Mickey's Cab Keeps It Clean

Traffic Troubles (1931) contains some familiar gags: trying to fit a hippo into a small vehicle, a car going above another car hogging the road, a car biting another car, an angry car exploding black smoke at someone from the exhaust pipe. Walt Disney and his breakaway animators, Ub Iwerks and Hugh Harman/Rudy Ising used them all.

There’s also a license plate gag in Traffic Troubles. Mickey’s car blows a tire. As the car sinks to the right, the license plate turns upside down.



There are some good routines in this one. Mickey’s interrogated by a cop that won’t let him talk. Bumps in the road change the price on the taxi meter. And there’s a bizarre scene where Minnie plays a concertina while Mickey jumps on a pig attached to a hose. The jumping forces air from the pig through the hose and into the flat tire. There’s a great smash-up at the end so Disney’s animator can show off how many feathers he can animate in one scene.

Fans of Piggy Pack Theatre

Everything rocks back and forth to Frank Marsales’ beat in You Don’t Know What You’re Doin’ (1931) as patrons, including an enthusiastic duck, stream into a theatre.

There are 24 drawings to this cycle, animated one per frame. This is close to the timing in the actual cartoon.



This starts out as a typical Harman-Ising cartoon for Warner Bros.—familiar character design, girl-friend with a falsetto voice singing “la la la” while getting ready, blackened character exclaiming “Mammy!”—but takes a turn toward the end with some wilder animation as alcohol envelopes the proceedings. Gus Arnheim’s band bubbles away nicely.

This was one of two cartoons starring Piggy.

Friz Freleng and Norm Blackburn are the credited animators.

Pssst...Wanna Real Bargain?

Once the “cheap” aspect of Jack Benny’s radio character got established, there was no end of stingy jokes. It’s a little odd, then, to go back and read a story about Jack frivolously spending money (in later years, those stories juxtaposed his character with the way he was in real life).

This appeared in the Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph of March 2, 1936. Jack’s show hadn’t moved permanently to Los Angeles at this point; he only went there from New York when he was making a movie. The paper’s entertainment section used a gimmick for about two years that the office cat would write columns in the form of letters to entertainment reporter Jane Hamilton. The drawing of the cat (there were different ones) that accompanied the article is below.

Jack Benny Buys Two Tickets To See Himself Broadcast From Radio City
By EBBERBELLE (the office cat.)
Dear Jane:
Well . . . spring is within a gunshot of being here! And here am I full of the wanderlust and indulging in my week's work.
As I look back over the week . . . grasping for things to report that you never heard before . . . my brow furrows . . . The most interesting news . . . was that story that Tom Harrington told about the Jack Benny tickets.
Harrington was the production man on the the Benny program last night . . . He's the production man on all the Benny shows, for that matter, and he was telling about the ticket situation in New York.
Somebody said they had two tickets for the Benny program they'd sell for $40 apiece . . . Now that's a laugh . . . you know, because you can't be allowed to sell broadcast tickets . . . they're free . . . if you cart get them which you usually can't.
Well, Harrington was telling about a time once in New York when he and Jack Benny had gone out to get a bite to eat between broadcasts . . . and were going back into Radio City . . . A furtive looking young man approached them and said . . .
"I've got a couple of tickets for the Benny show . . . want to buy 'em?"
Jack Benny said, "Sure . . . How much?"
"Oh," said the dumb egg, "they're for the late show . . . they'll only be $2.00 . . . I let a couple for the early show go for Five."
Jack Benny gave the guy $2.00 . . . and walked into Radio City for his broadcast.
Yeah . . . I thought that was funny, too.

Disney or Money

How many young men and women wanted jobs in animation because they watched cartoons when they were kids?

Without providing you with any proof, I suspect the number is countless.

Well, let’s provide a smidgen of proof.

Walt Disney Productions attracted would-be Freddie Moores and Bill Tytlas, as revealed in this article in the McClure Newspaper Syndicate’s “TV Keynotes” column that appeared in papers starting around March 4, 1957. The service had a little chat with animator Volus Jones about life (and pay) at Disney; he animated the scene from Clown of the Jungle to the right. Jones worked in a number of other studios, including Columbia/Screen Gems and Walter Lantz, then headed to Hanna-Barbera. He died on May 3, 2004 at age 90.

Hopefuls Write To Walt Disney
by STEPHEN H. SCHEUER
Every week, hundreds of kids write Walt Disney asking to work for his mammoth organization.
When they become older, and a bank account takes precedence over membership in “The Mickey Mouse Club,” the job has less appeal.
“Beginners start at Disney as ‘in-betweeners,’” admitted animator Volus Jones, “making between $55 and $60 a week.” (About what errand boys earn at the other Hollywood studios.)
An “in betweener” has the tedious task of sketching hundreds of individual cartoons which go “in between” an animator's major drawings.
“Of course,” continued Jones, “the salary shoots up after a while. A top Disney director earns up to $25,000 a year.
“That's high in the art field, but mighty low for motion pictures and TV. A man directing a 'live' movie is usually worth $100,000 or more.”
At this salary scale, it might seem that Disney would have trouble keeping his best men. Which is partially true. Graduates of the Disney studio who have set out on their own include Walt Kelly, creator of "Pogo Possum"; Hank Ketchum, responsible for the antics of "Dennis the Menace"; and Ace magazine cartoonist Virgil Partch.
Why has Jones (who played a major role in developing Donald Duck), remained with Disney for more than twenty years?
“I like Walt,” he answered. “And there's more creative freedom at our studio than with any other cartoon outfit in town.”
Turning to the problems of animation, Jones noted that the toughest figure to draw is a human being. “Which is why we often roto-scope humans,” he said. Using the roto-scope technique, a model is photographed, and the photo traced on drawing paper. Marge Champion was, for example, the original model for Snow White.
“The smaller an animal,” continued Jones, “the easier to draw. A mouse may be a frightful thing to find in your kitchen, but animators love them.”
Squirrels are also popular. It could be because they work for peanuts.

Figaro?

Sylvester avoids stuff thrown at him by Elmer Fudd in the terrific cartoon Back Alley Oproar (1948).



Sylvester ducks down, slowly pops his head up and asks “Figaro?”



Satisfied the bombardment has ended, he jumps up onto the fence and enthusiastically finishes his song just as a boot comes flying to boot him off the fence.



Friz Freleng’s next two releases were Buccaneer Bunny and Bugs Bunny Rides Again. Three real winners, all written by Mike Maltese and Tedd Pierce.

Pugilist Pudgy

The underwhelming Pudgy the Watchman (1938) climaxes with the title character getting into a fight with a Jack Mercer cat that has taken his job.

Four drawings are used in a cycle (one per frame) with the background slightly moving to give the scene more of a feeling of motion.



Pudgy bites the cat’s tail. Another cycle, this one with three drawings. They alternate 1-2-1-3, one per frame.



So let’s see. Betty wants Pudgy to catch mice. Pudgy won’t. Betty hires a cat to catch mice. The cat catches mice like Betty wants. Pudgy still has a home, but has one less thing to do that he’s not doing anyway. But the cat’s the bad guy. Oh, well.

Tom Johnson and Hal Walker are the credited animators.

Two Comedy Greats, One Silent, One Not

Groucho bets on people
he finds he likes them after forty years in show business
GROUCHO MARX, whose NBC show, You Bet Your Life, has been consistently among the Nation’s favorites, has been accused of sometimes presenting contestants in an unfavorable light in order to get laughs. It’s one charge that can cut through the poise built up during 40 years of show business.
“I don’t insult people on my show, I spoof them,” Groucho says indignantly. “Others who did insult contestants have failed. You Bet Your Life wouldn’t be a hit, if I did. There’s a big difference between kidding and ridicule.”
As a matter of fact, Groucho, whose barbed wit was the highpoint of many shows and movies before he turned to television, has grown to genuinely like and appreciate people while doing the thousands of interviews involved in his quiz show.
“My estimation of people has risen tremendously in the past six years,” Marx says. “There are a lot of wonderful people in the world, and this job has given me a chance to meet them.
“I’ve seen poor people give their prizes to charity. I’ve met baseball umpires and the motorcycle cops who hide behind billboards, and they’re nothing like what you’d expect.
“I find that they enjoy the fun of the shows, whether they win or not, and they like a lot of spoofing. That goes for everybody, because I’ve quizzed people from some 50 countries, and the list has included Congressmen, admirals, and other people you might expect to be stiff and formal.”
In six years, Groucho has learned to take everything in his stride, including a woman with two husbands named Bodovnic, triplet sisters from Pinsk, Russia, and the Irish janitor of a synagogue.



“I’ve never been stumped yet,” Marx says. “I guess those years of trouping do something for you.”
In fact, he considers being a quizmaster a soft job. “Next to robbing a bank, it’s about the easiest of all,” Groucho contends. “But this is the culmination of years of hard knocks, believe me. Maybe I’ve earned this kind of job.”
In spite of his gruff pose, Groucho is happy that his show has succeeded and pleased that it appeals to a full cross-section of the public.
He gets letters and an occasional gift from viewers all over the country. Contestants strive for a place on his program, not only for the prizes and the fun of matching wits with Groucho, but because it can be a stepping stone to the movies. One young Mexican, a natural comedian, was signed to a Hollywood contract immediately after appearing on Groucho’s show.
This happy way of life caps nearly 40 years of nomadic trouping in vaudeville, stage, motion picture and radio roles for Groucho.
He started in 1906, at the age of 11, when he joined a Gus Edwards troupe as a boy soprano. Born Julius Marx in New York City on October 2, 1895, he and his brothers Leonard (Chico), Adolph (Harpo), Milton (Gummo) and Herbert (Zeppo) were spurred to theatrical careers by their mother Minna.
Early Days Were Hard
The hardships of the early days in their struggle for success still cling to Groucho’s retentive memory. On a vaudeville circuit in Canada he strolled by a theater one day and was stopped by the unrestrained sounds of laughter. He looked in and saw a bushy-haired, baggy-pants comedian, recently immigrated from England. It was Charlie Chaplin.
Their tours finally brought them to Los Angeles simultaneously and there a film producer spotted Chaplin and offered him $100 a week in pictures. “I won’t take it,” said Chaplin.
“Why not?” asked Groucho.
“Nobody can be worth that much money!” scoffed Chaplin.
Several years later, Groucho returned to Los Angeles. He received an invitation to Chaplin’s home for a party. It was a palatial residence, with formally-dressed servants, sparkling silverware and all the accoutrements of costly living.
The few years had brought a striking change in Chaplin’s manner of living but not corresponding mental satisfaction. “He once said to me, ‘You’re the greatest comedian of all’”, Groucho recalls now, “but I attribute that to his admiration of someone who could speak on a stage, instead of being confined to pantomime.



A Comfortable Life
To Groucho, the experiences of 58 years of hardy living have brought beneficial results in that he knows what he wants and achieves his desires. He lives comfortably in Beverly Hills. His program has settled into a relaxed weekly schedule.
Groucho spends much of his free time with old friends, like Norman Krasna, Hollywood writer, and with his children. His two oldest children, Arthur and Miriam, are writers. Groucho’s youngest daughter, Melinda, 7, finds him always willing to take time to play with her.

P.S. from Yowp: This article, with accompanying photos, appeared in TV Guide of July 24, 1953.

Clothes in Context

The villain doesn’t lie in Tex Avery’s The Hick Chick. He promises Daisy June more clothes than she has ever dreamed of. “All about you will be clothes, clothes, clothes!”



Cut to the gag shot.



Avery and gagman Heck Allen carry it further. “Here are your clothes, my little dove,” gestures the villain. “Millions of clothes. And all of them dirty!” Cut to the next gag shot.



The villain forces Daisy June to wash them all in an animation cycle.



The cartoon was released in May 1946 but you can see by Claude Smith’s model sheet, it was in production well before then.



Preston Blair was still in Avery’s unit then, along with Walt Clinton, Ed Love and Ray Abrams. Frank Graham attempts a Charles Boyer voice for the villain.

Lantz Links

A panorama shot of a golf course by Fred Brunish opens the 1952 cartoon Woodpecker in the Rough.



Brunish died on June 25, 1952, nine days after this cartoon was released.

The Smell of Entertainment

How loud is a smell?

That question—a quite logical one, in my mind—was once raised by Jack Benny. Whether he got an answer, we may never know.

The response is not revealed in Charlie Einstein’s “Top of the Town” column in the San Francisco Examiner of August 28, 1960. But he does reveal some of the goings-on at a Benny stage show rehearsal and why Jack continued to work and work until his death in late 1974.

The column is interesting, but not as much as Einstein himself. Wallace Stroby wrote this wonderful remembrance in this blog post. Charlie’s father was radio’s Parkyakarkas, Harry Einstein. Read the blog for more.

Jack Benny's Three-Fold Reason for Hard Work
The Comedian Rehearses for A Cabaret Act
“WHY,” SAID somebody with awe in his voice, “does a man with so much money want to work so hard?”
He was talking about Jack Benny, who was knocking himself out in a marathon rehearsal for his new stage show at Harrah's South Shore Room at Lake Tahoe.
The question was relayed to Mr. Benny.
He seemed puzzled.
“Why work so hard?” he said, and reflected for a time. “Well, maybe there are three reasons. One is that I don't know any other way to work. One is that people are paying money that they worked hard for to watch my show. And one is there's a face I have to look at in the mirror the next morning.”
Those three reasons in combination are good enough. Matter of fact, any one of those three reasons would be good enough.
The man in charge of the rehearsals that makes the Benny show as top-flight as any in the business is a gentleman named Jack Benny. He has forgotten considerably more about his job than any two of his high-priced floor men ever knew.

Sample: there is a gag interlude in his supper club show where two elderly ladies, arguing with the head waiter every step of the way, forge from the back of the room to a table directly beneath the stage, demanding to be seated close to their idol all this while Benny is playing his violin, serenely unaware of the commotion.
“Jack,” one of the floor men said at rehearsal, “at what point on their way down the aisle do you want the spotlight to pick them up?”
“At no point,” Benny said. “It's an audience gag. People are supposed to think it's real. If it's the genuine thing, who’s going to be ready with a spotlight?”
At another point in the show, Benny is supposed to think aloud. He does this through the medium of a recording of his voice, which is played as he saws at his fiddle.
The first time they tried it in rehearsal, Benny thought the record should be played a trifle louder.
“Just a smell louder,” one of the floor men agreed.
“Wait a minute,” Benny said. “A smell louder? What precisely, if I may ask, is a smell louder? What is the sound of a smell?”
He delivered these lines exactly the way you might imagine a Jack Benny delivering those lines. This is not his secret, but it is one of the things that makes up his secret. Jack Benny is Jack Benny, offstage as well as on. And when a few hardened professionals, and a vaguely dressed orchestra, sitting in on a tech rehearsal in the nakedness of a swank supper club at 1 o'clock in the afternoon, find themselves laughing at the same things the audience will laugh at in the tinseled surroundings that night—and laughing just as hard—then the fellow in charge has got to be pretty good.
He is pretty good. He and his wife came to Tahoe accompanied by their lifelong friends, George Burns and Gracie Allen.
“Where's Burns?” Benny said, looking around the empty room during rehearsal.
“He said you'd kill him if he showed up,” a friend answered. It's true. Burns looks at Benny and Benny collapses.
“He's probably at the blackjack table,” Benny said. “He'll win $40 and give it to Gracie.”
Burns was located at the swimming pool.
“What've you been doing?” he was asked.
“Not much of anything,” he replied. “Taking it easy, getting a little sun.”
“Play any blackjack?”
“Just a little.” “Do any good?”
Burns took the cigar out of his mouth. “Won $42.”
“What'd you do with it?”
The cigar went back in the mouth. “I gave it to Gracie.”