
Bob Thomas, to his readers: “Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.”

Quotes of Year From Hollywood
By Bob Thomas
Hollywood, Dec. 22—(AP)—Every year a lot of wind blows in Hollywood and some of it is worth remembering.
I have collected some of the 1950 quotes that are remarkable for one reason or another. Here they are:
Tallulah Bankhead’s answer to reports that Bette Davis imitated her in a picture: “Hasn’t she always?”
Betty Hutton, announcing that she was giving up night life after a reconciliation with her husband, Ted Briskin: “Contented people don’t go to night clubs.”
Fred Allen: “Television is based on the belief that there are a lot of people with nothing to do, willing to waste their time watching people who can do nothing.”
Betsy Drake, asked after her wedding to Cary Grant about possible plans for children: “I think it would be very depressing for one to know that he was a planned baby. That’s so cold and unromantic.”
Hedy Lamarr, explaining why she couldn’t see the police for two days after losing $250,000 worth of jewels: “You know what it’s like to come home late after a party and be wakened from a sound sleep.”
Director Elia Kazan: “Actors should stay hungry.”
Vivien Leigh, asked if her husband, Laurence Olivier, had plans to film more Shakespeare: “I don’t think he’d say. If he did, Orson Welles might start filming the same thing immediately.”
Dorothy Parker, explaining why she didn't take a honeymoon after her re-marriage to Alan Campbell: “We’re going nowhere. We've been everywhere.”
Red Skelton, hearing about a fire at the preview of one of his pictures: “You can’t blame it on the picture because it’s not so hot.”
Jean Simmons, commenting on yell leaders after seeing her first American football game: “I don’t like those people waving their arms to get people to yell. Goodness knows, we scream our guts out at soccer matches, but not at somebody else’s direction.”
Italian Actress Marina Berti, arguing against divorce: “Men are all alike, so why throw one away and get another just like him? It is better to keep the one you have and profit from the time and trouble you have spent on him.”
Marta Toren, on U. S. males: “The American wolf is really shy and uncertain. He is abrupt in order to hide his shyness.”
Lauren Bacall, on the nature of her profession: “A person has to be unnormal to get into this kind of business. Normal people couldn’t take it.”
Jack Paar, telling about his three-year contract with R.K.O.: “I was never even scheduled for any of the pictures they cancelled!”
Bob Hope: “Vaudeville is dead and television is the box they buried it in.”
Chill Wills, the voice of “Francis:” “Folks have been talking to me about going into politics, but I figure I better stay in a field where a talking mule is a novelty.”
Sir Laurence Olivier, after observing the Los Angeles smog: “Isn’t it ironic that motion pictures came westward for the sunshine and now there isn’t any?”

Lo! The King Approacheth!

A smear drawing by Lloyd Vaughan from one of Chuck Jones’ funniest Bugs Bunny cartoons.



Ken Harris, Phil Monroe and Ben Washam get the other animation credits on ‘Rabbit Hood’ (1949).

Vaughan didn’t return to the studio after it shut down for six months in 1953, but he worked for Jones again in the 1970s.

You Won’t See This Movie Ad Today

An example of how our vocabulary has changed since September 1940, when this ad appeared in print.



The cartoon advertised, “Little Lambkins,” is not about a lamb. It’s about a destructive kid, animated by Nelson Demorest, the pride of Greeley, Colorado, under Dave Tendlar. I don’t find it enjoyable, but you might.

George Pal Jumps to the Big Time

Stop-motion animation didn’t originate with George Pal, but he certainly showcased it to an audience on a regular basis with his Puppetoons through the 1940s. Without Pal, one wonders whether TV viewers would have ever seen the somewhat bizarre Gumby or various quirky Rankin-Bass specials, both with coteries of loyal followers.

Pal was an admirable craftsman and technician, taking Jack Miller’s stories and creating delightful little films.

However, there was only so far one could go in shorts. Walt Disney realised it. Frank Tashlin realised it. And George Pal realised it, too. Because of that, he achieved fame in the science fiction film world.

Here’s an Associated Press article from 1950, outlining why Pal made the jump to features. It also refers to a popular commercial for Lucky Strikes.

New Film To Show Collision Of Worlds To Be Produced By George Pal
By BOB THOMAS
HOLLYWOOD, Dec. 23.—(AP)—Not content with having flown to the moon, George Pal is now causing the end of the world.
Pal is no flying saucer pilot or evangelist. He is a miracle worker in another field—motion pictures. Born in Hungary, he studied to be an architect but graduated at a time when there were no jobs. He was fascinated with American cartoon films like Felix and the Cat and went into the cartoon field in Europe.
Soon the ambitious draftsman grew tired of the tedious work of drawing thousands of flat figures. For a novelty, he made a tobacco advertising film that featured marching cigarettes (a forerunner of today’s television ads). He began to make animated films by the use of puppets.
Pal came to America in 1939 to produce puppetoons for Paramount. They achieved success but recently he was forced to abandon them because of rising costs. This year Pal produced a film called “Destination Moon,” a fanciful but seemingly authentic account of what interplanetary flight would be like.
The film was produced for about $600,000 and is expected to bring in $3,000,000 in this country alone. ]t started a cycle of science fiction movies.
This week Pal started filming a new project called “When Worlds Collide.” It will be the ultimate in movie catastrophes, making the “San Francisco” earthquake and “The Last Days of Pompeii” seem minor-league.
“The story starts with the approach of a planet and a star toward the earth,” Pal told me.
“Many people fear that it means the end the the earth, but others do not become alarmed and claim the other worlds will bypass the earth.
“Well, the planet does bypass, although it causes huge tidal waves, earthquakes and volcanoes. After that comes the star and it strikes the earth and destroys it.”
The picture will have a human story about a group of people who believe the worlds will collide and try to make some plans for it. They devise a space ship and select 800 candidates for passengers.
“They are chosen for their mental and physical well-being and because they are best in their fields, such as carpentry, medicine, etc.,” said Pal.
“Would a newspaperman be included?” I asked.
“There might be one among the Et Ceteras,” he added slyly. “Of course there is only room for 40 people aboard, so they are chosen from the 800 by the democratic process of drawing names.”
The survivors will watch the end f the world from their space ship and then zoom on to the nearby planet, which is deemed suitable or human habitation. They carry with them enough animals and needs to start anew.
“When Worlds Collide." has no relation to the recent best seller, “Worlds In Collision,” which attempted to explain Biblical events by planetary phenomena. The Pal story was a piece of science fiction vritten by Philip Wylie and Edwin Palmer in the early 30s’. It was originally planned as a Cecil B. DeMille epic, but he never got around to it.
I asked Pal how he would be able to top “When Worlds Collide.”
“I’m not going to try," he answered. “Next I may do a picture about Tom Thumb.”

The October 1941 edition of Popular Mechanics devoted a page to how the Puppetoons worked. Click on the picture to the right to have a better look.

There are plenty of fans of Pal on the internet. Look HERE for links aplenty.

It seems to me today's computer-generated 3D kids films are attempting to replicate a similar visual effect to the Puppetoons, but without their natural charm. George Pal may not have been a stop-motion pioneer but he was one of a handful of people who was truly adept at using the technique to entertain.

Pretty Darn Long, Isn’t It?

Tex Avery relied on background painter Johnny Johnsen to set up a lot of his cartoons. Even at Warners, Tex would open with a languid left-to-right pan over one of Johnny’s fine drawings, sometimes done in oils.

In ‘Red Hot Rangers’ at MGM, Avery decided to use the opening shot as a gag rather than to set a mood of calm (such as in the 1941 Warners’ cartoon ‘Of Fox and Hounds’). We see scenic Jello-stone National Park and as the camera moves along, the “No Smoking” signs get progressively, and more ridiculously, bigger and dominating. And it just keeps going and going, with Scott Bradley’s peaceful and serene strings and woodwinds in the background. Almost 30 seconds worth.





I’d love to snip together another great background but there’s no clear shot of all of it, so you’re going to only get the two ends instead. There’s a highway in the foreground connecting the two frames below. The snow’s disappeared from the mountains.




Here’s one more. Sure is a change from the flat settings Avery used just a few years later.



For cartoon fans that don’t know, Jellostone was also featured in the Bob Clampett cartoon ‘Wabbit Twouble’ (1941), with another great opening pan over a Johnny Johnsen background. Johnsen soon left Warners to rejoin Avery at MGM.