Oceans of Beer

What did I just watch?

A Spanish Twist has to be the most disjointed Tom and Jerry cartoon from the Van Beuren studio. First, Tom and Jerry are on the ocean menaced by an octopus. Then suddenly they’re in a cantina in Spain where a rubber hose dancer gets the spotlight. Then they’re beating up bulls in a ring with no gags in sight. Suddenly the cartoon is interrupted by an aged Western Union boy. The message?



Yes, Prohibition is over. Hurrah! Tom kisses the Western Union deliverer then kicks him out of the cartoon.



As Gene Rodemich plays “Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight” on the soundtrack, our heroes (?) row their way back to the U.S.A., the whitecaps forming a glass of beer, then an American flag.



What?! Wait, the cartoon is over? That’s it? I swear the writers and animators partook of a bit too much of now-legal beverages before writing this thing.

John Foster and George Stallings get the “by” credit.

The title tune is a 1926 song called “In a Little Spanish Town (‘Twas on a Night Like This)” written by Sam Lewis, Joe Young and Mabel Wayne. Listen to the Paul Whiteman version below.

The Working Ham

Jack Benny liked to work. He said it to interviewers. And he proved it by appearing on stage and television almost until his death. He was working on another TV special when cancer felled him in 1974.

Here’s a feature story on Jack, talking mainly about work. It’s dated May 11, 1963 and from one of the syndication services. About the only thing I’ll take issue with is Jack’s hair colour. It wasn’t brown in 1963. It wasn’t brown in 1943, and I don’t believe it was brown in 1933. He coloured it for years.

Workhorse Benny Will Never Retire
By ISOBEL ASHE
AMERICANS, FOR the most part, are sentimental people. They revere traditions like Mom's apple pie and the Fourth of July. They grow misty-eyed over helpless puppies or abandoned babies.
And they are loyal, almost without exception to old-timers in show business who have made them laugh over the years.
Of the living legends, less than a handful have remained in the most grueling of show business mediums, television. Most of them made the transition gracefully from radio or movies.
♦ ♦ ♦
Left today are only Bob Hope, Red Skelton and Jack Benny doing regular shows. And of these three, it’s a toss-up who works harder, Hope or Benny.
As Jack says, “Bob and I argue who is the bigger ham. We’ve never resolved it. All I know is that we’re agreed on one thing: we’ll never retire. I don’t think either of us would know what to do with our lives.”
Entertainment industry folk gasped when Benny announced a few seasons ago that he would switch from a monthly television show to a weekly series.
♦ ♦ ♦
“How can he do it at his age?” some asked. “Why does he want to do it?” others pondered. “Why should he do it?” was another question.
Jack’s answer was the same to all the queries. “Because I like to work.”
The impression should not be gotten from this statement that the blue-eyed comic is a man of only one facet, at loose ends when he isn’t poring over a television script.
♦ ♦ ♦

He golfs almost daily at Beverly Hills’ swank Hillcrest Country Club, and any dedicated golfer knows this sport can become a full-time preoccupation.
He is an authority on art and artists, and discusses their works with knowledge. He is an exceedingly well-read man and can converse, again with knowledge, on the latest novels and nonfiction books.
And — oh yes — he is a violinist. Of course, he is a master at his profession — comedy.
♦ ♦ ♦
The line, “Jack Benny couldn’t ad lib a belch after a Hungarian dinner” has been variously attributed to the late Fred Allen and Benny’s best friend, George Burns.
In any event it is apocryphal, because it isn’t true at all. Jack Benny is a very funny man even in conversation with friends. But he will decry it. His modesty shows all the time.
Getting back to the weekly tele­vision show, “I didn’t regard it as a challenge,” Jack comments. “Actually I was far more nervous when I used to be in radio. When you do a show once a month on television, it’s regarded as something rather special and you have to live up to this.
“But every week, well, you don’t have time to think whether you’ve been spectacular. You just keep on working.
♦ ♦ ♦
“I do think, however, that since we’ve been doing a show every week, we’ve been good. We’ve never been really bad,” he puffs thoughtfully on the ever-present small cigar.
Last season, Benny was moved from his 30-year-tenure of Sunday nights to Tuesdays on CBS Television and gloom-guessers thought his audience wouldn’t make the switch with him. They couldn’t have been more wrong.
The ratings on the Jack Benny show this past year have been better than ever, and professional television critics maintain the shows have been better too.
♦ ♦ ♦
One close friend observes: “The man is a workhorse. He was less bored this year and he had more physical ideas for the shows, for publicity value.
“Take the Tarzan show he did with Carol Burnett, swinging from vines. Or re-creating the USO show with Martha Tilton. And that Dennis Day Irish Mikado stunt!
“Jack works hard on all these shows, but he still maintains he works a total of only 13 hours a week. I don’t believe it! I think he’s working all the time, even when he’s on the golf course or practicing his violin.”
♦ ♦ ♦
Of course, to Jack practicing the violin isn’t work; it’s a release. He always has a fiddle with him, not necessarily the Stradivarius he plays with symphony orchestras around the country, but valuable and expensive instruments just the same.
“That’s really my escape,” Benny says. “If I’m upset or worried about something, I play the violin for an hour or two and I feel better.
“I would like very much to make a violin album. So far, no one’s asked me,” he grins.
♦ ♦ ♦
And it is, of course, a source of considerable satisfaction that through his guest appearances with symphonies around the country, he has raised well over $3-million for the various musicians’ funds and helped perpetuate their orchestras.
There was a classic instance, at one concert, where at the first rehearsals, the orchestra was having difficulty.
“They’ve got to get better at the concert,” Jack insisted. “They have to be better, to make me look bad. There isn’t enough contrast at this point.” They did get better, of course, to Benny’s gratification and to the benefit of the box office’s ailing coffers.
♦ ♦ ♦
There are those who maintain the Benny scores at these symphonies are purposely written incorrectly so he can make his classic goofs. Not so, insists his violin teacher, Larry Kurkdjie.
“Jack plays to the best of his ability,” says Kurkdjie, who is a member of the Benny television show orchestra. “He might have been great, if he had continued after he started as a little boy. But there was a lapse of some 60 years when he didn’t play at all, until he resumed.
“And considering this, he does very well,” Kurkdjie puts it tactfully.
Currently preparing shows for the 1963-64 season, Benny plans no radical changes in his Tuesday night CBS television format.
He will continue using guest stars, since last year the fan mail coming to his office was highly favorable toward such guests as Jimmy Stewart and his wife, singers Frankie Avalon, Connie Francis and Frank Sinatra Jr., who made his professional debut with Benny.
“The mail for Sinatra Jr. was tremendous,” says Ned Miller, Jack’s longtime friend.
♦ ♦ ♦
Miller, who met Benny back in 1921 when the comic was in vaudeville and Miller was writing what he terms “Chicago songs” (“that was because of the beat they had— songs like ‘Why Should I Cry Over You,’ ‘You Don’t Like It, Not Much,’ ‘Don’t Mind the Rain,’ and other novelties”), now doubles as Jack’s stand-in on the television show and handles his fan mail.

“The mail is divided. Among fan mail for Jack and the guests, asking for autographed pictures and questions about Jack’s personal life, are letters from violin owners.
“We get hundreds of letters from people who have violins which they think are old, or genuinely worth a lot of money.
“They ask Jack to whom they should take them for an appraisal, or how to sell them. He’s considered an authority on the subject,” Miller says.
♦ ♦ ♦
Obviously, Benny is considered a authority on many subjects, from violin-appraisals, to money-raising for symphonies, to comedy, and to show business longevity.
Fans, seeing him in person at his television show, at personal appearances in Las Vegas or Lake Tahoe or the recent Ziegfeld Theatre Broadway show in New York, exclaim at how he looks.
“I don’t think I look 69 either,” Jack says. And he doesn’t. He’s slimmer than he appears on television. There is no gray in his brown hair. And he moves like a younger man.
“I simply don’t believe in retirement,” he repeats. “I heard of an acquaintance, younger than I, who did retire and practically overnight he changed.
“His speech became slower, his walk more pronounced. He almost fumbled. And I think it’s because he had no reason for being. Nothing with which to occupy his time or his thinking.
“I know from this man’s experience, and from my own observations—for me life has zip and purpose only when I’m working.”
With termination of his present CBS contract still a year away, workhorse Jack is already making audible noises about doing a straight play on Broadway. Benny the matinee idol? Who knows?
He put his feet up on his desk and commented, “Besides, I'm too old now to be thrown out of show business. They can let me out, if they want to — thank God no one's made the offer, yet.”

Alvin and Calvin (And The Rest)

Three half-hour cartoon shows didn’t make it in prime time in 1961. Top Cat, The Alvin Show and Calvin and the Colonel were all cancelled after one season; Calvin was even pulled from the airwaves for a while for some re-tooling. T.C. ended up in Saturday morning reruns and, occasionally, Hanna-Barbera brought him and the gang out of retirement. The biggest success of them all was Alvin. 1961 was a very minor setback. The Bagdasarian family built a huge empire out of the Chipmunks long after the record label which brought them to life went bust.

The Cincinnati Enquirer’s TV editor, Luke Feck, wrote about one of the three shows in his column of September 15, 1961 and the other two the next day. Two consecutive newspaper columns devoted to TV cartoons! That might have been unprecedented.

I’m afraid I’m with the 1961 TV audience in finding no appeal in Calvin. Other than the score, I could never get into Top Cat, even with Arnold Stang as the lead. As for The Alvin Show, the theme’s good, the opening and closing was imaginative, but Alvin himself is an annoying jerk and the musical segments mostly featured tired, worn-out songs. The “sped-up singing harmony” bit gets tired fast. The cartoons with Clyde Crashcup are still my favourite part of the show.

Feck’s first column also includes a note about The Bullwinkle Show. It aired Sunday evenings at 7 p.m.; I don’t really consider that prime time (in the ‘70s, they called it “prime time access”). Bullwinkle was the funniest series of the four; it was faster-paced and made fun of ridiculous things, like politics and pop culture.

In a column earlier in 1961, Feck proclaimed himself “the regional defender for Huckleberry Hound and Yogi Bear” against those who would insist “cartoons are kid stuff.” It’s no wonder he got a chance to chat with Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera, who tried to differentiate between “limited animation” and “planned animation,” but never really specified what “limited animation” was; I can only guess they considered it along the lines of NBC Comics or the original Crusader Rabbit, where there wasn’t much movement. But, still, Bill and Joe...

As for the second column, I’ll bet the unpublished first-hand tales about the heydey of Amos ‘n’ Andy were funnier than anything in that Calvin series.

Animated
HOLLYWOOD—Trend spotting can be almost as much fun as bird watching. TV, which has almost had it with the horses (hear them galloping off?), will lay many of its eggs in the animated cartoon basket.
Over at ABC, that prolific paid, Hanna-Barbera, who followed their syndicated success of "Yogi Bear." "Huck Hound" with the "Flintstones," have conjured up still another gimmick from their pens.
"Top Cat," a Bilko-like cat with a feline following similar to the platoon, makes its debut Wednesday, September 27, in a trashcan-forested Manhattan alley.

The voices, one of the treats of earlier H-B productions will be supplied by Arnold Stang, Allen Jenkins, Maurice Gosfield (Bilko's bestial Doberman), Marvin Kaplan, Leo De Lyon, and John Stephenson.
Hanna, who had just come from a 7:45 a. m. dental appointment, found the porcelain filling impaired his chewing but he minced no words in speaking out on his favorite subject: cartoons.
"We do over two hours of cartooning a week for TV. In the movies that would be a full year's output. The secret is in the animating." Barbera said.
"The movies use full animation, trying to be as lifelike as possible. Limited animation (a herky-jerky animation form) is too shoddy for TV. Ours is called planned animation where each move is planned and there is a lot of closeup facial work."
Hanna said voices are awfully hard to come by. "Over 80 people read for the "Top Cat" role. You just have to close your eyes and listen to them talk. The voice must fit the cartoon, not the actor." (Arnold Stang has the "Top Cat" voice.
Now firmly entrenched in the prime time firmament, H-B are already planning ahead for next year. In the works: Touchee Turtle, Lippy Lion, Hardy Har Har a baboon and Wally Gator, any one of which may be slapped into the breech [sic] next fall if a familiar series falters.
Bullwinkle
Jay Ward, who heads up one of the funniest publicity campaigns ever, "I'll give you a pewter spoon warmer if you watch us," brings his clod-[l]ike, plodding moose (named Bullwinkle?) to the home screens in color September 24 on NBC.
"The Bullwinkle Show" promises such stalwart regulars as Dudley Do-Right and the maliciousest meanie of them all, Boris Badenov.
The word out here is that you can expect some sharp satire from Jay Ward—one-time Mr. Magoo and Gerald McBolng Boing scripter—and his associate, Bill Scott.
Tomorrow, two more cartoon series are visited.

Amos ‘n’ Ross
HOLLYWOOD—Amos 'n' Andy's white-haired human counterparts, Freeman Gordon and Charles Correll, sat at Rominoff's dispensing their patented cure-all: Laughter.
Gosdon, a raconteur of the old school, and Correll, a 71-year-old composite of one-line jokes, were on hand to discuss their latest venture into show business: "Calvin and the Colonel" on ABC-TV.
Rambling off into marvelous, and frequently unprintable yarns about the heydays of Amos 'n' Andy, the pair would be casually guided back into line by an ABC publicist—which is a nice word for press agent.
The pair, after 33 years together, have found TV just what they need in their later years. "We work two or three hours a week doing the voices for the series, Gosden drawled in his Richmond, Va., voice.
"We have had some practice working with our voices together," Correll added in the understatement of the day.

"The cartoon, done by Creston Studios, is all about some animals from the South. Charlie plays a bear named Calvin and I'm a fox called the Colonel," Gosden said. "Everybody wants to know if we'll be doing the same voices we did on radio. The answer is definitely no. "By the way, Charlie has a little bit, that he uses every time he sees a girl. He gives a little tip of the hat and says 'How de do.' It should catch on." It is impossible to report here just what went on for the next several moments as Correll went through his hat-tipping exercises for any and all social occasions. Calvin and the Colonel will make its Cincinnati debut October 3 on Channel 12. The series is being put together by Joe Connelly and Bob Mosher of "Leave It To Beaver."
Ross Who?
"How would you like to talk to Ross mumble jumble mumble," a CBS press agent asked the other day.
"Ross who?" I asked. "Bagdasarian, the fellow with the chipmunks," he said.
Then it dawned on me who he meant—the guy with that nutty collection of chipmunks which, for want of a better word, sing those nutty songs.
Ross, as he shall be henceforth called because of an economy move, was a former farmer in the raisin racket. In 1949 he produced a bumper crop just as the bottom fell out of the market. He went to Hollywood with an unpublished copy of "Come On-A My House" which he wrote with his cousin, playwright William Saroyan. The song sold—making Rosemary Cloony [sic] a star—and Ross was on his way.
Now he's busy bringing his famous trio of rodents to animated fame. "Our necks are stuck way out on this. We are going to do something entirely different. This will be like a cartoon variety show. When Alvin sings (two songs each half-hour usually with his brothers) it will be a regular production number," Ross said.
"The backgrounds to the song will try to take on the flavor of the country. In Japan, for example, the artwork will have a Japanese motif. Most of the cartoons, however, use the contemporary format familiar to UPA cartoon enthusiasts.

All the animal voices will be supplied by Bagda, whoops, Ross. "It's really a difficult thing to do," he said. "When you record, you must talk at half speed, but what that really means is that you have to be thinking at half speed. That's something my teachers always insisted on for me anyhow.
"There are 160 people working on various stages of this production and I'm always around to overlook better make that oversee. Whenever someone asks if he should do it like (sic) It was done somewhere else, I tell him no. We are not going to be like anybody else in the animated cartoon field. Like I said, our necks are stuck way out. If we die, we die but with dignity." Outside of the chipmunks and their songs, one other character will be introduced an inventor named Clyde Crashcup who invents things like shoes, jokes, horses, yes even babies, long, long after they're been invented, discovered or created as the case may be.
And as for Ross, at the end of each show, his name will be spelled out to a tune similar to "M-I-C-K-E-Y   M-O-U-S-E."
"If people can pronounce it after the series, I know we're a hit."

Boom Boom Bust

Jack King decides to cram a bunch of film transition techniques into Boom Boom, a 1936 Warners cartoon starring Porky and Beans. He didn’t cram it with gags. It simply isn’t funny.

I like the lighting highlights on the fence as the cartoon opens. They flash, though you can’t tell from this solitary frame.



The next scene has animation in silhouette.



King decides to show off with a bunch of wipes and dissolves.



Gags? One scene-ending gag is Beans eating a can of beans. That’s a bigger bomb than the ones seen in the cartoon.

Sandy Walker and Cal Dalton are the credited animators. Joe Dougherty is Porky and you’ll hear Billy Bletcher on the soundtrack, too, along with composer Norman Spencer’s obsession with a backbeat woodblock.

Jail Break!

The cry of “Jail break!” goes up in the Mickey Mouse cartoon The Chain Gang (1930). Prisoners run amok (some in cyclical animation amok). In one scene, we have running prisoners near the background and others running in the foreground. Some even stop and yell at the camera.



Later, we get prisoners running in perspective past the camera and some falling from the sky.



When in doubt, turn the drawing around and give it a different paint job.



It’s 1930, so there isn’t a plot. Mickey Mouse is in jail. For what crime, we don’t know. Maybe on a made-up charge of stealing his design from the Van Beuren studio.

Hans Conried, a Paart of the Show

Maybe Hans Conried should have got a better manager.

Conried worked continually during the days of network radio, one of those top supporting actors who could do several shows a day. Then he appeared regularly on television. But he sighed that he still had to keep working because he didn’t have money. Either Conried was spending way too much on Japanese antiques or he wasn’t getting paid enough.

By 1958, one of Conried’s semi-regular TV parking spots was on the Jack Paar version of the Tonight show. Paar and Conried were friends and occasionally took trips together. Here are a couple of feature stories on Conried’s appearances on the show. The first is from the New York Daily News of August 27, 1958. Conried reveals where he and Paar first met. The second is from Arthur Grace’s column in the Miami News of January 15, 1958. Conried credits Mel Blanc into getting him into radio comedy.

By the way, to explain something odd in the second story—when the Tonight show first started on NBC with Steve Allen, the show moved over from WNBT in New York. Because of local ad commitments, the show started at 11:15 p.m. with the first 15 minutes appearing only on WNBT. This carried over into the Paar years, which is referenced in the story (Johnny Carson finally ended the quasi-pre-show after refusing to appear on it; Ed McMahon and bandleader Skitch Henderson were responsible for the 11:15-11:30 period).

Jack Paar's Looks Set Hans Conried to Talking
By MATT MESSINA
Hans Conried never has trouble doing his conversational bits on Jack Paar's NBC-TV shows. “When Jack looks at me the first time, I start talking. When he looks the second time, I stop,” he explained.
Conried is in New York on one of his quickie trips from the Coast. He has been hopping around town the last two weeks doing everything from recording for NBC-Radio's "Monitor" to posing for liquor ads—“little bits of sweepings” is how he describes his varied jobs—and, of course, he’s guested with Paar (he was on last night).
The busy actor appeared on Paar's summer-subbing stint for Jack Benny on CBS-Radio some years ago.
“Since then, Paar has taken a kind interest in me. He has been unfailing in his loyalty, based on nothing but a sense of kindness, I’m sure,” he said.
No Scripts
Is all the repartee between him and Paar ad lib? “Completely,” he declared. That's one of the reasons he looks forward to guesting with Paar. “It's very easy—no scripts, no lines to memorize.”
Conried will be visiting Paar whenever he’s in town. “I have an open invitation to go on his show,” he related.
Featured in most of the top shows during radio's “golden age,” Conried has also been seen in many TV offerings, including “Omnibus,” “Maverick,” Danny Thomas' stanzas and “Pantomime Quiz.”
He appeared on the latter, in fact, when the program was first struggling as a West Coast TVer.
“We didn’t get any money in the beginning. But, in lieu of cash, the members of the panel were rewarded with cigaret lighters. Also, a local mill company used to send six bags of its flour products to the show, so that the Conried household had a pantry full of macaroni, pancake mix, etc. We lost our figures for a while until I started getting money for my appearances,” said the lean six-footer.
Watches His Old Movies
Conried confesses to a “morbid fascination” in watching on TV one of the more than 100 movies he made in Hollywood. “I see a young man of 20 or so, slim, with all his hair, who now works for nothing in competition with you on television,” he said with a bite in his voice. Then, putting a hand to his head, he added: “All the hair you see here is mine, but there used to be more.”
Although Conried, who began his career as a Shakespearean actor, admits “No one ever becomes an actor without wanting to become a star,” he insists he has no ambition to head a TV show of his own. “I'd want a challenge, but without the responsibility. And that’s hard to come by.”
He's had two-and-a-half weeks off from work in the last 16 months and there doesn't seem to be any letup in sight. For example, Conried will be seen in the Bell science TV series’ “Alphabet Conspiracy” and he’ll also guest on the Danny Thomas CBS-TV show this fall.
“I'd like to retire,” he sighed, “but who can afford it?”

Hans Conried Set a For Busy Future
If there is anything more grisly than driving from Tropical Park to the Carillon Hotel on Miami Beach, I'd just as soon not know about it. Or maybe you think it's fun driving 20 miles through hip-deep traffic after betting nine losers?
I made this interminable journey Monday night for one reason only; I had to find out what happens on the first 15 minutes of Jack Paar's delightful "Tonight" show.
Ever since I started watching "Tonight" on Channel 7, the first 15 minutes of the show have been preempted by a surly, rotund horse player who dabbles in sports announcing. This fellow happens to be entertaining enough to prevent me from lodging loud protest, but I still wondered what happened to "Tonight" between 11:15 and 11:30 p.m.
With Paar and his guests telecasting for one week from Miami Beach, I had my chance to find out. I can now report on what local viewers missed:
1. An amusing monologue by Paar.
2. A pretty French song by Genevieve.
3. An interview with an inventor of odd-ball shoes.
4. Jose Melis at the piano.
Funny Stuff
Paar's monologue was first rate. Referring to the still-incomplete hotel, he commented that he had a room overlooking a carpenter.
The weather report was very heartening, he noted. Temperatures of 78 and sun were expected tomorrow, with winds of 140 miles-per-hour.
The shoe salesman has invented "shoes" which will enable its users to walk on water. It is intended, I gathered, to replace the Queen Mary.
The shoes resemble two outrigger canoes. A hotel lifeguard tried to demonstrate them but was unable to move. It wasn't clear whether they were for motivation or for anchorage.
As for the song by Genevieve and Metis' piano playing, both were completely enjoyable.
The first "Tonight" telecast originated from the Tambourine Room of the hotel. It is a small area and things were pretty hectic Monday night. Facilities were not all that they might be.
At 12:31, for example, the show signed off when it should have signed on. For about 60 seconds, in view of millions, Paar tried to determine whether he was on or off the air.
These little entanglements would be catastrophic to most shows. On easy-going "Tonight" it's just part of the fun.
Jack's guests for the week include urbane Hans Conried, inexplicable Dody Goodman, the somewhat British Hermione Gingold and a confused Genevieve.

Mr. Conried is man of diverse talents. At the moment he is, as he describes it, “a professional wise guy.” He has not always been thus.
Hans Tops
“All actors go through phases,” he said. “I started with Shakespeare, working with Barrymore for three or four years. I realized there was no commercial future in this so I became an emotional radio actor, doing a lot of dialect parts.
“World War II came along and I became a heavy, one Nazi officer after another. I went into the Army and came out without a job.
“A friend of mine—Mel Blanc—had a comedy show and asked me if I wanted to work. I told him I'd never been really successful at comedy roles but he insisted. All at once I was ‘hot’ as a comedian.
“When radio went downhill we had to adjust. A radio actor had about as much future as a dirigible pilot.
“So I’ve drifted into comedy and I’m being kept busy. Next Monday I fly back to the west coast to film a ‘Danny Thomas Show.’ I play his Armenian uncle. It’s character comedy, not the role of a stooge.”
A dozen years ago, however, Hans was “stooging and knocking around town” when Paar hired him for his show.
“He gave me a job when it counted and things have gone pretty well since. I’ve worked with him often. I don’t know why he’s so loyal to me. I guess it's because we like each other; he likes to have his friends around him.
“Most of the people on this show would go through fire for Jack.”
Is Hans unhappy with his role of “professional wise guy?” Not at all.
“It isn’t bad; working on Jack’s show is the easiest job I’ve ever had and the most fun. There's no preparation at all. My ambition? To keep working.”
Conried recently completed two movies, with “The Big Beat” to be released in April. He will portray a witch in the "Hansel and Gretel" TV spectacular in April. He always keeps turning up on panel shows such as “Pantomime Quiz” and “What's It For.” Not even Hans could save the latter series from an untimely death at the age of 13 weeks.
If Conried can't save a show, it’s beyond human salvation.
It is this writer’s opinion that Mr. Conried would be perfect as narrator of children’s stories on TV. A title? How about “Hans Across The Fable.”

Hey, What Does That Say?

A searchlight tracks the path of an escaped convict wolf in Tex Avery’s Dumb-Hounded.

The light realises it has zoomed past some writing on the wall, skids to a stop, and backtracks (a switch on this gag involving a painting was used in Northwest Hounded Police



The writing reveals a clue. The camera pans up to show the convict has escaped over the wall.



Johnny Johnsen is the background artist. The version of the cartoon in circulation is a re-issue and without a writer credit.

Friz is Better Than Fritz

Continuous movement? Sure. Gags? Uh...no.

The Captain and the Kids short Seal Skinners (1939) is no eyesore, thanks to the work of the uncredited MGM animators, but there’s really nothing to it. None of the characters are likeable. Even the voice-work is grating. Mel Blanc’s sort-of-cockney pirate doesn’t work for me and a decision was made to speed up Hans’ voice so he sounds more like Theodore on The Alvin Show.

An interesting bit of animation is when Hans waves his hands anxiously. The animator uses multiple hands, with some inked lighter.



The animation was reused later in the cartoon, as was the scene of a growing number of birds flying and swooping.

Friz Freleng directed the cartoon. His name isn’t on the credits. Friz never had much good to say about this series and he willingly rushed back to the lower budgets of the Leon Schlesinger studio than to continue to put up with weak concepts and strong studio politics at MGM.