Friday, 3 January 2020

The Return of Animato!

Once upon a time, there was no internet. If you wanted to see cartoons, you watched them on TV or (if you were lucky) bought some on 16 millimetre film and ran them through a projector.

If you wanted to read about cartoons, you went to the book store or the library. There, you could thumb through Leonard Maltin’s “Of Mice and Magic” and discover whole chapters devoted to studios you had never heard of. You could pick up a book by Joe Adamson and learn all about an unfamiliar man named Tex Avery who made funny cartoons. Things like this were the building blocks of animation historical research that we, frankly, take for granted these days.

Historians struck the spark. Soon, others interested in old animated cartoons found each other and began writing and sharing. This sprouted fan magazines which collected and revealed things for the first time, such as every cartoon made featuring Scrappy, or the history of Mighty Mouse.

More years ago than I care to remember, I somehow happened upon a little publication called “Mindrot.” I subscribed. I saved copies; they’re ten feet away in my bookshelf. Then I ended up subscribed to something called “Animato!” (there seems to have been a debate about how the word was pronounced). One day I renewed my subscription and the magazine stopped coming. I wrote a letter (no e-mail then) and asked why. I never got an answer. I still don’t know why.

Anyway, “Animato!” was edited for a time by Harry McCracken who has taken time away from valuable Scrappy research to scan and post seven editions he edited on archive.org for, we hope, permanent preservation.

You can link to them right here.

Those of you used to a couple of decades of instant, in depth information about cartoons, their makers and their studios, may think these magazines are a little quaint, bare bones, and perhaps primitive. I wish to point out some of the finest historians of their time wrote for it and anything they have to say, regardless of how much more we know today, is worthy of perusal.

Many of the authors are still writing in one venue or another, and I’m pleased some are even friends on Facebook. It’s worth your time to flip through these editions.

Summertime

Steamboat Willie started a simple formula in sound cartoons—action on the screen synchronised to music or sound effects. That was in 1928. Other studios started doing the same thing when they went to sound. For a while, that sufficed as entertainment.

Ub Iwerks’ studio was still doing it in 1935. In the misnamed short Summertime (it is set during the start of spring), the plot is full of Disney—scenes of frolicking animals and plants with the gentlest of humour.

An example is a scene when two turtles are playing Xs and Os on a sleeping turtle. It’s all timed to the classical music. The gag is the mildest possible as the turtles emote. A take consists of one turtle’s neck stretching up. Regardless, you can tell what the turtles are thinking by their expressions.



The turtles may have been laughing, but I’ll bet the audience wasn’t.

Meanwhile, over at Schlesinger’s, Friz Freleng was directing musical cartoons that stayed away from coyness and went for a few laughs. Still, the few reviews I’ve read from when the cartoon came out are positive. Colour and gentleness could still entice critics. Despite this, the Depression was tough for an independent studio (Iwerks) and distributor (Pat Powers) and the ComiColor series was gone about a year later.

I’m looking forward to the day when the ComiColors will finally be restored and get a public video release.

Thursday, 2 January 2020

And I Will, Too

Poor Hay-De La Mare! The screen star is trapped in an accidental fire on the set of her film. Who will save her?



Why, it’s none other than the stunt stand-in for the star (who cowardly slithered away like a snake when the fire started). It’s the Mortimer Snerd-like Charlie Horse, who stops his daring rescue to look at the audience and exclaim “And I will, too!”



There’s a running gag in the cartoon about workmen carrying a flat across the screen in front of Charlie. It’s used as a gag topper, as when the flat passes by Charlie going into his rescue, we discover he’s somehow rescued Hay-De.



The cartoon is Bob Clampett’s final theatrical, It’s a Grand Old Nag, released on December 20, 1947 by Republic Pictures. This was intended as part of a series of cartoons (four originally) that Republic was set to release. However, this wasn’t exactly the best time to be a cartoon producer. MGM and Warner Bros. eliminated units, Columbia closed its Screen Gems cartoon studio altogether and Walter Lantz would soon go on a year-plus hiatus due to a lack of cash after changing distributors. Showmen’s Trade Review of March 6, 1948 reported:
Republic revealed this week it is considering dropping production of short subjects. Over a year ago Republic made its first shorts’ commitment with Bob Clampett Productions, but complications that ensured kept the program from getting into gear.
Accordingly, the studio executives are watching closely the reaction to “It’s a Grand Old Nag,” first of six scheduled Trucolor cartoons which goes into national release March 9. If it gets solid reaction, the rest may be resumed. Otherwise, Republic will remain shorts-less.
Despite Clampett’s groaner punny names (his Beany and Cecil cartoons for TV were littered with them) and switches on some familiar gags (the insanely long limo), this was the only Clampett short released by the studio and he would soon concentrate his efforts on TV. We posted about the cartoon here before Thad purchased the print from which these images come.

Wednesday, 1 January 2020

Dance of the College Footballers

It’s the day of the Chili Bowl, and the field goal kickers are warming up. They’re also performing a satisfied little dance.



This is from Screwball Football, a 1939 Tex Avery cartoon loaded with obvious puns. Virgil Ross gets the animation credit. The narrator is not Robert C. Bruce or Gil Warren.

Tuesday, 31 December 2019

The Stars Resolve—For 1945

What did radio’s stars want 75 years ago?

Some of them answer that question in a story in the December 31, 1944 edition of Radio Life magazine. There were joke answers and there were serious answers.

If you’re of a certain age, you should recognise many of the names. It’s odd to see the magazine explain who Art Linkletter and Gabby Hayes are, but I guess Linkletter’s real fame came when CBS got into the television business. Sam Hayes was a news commentator sponsored as of the above date by Choclettos. Chet Huntley was a newsman on KNX (CBS) at the time. There are a bunch of cartoon voice actors here, too, and a few references to the war.

While the article is accompanied by a picture of Jack Carson (upper right), Carson’s resolutions isn’t in the story.

IF YOU THINK radio stars are perfect and able to do whatever they want to do when they want to do it, you have another think coming! To prove our point, Radio Life canvassed the studios during the remaining days of 1944, and asked your airlane favorites for their New Year's resolutions. Here's what they told us:
KENNY BAKER: "I hereby resolve to teach my kids how to fish. In that way, I'll be sure to do some fishing myself!"
ONA MUNSON: "I'm going to buy myself a hat in 1945. Right now, I don't even own one!"
MEL BLANC: "I resolve not to do more than nine shows a day."
HELEN FORREST: "I'm going to keep right on following my hunches. They've always been lucky for me."
DICK HAYMES: "For years, I've been kidded about my big appetite. In 1945, I'm cutting down to a starvation diet—only five meals a day and no more!" CATHY LEWIS (actress): "I'm going to quit worrying. I resolve this every year, but it never does any good."
JOE KEARNS (actor): "I resolve to learn to play "Staccato and Fugue" on the organ."
CHET HUNTLEY: "I'm going to take a day off next year."
ROBERT ARMBRUSTER: "I resolve to fulfil my life's ambition—to be a rich eccentric!"
TOM BRENEMAN: "I resolve to continue going to bed with the bees, getting up with the birds, and worming my way down to Sardi's to let four hundred chicks make a monkey out of me!"
HOAGY CARMICHAEL: "Someone said in 1944 that I didn't want to write any more songs. Well, in 1945, I resolve to make you forget these words, and to write what you'll want to remember."
DINAH SHORE: "I resolve to keep George out of the kitchen because no G. I. should be made to do K. P. at home!"
HELEN WOOD: "I'm not going to make any resolutions to break."
NORA MARTIN: "I'm going to find something good in everybody and everything."
TED STRAETER: "I'm going to learn to do the zomba and the rhumba. Sonja Henie's my teacher!"
KITTY CRAWFORD: "I resolve to write that fifth chapter of my book!"
ROSEMARY DE CAMP: "I'm going to try to keep up with my two-year–old daughter who is way ahead of me already!"
GINNY SIMMS: "I'd like to take a vacation—but it will be another two years before I get one!"
Won't Kid Benny
ROCHESTER: "I resolve not to kid Mr. Benny about his toupee—at least, not the curly one!"
CLAIRE TREVOR: "I have a husband in uniform whom I want my little boy to get to know better in 1945."
SARA BERNER (actress): "I resolve to remember my creed—'it's nice to be great, but it's really great to be nice!'"
TOM HOLLAND: "I resolve to keep on playing juveniles, so that I can go up to any producer and call him ‘Pop!’”
JANET WALDO: "I'm not going to make more than one date for the same night. I do it all the time!"
LINA ROMAY (singer): "I'm really going to work hard to achieve a spot for myself in radio, because I love it."
FANNY BRICE: "I resolve to make no more appointments in advance."
MARY LIVINGSTONE: "I resolve to be calm when we go on the air. I haven't been since my first broadcast, although I try to be every year.
JIMMY SCRIBNER: "In 1945, I want to come to Hollywood. Maybe I could resolve it, but maybe I'd better let 'Papa Johnson' evolve it!"
LOUISE ERICKSON: "I resolve not to have any more crushes on older men. Hereafter, I'll confine my attention to the Van Johnson type, rather than the Alan Ladds."
DIX DAVIS: "I resolve to do all my homework—well, at least one night a week."
DAVE WILLOCK ("Tugwell" of CBS' Jack Carson show): "I resolve (at my wife's request) to cook my own omelet only once each week in 1945."
GLENN HARDY (Mutual newscaster): "I hope to be able to carry out my 1944 resolution—to be the one to shout 'the war is over' first and loudest, in 1945!"
Ladies Won't Worry
ART LINKLETTER (Blue's "What's Doing, Ladies?"): "I've decided to be more discreet while going through ladies' purses on my program!"
ED GARDNER ("Archie" of N B C's "Duffy's Tavern"): "I'm gonna get into the higher income brackets next year—$17.50 a week or bust!"
FRANK MORGAN: "I never make resolutions. They always make a liar out of me!"
JACK KIRKWOOD (CBS comic) : will not "I knock ladies down in trying to beat them to a seat in the street car—I'll think of some other way!"
REX MILLER (Mutual news commentator) : "In 1945, I hope to put my own code for a commentator into practice with every word I say—'let every word build a straight, sure route to peace. Let no word begin a detour from that route.' "
HAVEN MACQUARRIE (NBC's "Noah Webster Says") : "I resolve to stoligate the frantistraph whenever I thiculize the entire fosnick during 1945."
GEORGE "GABBY" HAYES (Blue's Andrews Sisters show): "I'm gonna git more actors to go where I've jist been, on bed-to-bed Army and Navy hospital tours. I want more people to see what I've seen. You kin bet there'll be less gripin' about sech things as the cigarette and gasoline shortages. Yessiree!"
PATTY ANDREWS: "I'm going to quit flirting with every good -looking man I see!"
MAXENE ANDREWS: "I'm not going to buy any more dogs. I just got rid of seventy-five!"
LAVERNE ANDREWS: "I'm going to bed earlier every night!"
Dagwood Serious
ARTHUR LAKE: "I'm going to continue to do everything I can to promote the war effort."
ELSIE JANIS: "I resolve to keep sincerely trying to make it a better and finer world for those boys who we hope will be coming home soon."
SAM HAYES: "I resolve that through-out the New Year I shall never forget what those boys who have fought overseas have done for us. I shall always remember they have the right to ask as that soldier boy on the battleground in Italy did when he thought he was going to die:
'What did you do today, my friend,
To help us with the task?
Did you work harder and longer for less,
Or is that too much to ask?
What right have I to ask you this,
You probably will say.
Maybe now you'll understand—
You see, I died today.'"
DICK POWELL: "I'm going to stay on that war bond bandwagon."
JACK BENNY: "I hereby resolve to learn something else to play on my fiddle besides 'Love in Bloom.' In fact, I resolve to learn 'Love in Bloom.'"
PHIL HARRIS: "This New Year I dissolve to quit making them corny revolutions that nobody pay no attention to on Jan two, anyhow."
FRANK GRAHAM: "I resolve to continue living as wickedly as I have—and get by with it."
PAT MCGEEHAN: "I'm going to get married—that's all, brother!"

Monday, 30 December 2019

Goona!

Walter Lantz’s 1933 cartoon King Klunk climaxed just like the feature King Kong did—the giant beast fell from a skyscraper to the pavement.

In the Lantz version, the title character caught fire and turned into one of those skeletons so popular in early 1930s cartoons.



The big gorilla spent portions of the cartoon falling in love, thanks to arrows from what looks like an insect version of Cupid yelling “Goona!” at him. At the end, the taunting Cupid is smashed by the living skeleton, which flies into pieces. As the camera closes in, Cupid lifts up the skull and looks bewildered. Fortunately, our readers know more than I do. See their explanation in the comments.



Frankly, I’m bewildered by the “goona” business.

Evidently this cartoon was too much for the British Board of Film Censors. Motion Picture Herald reported on March 3, 1934:
'Pears they took objection to one of the Warner cartoon shorts. [sic] "King Klunk" it is called and it burlesques "King Kong." So they gave it an "Adults only" certificate and listed it as a "horrific" film, meaning that exhibitors would have to hang a notice on the theatre front to let patrons know it was a horror!
Manny Moreno, Tex Hastings, Les Kline, Ernie Smythe and Fred Kopietz are the credited artists, with Jimmy Dietrich littering the score with Arkansas Traveler.

Sunday, 29 December 2019

General Tire and Jack

As inconceivable as it is, Jack Benny was fired by his first two sponsors despite his popularity with radio listeners. Canada Dry got annoyed at Benny having fun with the soft drink on the air (and being forced to fire a writer it imposed on him). Chevrolet’s boss, C.E. Coyle, decided he wanted something classier than a comedian and over the objections of franchise dealers, replaced the Benny show with Victor Young (who didn’t last very long).

Benny wasn’t out of work for long. He was quickly snapped up by General Tire and Rubber Company. His last show for Chevrolet was April 1, 1934. His first for General Tire was five days later. Mary Livingstone and vocalist Frank Parker stayed when the new sponsor took over. Significantly, a new announcer was hired and Don Wilson won the audition over the others in the NBC stable. He remained until the Benny TV series ended in 1965.

How the Benny show came to be sponsored by General Tire is outlined in the book A Whale of a Territory: The Story of Bill O'Neil by Dennis John O’Neill (with two Ls), published by McGraw-Hill in 1966. What the book doesn’t reveal was how it came to be unsponsored. Trade publications in 1934 stated that a deal was struck that Benny would be “loaned” to General Foods for the winter and General Tire would resume sponsorship in the spring. But it never happened; Jack and Co. stayed with General Foods for another ten years. What happened? We may never know.

Benny was finished with General Tire on September 24, 1934 and, after a short break, took to the air with General Foods on October 14th.

Here are the pertinent points about O’Neil and the Benny show from the book.

One of the reasons his associates—and competitors—were frequently taken off guard by Bill O'Neil's ideas was his habit of starting with an idea and using it as a launching pad for a vaguely related but quite different one. A good illustration of this was what happened as a result of his first exposure to radio. In the early 1930s, national radio shows had become the glamour advertising medium. The big stars were coming into American homes and making friends in a way never before possible. These people could influence potential customers, and W.O. had great faith in the power of the spoken word to sell ideas and products. W.O. felt that in many cases the stars received more advertising than some of the products they were paid to advertise, but this was because their sales talks were not properly prepared. One young fellow seemed to have an especially nice, easy way of weaving the advertising messages into the format of his show. So Bill O'Neil phoned his advertising agency and asked how much it would cost to sponsor Jack Benny. Characteristically, he did not ask for any listener ratings or for any other program suggestions. He had made up his mind that he wanted Benny.
The price floored him. General advertised heavily in the expensive media of national magazine and newspaper advertising, but W.O. figured that they had large equipment and inventory expenses, tons of paper to buy, and costly distribution and postal charges.
Theirs was a manufacturing business and these costs he could understand. Radio, he figured, had none of these expenses, or practically none. For days W.O. reasoned his case with everyone remotely connected with the problem. He stormed, pacing up and down his office, hands jammed into his pockets. He burned the long-distance wire to New York. In short, he reacted as he always did when his own ideas collided with an entrenched status quo.
Finally the temptation of being able to speak with millions of consumers in their homes became overpowering. So W.O. instructed his advertising agency to sign a contract for the Jack Benny program, including Jack's wife, Mary Livingston, tenor Frank Parker, announcer Don Wilson, and the orchestra.
The association was a success and W.O. enjoyed it immensely. During the initial weeks he found excuses to be in New York and attend the broadcasts. One reason he gave for wanting to be there was to familiarize Benny with tires— General Tires— so he could ad lib some sales points: it was Benny's knack of selling other products informally and effectively that had attracted W.O. to him in the first place. But the hazards of the technique showed up on one of the early programs. Frank Parker had just finished a popular song and Benny returned to the air to exclaim enthusiastically, "Wonderful, Frank! Wonderful! That was as smooth as General Tires!" With this remark Bill O'Neil's enthusiasm for the ad-lib commercial waned.
On the first program, Jack Benny told a story about his new sponsor and referred to him as Mr. O'Neil. On the second show he told another story and again referred to Mr. O'Neil. After that program, W.O. got his advertising man to one side and and said: "I don't feel comfortable having Jack call me Mr. O'Neil. Don't make a big issue of it, but see if he'd mind calling me Bill O'Neil. It sounds more natural."
The significance of W.O.'s early association with the Jack Benny show was that it gave him his first contact with radio. No one at the time attached much importance to the interest he showed in every detail of the business. After each of the early Friday-evening broadcasts he gathered together a group from the studio, usually the producers, engineers, time salesmen, agency men— the people who were knowledgeable about radio as a business. More often than not, they would go out to a restaurant for a late supper and talk radio for hours. The studio people had never met a sponsor quite like him. He did not want to tell them how to handle his show, or talk about his business at all. He wanted to talk about theirs. A most peculiar sponsor!
They liked him, not only as a big, attractive human being with wit, great personal magnetism and a naturalness that was refreshing, but also because he was obviously interested in their business and shoptalk.
Usually at the restaurant sessions, he would sell one or another a set of General Tires. He seldom missed an opportunity to do that. There was always a new face or two at these get-togethers, any one of whom might be the next eager caller at the New York General Tire store the Monday morning after hearing W.O. quietly paint a word picture of the difference between Generals and other tires. "Bill O'Neil said you'd give me a good trade-in and a good price on a set of Generals," became a familiar opening gambit of these radio friends calling at the store.
This was the seed of General Tire's eventual role as a major factor in radio and television through RKO General, today the largest independent operation in the field. W.O. learned enough about radio to know that the business was attractive to him. He felt at home in it. He felt radio to be the wave of the future. It would be a challenge— his ideas against larger entrenched forces. There is no question that he decided then that someday he would like to test them. And test them he did, very successfully.

Saturday, 28 December 2019

Don't Follow the Bouncing Ball

Cartoons have been considered kid stuff for so long, it’s refreshing to read a film critic who actually looked forward to going to the theatre and watching them.

Well, some cartoons, anyway.

Tracy Tothill was a columnist for the Abiline Reporter-News after graduating from the University of Oklahoma in Journalism in 1951. She revealed her love of cartoon shorts in her “Press Passes” column of August 3, 1952. Maybe we should qualify that by saying “West Coast cartoon shorts.”

Mrs. Tothill and I share a dislike for the Famous Studio bouncing ball cartoons. I always thought they were incredibly hokey and obvious, and I’ve never been crazy about the mixed chorus Famous hired. She wasn’t a fan of the Famous Popeyes (neither am I) and would have preferred someone silenced the operetta Mighty Mouse cartoons (I like them in small doses and some of the dialogue is clever).

But she cottoned onto filmdom’s newest star in 1952—Mr. Magoo. This was when Magoo was new and fresh, and hadn’t been run into the ground with the worn-out “misread the sign” bit, followed by Magoo being incapable of seeing anything for what it is. By then, Magoo had turned into a TV-only character and the sheer volume of the cartoons needed for the small screen must have taxed the abilities of a fairly adept group of writers.

This must be a rare column where someone noticed Hubie and Bertie, though the first name is wrong. I wonder what Bob McKimson (and even Kenny Delmar) would think of “Senator Laghorn.”

To finish the Tothill story, and it’s a sad one, she divorced and left Texas for New York. She was working on a book. She was found dead on her bed by a friend on September 3, 1974; she had been dead for several days. Tothill was 45.

About Movie Cartoons; The Singing Kind Flunked Out; Good Ones Are Hard to Get
Six "singing" (just follow the bouncing ball) cartoons at six successive movies were just too much.
This writer, who frankly admits the cartoons count as much as the shows, vowed to lodge a complaint.
The manager of the theater was very interested—but it seems the complaint was a little late.
Hollywood has given up making singing cartoons, he said. They just didn't go over, he added.
Hallelulia! Now if someone will just do something about those where the mice talks in lyrics, showtime will again be goodtime.
The manager also said it was nice to see an adult (supposedly anyway) take an interest in cartoons.
He said most of them love the cartoons as much as the kids do but getting them to admit it was another thing.
But for us "kids" who will speak up and grant that they're wonderful (sometimes), here's the lowdown on what Hollywood has planned.
Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker. Tom and Jerry, Slyvester [sic] and Tweety Bird, and Chip and Dale are still going strong and all are scheduled to be drawn during the coming year.
However, (unfortunately) so is Popeye. Also, still popular are most of the Walt Disney characters including Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Pluto.
New cartoon characters making their mark in this world are Yosemite Sam, Senator Laghorn [sic], Herbie and Bertie [sic] and that wonderful Mr. Magoo.
Mr. Magoo is this writer's current favorite.
Dear nearsighted Mr. Magoo.
This writer first spotted him in a side-splitter in which he attempted to engage a Colonel somebody or other in a tennis match. Because of Magoo's nearsightedness, he ended up playing tennis with a walrus.
Hotel house detectives were horrified—but even when Magoo was convinced of his mistake he persisted in his friendship. He decided he liked the walrus better than the colonel. Mr. Magoo was seen on the screen in Abilene recently in a job called "Dog Snatcher".
His nearsighted campaign against an arrogant city hall tax collector and dog snatcher led him into the circus grounds, where he mistook a panther for his mutt, Cuddles.
Panther on lease [leash], he confronted the dog snatcher, who was all too happy to pay for the license himself.
The informative theater manager also told this writer that the local theaters have a ton of trouble getting good cartoons.
The reason is they're so complicated to make.
Every time a cartoon character moves so much as a little finger another picture has to be drawn.
He said that the normal cartoon runs eight minutes and that the film will travel through the projector at approximately 90 feet a minute. The film averages one picture to every inch so (if the arithmetic isn't off) that would mean 8,640 pictures have to be drawn for every single cartoon.
The manager also added the interesting sidelight that one man, Mel Blanc, is the voice for all the Warner Brothers cartoons. Their menagerie includes Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Herbie and Bertie, Tweety Bird and others.
Seems he should more properly be called "The Voice" than one other who has that monicker.
Latest addition to the cartoon world is a character named Pepe LePew, a skunk. He's a great lover and talks in a Charles Boyer voice. This writer hasn't seen the Great Pepe—but folks who have are raving about him.

Friday, 27 December 2019

Walky Talky Tree

Foghorn Leghorn steals the show in the Henery Hawk cartoon Walky Talky Hawky (1946). Director Bob McKimson scored a hit on this one. Showman’s Trade Review rated it “excellent.” Ray McFarlane of the Arbuckle Theatre in Arbuckle, California told the Motion Picture Herald: “One of the best cartoons we have had for a long time.” It was nominated for an Oscar (and lost to The Cat Concerto with Tom and Jerry).

Warren Foster’s inventive idea of a chicken hawk that doesn’t know what a chicken is sets up the cartoon takeover by loud-mouthed, aggressive Foggy, who is in the midst of harassing the barnyard dog.

The cartoon opens with an establishing shot of a tree. The camera “looks down” to the ground from mid-tree, then pans up to the top. It’s all on one drawing, so artist Dick Thomas had to paint it with an odd perspective when you look at the complete background (which, of course, the audience never did).

Mel Blanc changes voices on the father chicken hawk after the first line and Henery tosses away a Lucky Strike cigarette catchphrase for good measure.

Since the Foghorn-Leghorn-is-Senator-Claghorn story keeps making the rounds, you can do no better than to click on this research by Keith Scott who actually delved into the origins and timeline to come up with the truth, using Warner Bros. studio records.

Foggy had some pretty good outings at first. McKimson’s cartoons got tamer and tamer as the ‘50s wore on and were inert compared to some of the wonderful thrashing about you can find in the earliest shorts.

McKimson had recently taken over the Frank Tashlin unit, so Dick Bickenbach, Don Williams and Cal Dalton animated this cartoon; whether Art Davis worked on this, I will leave to the experts.

Thursday, 26 December 2019

Turkey Eyes

Tex Avery liked eye gags. Eyes either became really huge or they took on a life of their own (such as the eyes unable to get back into a closet in Who Killed Who?).

In Jerky Turkey (1945), the turkey’s eyes did a bit of shocked travelling when the bird realised the pilgrim hunter had planted a bazooka in his snout.



Unfortunately, Avery and writer Heck Allen couldn’t figure out a way to finish the gag. The bazooka fires and that’s it; it’s on to the next scene.

Preston Blair, Ray Abrams and Ed Love are the animators on this cartoon.