Happy Days For the Hungry Wolf

“I haven’t got a daddy,” says the cute but oblivious little creature to a wolf that wants to eat him. “Will you be my daddy?” he asks.

You know, I said to myself, “Where have I heard this before?” Why, I know. In Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera’s pitiable duck cartoons at MGM, then later at their own studio, culminating as Yakky Doodle. Except then it was “Will you be my mama?” In fact, it was the plot of Foxy Proxy with Fibber Fox (1961).

Yes, the whole Yakky Doodle concept, right down to the “Go on, get out of here!” part, goes back almost 20 years before that in the MGM cartoon The Hungry Wolf. Hanna and Barbera weren’t involved in it; this was a Hugh Harman/Rudy Ising cartoon.

This one has a twist though. Mama Rabbit goes searching in the snowstorm to find her son and discovers him next to the frozen and unconscious wolf, who had chased him out of his home to save the bunny from being eaten by him. Since the cartoon’s almost at the nine-minute mark, there’s a perfunctory and implausible explanation that “I guess he must have fainted,” before the scene cuts to the finale with the fully-conscious wolf, his feet in a warm tub, being fed by the rabbit family, all singing “Happy days are here again.”



Ah, there’s nothing like clumps of food inside an open mouth.



The wolf hiccoughs his head out of the scene from being a glutton. Oh my!



And because there’s a war on.



Variety of January 28, 1942 reported Scott Bradley was conducting the score of the short. It was released February 21st, and copyrighted six days later.

Showman’s Trade Review rates it “fair.” “This one moves too slowly to be entertaining,” it assesses. One exhibitor in the Motion Picture Herald said: “Just a fair cartoon, not made for laughing purposes but to show artistic talent, I guess.” Metro’s own shorts publication didn’t bother to do a special review of it.

I don’t know who plays the rabbit, but Mel Blanc is the wolf. He couldn’t have voiced many more MGM cartoons after this. Variety reported on April 25, 1941 that Blanc had been signed to a term contract by Leon Schlesinger. Part of the deal meant he could not voice theatrical cartoons for any other studio. And, let’s lay to rest the oft-repeated tale that Blanc's contract stipulated no other actor could be credited at Warners. As Keith Scott’s research shows, it simply isn’t true. And he’s seen the contracts.

There are no credits at all on this cartoon. Jerry Beck’s research shows that Hugh Harman was responsible for it, but Harman was gone from MGM by the time it was released. Variety announced May 2, 1941 that Harman was leaving and had formed Hugh Harman Productions. It was Harman’s departure that quashed any ambitions by members of the MGM staff for a director’s job; Tex Avery was brought in from outside in September.

Painting With Crashcup

The Alvin Show would have been great—without Alvin. I can do without a self-centered jerkish character. And I can do without screechy renditions of songs that were ancient in 1961, when the show was produced.

But one part of the show was worth watching—the segment with Clyde Crashcup, the inventor of things that had already been invented. Created by Format Films along with Crashcup was Leonardo, his faithful assistant. Leonardo was childlike, sensitive (played the cello and harp) and loyal to his boss. He also knew he was in a cartoon, and reacted to what was happening by looking at the audience.



He was a pantomime character, which can be deadly in limited animation. He only spoke by whispering.



He was never afraid to express himself. When Crashcup would say he invented something and held up something else, Leonardo would roll his eyes. He’d look with horror when he knew Crashcup’s pending demonstration was going to fail. He also got bored with Crashcup’s endless self-congratulation by yawning, or looking bored.



Format engaged in money-saving techniques on the segments, such as cutting way to a held cel of Leonardo while Crashcup yacked off-screen, cycles (including turning drawings around and painting them on the other side) and using maybe the same ten cues. Here’s something you don’t see often in the series—a stretch in-between.



There was a bit of a Laurel and Hardy relationship between the two. In this sequence of the “Do it Yourself” segment, Leonardo accidentally paints Clyde’s face (Crashcup rather stupidly opens a door while Leonardo is painting it). The Hardy-like retaliation follows. Crashcup paints his nose with a roller.



Leonardo checks his nose for paint, then reaches down to do the most logical thing to end the scene.



One fact I didn’t know as a kid is Crashcup is a caricature of Stephen Bosustow, the somewhat-over-his-head owner of UPA. In the late ‘50s, Herb Klynn and a bunch of others finally tired of Bosustow and quit to form Format Films—which just happened to make The Alvin Show. I appreciate the subversion.

Cock-A-Doodle Dog

Obsessiveness? Insanity? Well, what else would you find in a Tex Avery cartoon?

The rooster in Tex Avery’s Cock-a-Doodle Dog (1951) follows the rule. Roosters crow. So that’s what he does. All during the cartoon. Spike wants to sleep, but becomes crazy trying to stop the rooster from doing what roosters do.

Finally, we reach the end of the cartoon. The rooster decides to sleep. Now, it’s the insane Spike who is obsessively crowing. The rooster tries to stop him. The last gag is a complete turnabout as the rooster looks at the camera to end the short.

Mike Lah, Grant Simmons and Walt Clinton are the animators, while Rich Hogan helped Avery with the gags. Avery even plays Spike. Is Daws Butler the rooster? Could be, but I don’t really know. Ed Benedict handled the layouts and Johnny Johnsen painted the backgrounds; if you have John Canemaker’s book on Avery you’ll see two wonderful layouts from this cartoon.

Crosby on Crosby

The year was 1946. It was the year Bing Crosby changed network radio for good.

The Old Groaner had been hosting a show on the air for Kraft for 11 years, all of which ended with three chimes courtesy of the National Broadcasting Company. And because NBC and CBS mandated live broadcasts, der Bingle did one show for the East Coast at 6 p.m. Thursdays then the same show three hours later for the West Coast. The networks were antsy about transcriptions, claiming they didn’t have the quality of live shows, the discs could skip, and audiences didn’t want recorded programmes.

Bing was not a stupid man. He knew transcribed shows, like Amos ‘n’ Andy, had been on the air since the late ‘20s. He didn’t see the point of doing an identical broadcast twice. And he knew during the war, the Germans had invented a high-quality reel-to-reel tape machine that was now being manufactured in the U.S. by Ampex. Bing liked the idea of editing out mistakes and having a better show. He also liked the idea of recording broadcasts in advance, leaving him stretches of time for golfing and fishing.

Another network, ABC, didn’t care about live or tape. It cared about getting stars to make any kind of ratings gains to jump out of third place. Sure, Bing, come to ABC and record your shows, he was told. Farewell, bong-bong-bong! Farewell, Velveeta! Crosby debuted his taped show (transcribed onto disc for airing) for Philco on Wednesday, October 16, 1946. (ABC followed Crosby with another heavy-hitter, satirist Henry Morgan, who went from ad-lib commentaries to his own variety show).

If you read the trade papers and/or radio pages in the public press at the time, there was huge fascination with Bing’s experiment. It turned out to be a success. The dam burst. Other live shows followed. NBC and CBS gave in.

Herald Tribune syndicate columnist John Crosby seemed quite pleased with both Bing and the broadcast, which he reviewed on Tuesday, October 22.

RADIO IN REVIEW
By John CROSBY
Bing Crosby
The hullabaloo started last spring when Bing Crosby's contract with Kraft Music Hall, his sponsor for ten years, expired. Throughout the summer, rumors flew around like magpies. Crosby was tired and was through with radio for good. Or, Crosby would like to do a transcription series but no network would take a chance. Then in August the news was flashed around the nation—the world's favorite barytone would do a series of transcribed broadcasts for Philco over the American Broadcasting Co. The pay would be the highest in radio ($24,000 a week) with a percentage on additional stations which might bring it as high as $30,000). The network would be the largest ever strung together for a commercial show (208 A. B. C. stations, possibly 400 independents).
As the great day approached, the publicity mounted. The network renamed Wednesday Bingsday. Magazine ads blossomed like magnolias, recounting the story of the voice on which the sun never acts. The Crosby face, as symbolic of America as Churchill’s cigar of the British Empire, peered forth from hundreds of newspaper ads to remind us Wednesday was the day. It was the greatest build-up since Bikini.
By the time the first strains of "When the Blue of the Night" crept through our loudspeakers in the serene, relaxed unmistakable tones of the world’s most nonchalant singer, it was a bit of an anticlimax. What were we all expecting—the Apocalypse? It was just Crosby—the same effortless voice you hear night and day from ten thousand juke boxes, the same velvet tones and perfect phrasing that emanate hour after hour via recordings from hundreds of independent radio stations.
Discounting the publicity, it was a darn good show. Bing warmed up with "I Got the Sun in the Morning," a song whose lyrics are peculiarly fitted to his own insouciance, and then, for a change of pace, offered "Moonlight Bay,” which gave him a chance to throw out his chest and give for a note or two.
There isn’t much left to be said about the Crosby voice. Its great charm, I think (and it’s hardly an original thought) is that Crosby keeps it at half throttle most of the time. Behind that easy going warbling are immense reserves of depth and volume, and when, about two notes to every song, he calls them into place, the rest of the popular singers are left far in the rear.
About the only thing you get on the Crosby show that you can’t get on a juke box is the Crosby badinage. The singer hates pretension of any sort and works tirelessly on his scripts to avoid straining at gags. The dialogue is as informal and as easygoing as the Crosby voice—and as difficult to express in print. Engaging is the word I’m looking for, I guess.
The program doesn't rest entirely on the 18-karat voice. Besides Bing, you get Lina Romay, a pleasant singer though overpowered next to the Great Name, and the Charioteers, who provided an excellent contrast to Crosby in “Moonlight Bay.” Skitch Henderson, a piano stylist, broke up the vocalising with a skittish arrangement of "Turkey in the Straw" and John Scott Trotter's orchestra helped out where necessary.
The cherry on this sundae was Bob Hope, another entertainer who has reached such a peak of adulation that he can afford to relax. The two old friends, who go together like scotch and soda, insulted each other’s waistline, hairline and baseball teams and wound up doing a duet called "Put Her There, Pal.” It was just like old times on the road to Singapore.
There were two great innovations in the Crosby show. First and most startling, Bing tore up the commercial because it interfered with the entertainment. The second and most important was the fact that a transcription show got on a national network at all. The success of the Crosby show may lead to lots more of the same.
The first show was a whopping success, but much of it was probably the result of the publicity. It’s too early to tell whether transcription will hold the same appeal as live shows. The first show was carried by the full A. B. C. network (208 stations) and “several hundred” independents. Just how many hundred remains the closely guarded secret of Philco, which is having a little union trouble and won’t give out exact figures. Bing got a Hooper rating of 25, which is excellent but not sensational (Fred Allen got 25.6 on Oct. 6).
But to the millions of Crosby fans the most important news of all is that the Groaner is back on the air.

Incidentally, Bing was bigger than ABC. He recorded a series of 15-minute transcriptions that were syndicated across North America.

The same week, Crosby wrote two columns on an audience survey (Oct. 21, 23) as well as one about returning giveaway show “Pot o’ Gold” on ABC (Oct. 23) and another on honesty in advertising (Oct. 25) which also contained routines from the Fred Allen and Henry Morgan shows. You can click on them below.

Under the Sea, 1929 Style

The Fleischer studio had to give a name to its new series of sound cartoons, so it (or Paramount) came up with “Talkartoons.”

There isn’t a lot of “talk” in the first one, Noah’s Lark, released on October 26, 1929. There’s singing and crowd sounds while the characters’ mouths move. The action is timed to the music.

The studio hadn’t quite developed truly surreal gags yet. The short ends with the ark sinking and a mermaid swimming up to Noah. He chases her underwater into the background to end the picture.



Director Dave Fleischer and Musical Advisor Max M. Manne are the only two people credited on this cartoon.

You’ll have to forgive the horrible digital fuzz on these frames. The Talkartoons are really in need of a full restoration. The Fleischers deserve it.

Today's Animation Question

You know this gag if you’re a fan of Warners Bros. cartoons; it’s quoted all over the place.

We get to a point of the proceedings in The Dover Boys (1942) where melodrama villain Dan Backslide says the best-known line in the cartoon.

“A runabout! I’ll steal it! No one will ever know!”

Today’s animation question: where does that line come from? Is in an inside joke? Is it from an old movie, maybe a silent movie title card? Is it just a non-sequitur? Does anyone have a real answer for this, instead of speculation I’ve read on-line.

Interestingly, one of the other boys book series of the era featured a runabout. It was "Tom Swift and His Electric Runabout" (1910).

The cartoon’s well-known for its smear animation. Here’s an example.

If you’re wondering what Carl Stalling has scored behind the opening credits, it’s the 1857 song ‘Annie Lisle,’ associated with a number of American colleges and universities.

On the Road With Don Wilson

Don Wilson wasn’t network radio’s first sidekick/announcer, but he soon became the most popular.

Jack Benny went through something like ten announcers in the first two years before General Tire picked up sponsorship of his show on April 6, 1934. In the earliest days, the network simply assigned someone to work his show. In fact, Wilson was hired to work with Benny as a result of a network audition in New York, where he had been transferred as a result of his football play-by-play on the West Coast.

Wilson was a refreshing change from Alois Havrilla, whose claim to fame was winning a diction award. Precise diction isn’t necessarily the first thing you want in a comedy foil. Wilson quickly chuckled and chortled his way to audience appreciation, coupled with the interruptions for sponsor mentions which Havrilla, Howard Claney and other network mouthpieces had engaged in.

He stayed with Benny until the end of the 1964-65 TV season. He missed only a handful of shows, generally when Benny hit the road and Wilson had commitments on other shows in Los Angeles. He did make the trip in March 1937, when Jack intended to bring his feud with Fred Allen to a climax and an end. He gave a little report on it to the paper in Monrovia, California.

Don Wilson Writes Column
"The world will little note nor long remember what we say here—“
By HOMER CANFIELD
Hollywood, March 15.—
THE POSTMAN DOES RING twice. On his second round this morning, he left me a very special letter from Don Wilson. As it gives an intimate inside picture of the Jack Benny troupe in New York, I'm taking the liberty of showing it to you. I'm sure Don won't mind, and I'm doubly sure you'll enjoy hearing from radio's No. 1 announcer every bit as much as I have.
Dear Homer:
Here we are in Radio City once again. It seems only like last year that we were here. Wait a minute—oh yes—Jack Benny, you know, that violinist, just looked over my shoulder to remark that it was last year. How time drags when all one has to do is listen to "The Bee" day in and day out.
But you wanted to know something about the trip. We caught the train out of Los Angeles Tuesday night, March 3, after Jack's broadcast with The Ol’ Maestro, Ben Bernie. Yowsuh! The party included, besides Jack and me, his secretary and able assistant, Harry Baldwin, those clever script writers, Al Boasberg, Eddie Beloin, and Bill Morrow. Mary Livingstone preceded us east by about two weeks and Kenny Baker by a couple of days.
I put in a good part of the time reading and playing solitaire while Jack stayed in the weekly huddle with his writers, turning out the script for the first of two broadcasts from New York. We arrived in Chicago Friday morning and

I spent three hours walking about the Loop and visiting with old pals in the NBC studios. Jack visited his folks between trains. It was a damp, bleak day with the penetrating wind driving in from Lake Michigan and I began to feel a bit nostalgic for sunny California. These easterners may joke about it, but the coast is the place to keep warm.
That afternoon we boarded the Twentieth Century. Following dinner, Jack called a conference to outline Sunday's show. I contributed a few suggestions for myself for some Jell-O plugs and we substituted the name "Lyman" as one of the six delicious flavors (in place of lemon, of course).
The train arrived in Grand Central station at exactly 9:00 a. m. on Saturday morning and we were greeted by a barrage of newspaper men and cameramen, not to forget agency and sponsor representatives and close to a thousand spectators. Many pictures and short interviews were in order, and we were swept into the glory being heaped on Jack's shoulders. The press meeting finally broke up and we all went to our respective hotels.
I dropped over to NBC at my earliest convenience and renewed some old acquaintances, and in the interim realized that one of my bags was missing. Immediately contacted all lost and found possibilities, but no light was shed on the matter. I was especially perturbed over the loss for in addition to my personal belongings, a silver plated traveling kit which Jack and Mary had given me Christmas, was among the missing items. Then I gave up in despair and took an early afternoon nap.
Awakened about 3 Saturday afternoon and called Jack's secretary, Harry Baldwin, to find out about rehearsal schedules. The first words which he greeted me over the phone were "I've got your bag, Don," which completed my self-disgust but relieved me of the worry.
At 4 we met for a script reading session in one of the conference rooms in NBC and went through the show for the first time with Jack, Mary Livingstone, Kenny Baker, Stuart Canin, the 10-year-old youngster who played "The Bee" on Fred Allen's program, Abe Lyman and myself present. That evening Kenny Baker and I had dinner together and took in an early movie. Then to bed with a busy and memorable day ahead of us.
Spent a quiet Sunday until it was time for our afternoon rehearsal at the Waldorf-Astoria. The practice session went off pretty well, although each member of the cast felt strange in the new surroundings, especially after broadcasting from our small and intimate Hollywood studio. Had dinner with some of the gang in the hotel and then was on hand in the ballroom at 6:30 p. m.
As the two thousand some-odd visitors filed into the improvised studio, each of our hearts sunk lower and lower, but our spirits were quickly revived when we sensed the tremendous studio reaction as Jack stepped to the rostrum ten minutes before air time and played "The Bee." Pandemonium practically broke loose. That peculiar edge of nervousness disappeared, and left us completely at home midst a host of congenial strangers.
With the familiar "Jell-O again," our first eastern broadcast in over a year was under way. It moved smoothly and gathered momentum as the minutes passed. The guffaws were frequent and hearty. Mary handled her bit admirably. Kenny sang as he never had before. Abe Lyman's music was stimulating. Jack talked in an inspired manner, Sam "Schlepperman" Hearn returned with a fresh and entertaining "Hello Stranger," and my "Six Delicious Flavors" seemed to make our friends' mouths water.
The show was a success, so we were later told, and we were all set for the rebroadcast at 11:30 p. m. The late broadcast went off just as smoothly, even though Mary had a lot of fun and provoked untold laughter as she juggled a line for a few minutes.
We undertake one more show from New York, and move to Chicago en route home again. I have busied myself looking up old friends, taking in a few of the current Broadway hits, enjoying a little night life and missing California with each breath I take. Hope to see you soon when I can elaborate on the story of our eastern visit. My regards to all the gang.
Cordially, DON WILSON.

Ozark in Florida

If you have a favourite animator in the Golden Age, it may be almost impossible to trace their careers. Only a few people had their names appear on screen at the start of a cartoon—and the credits may not have been accurate—and that was usually for theatrical shorts and features only.

Animators and other artists worked anonymously on commercials. If they were fortunate, trade papers mentioned their names if they won an award. Some of them picked up piecework, so they were more-or-less freelancing on industrials and commercial films and not regularly employed by a studio.

A good example is Jacob Ozarkawitz, born February 21, 1914, in Chicago. You know him as Jack Ozark. He started with the Fleischers in the early ‘30s. If you watched TV cartoons in the ‘60s and ‘70s, you would have seen his name on Filmation shows. He did some things in between, including operating his own studio in Miami. This story was in the Herald on March 7, 1954.

TV Cartoons Take Days to Prepare
Those animated cartoons which keep even the most rabid haters of TV commercials fascinated require days of tedious art work to prepare.
Frank Spalding and Jack Ozark, animators for Reela Films Inc., a subsidiary of WTVJ, spend almost two weeks, for example, in bringing a 20-second cartoon commercial to life.
It takes, they report, 240 separate drawings to put an exterminator superman through his bug chasing routine in 20 seconds time.
A minute-long commercial, they say, could run the number of drawings as high as 1,440 depending on the amount of action involved.
The animators put a cartoon together after studying the commercial script. They run a test of pencil drawings first to determine whether their cartoon idea works. If it passes the test then backgrounds are prepared and the tedious drawing-by-drawing animation is done on transparent acetate sheets.
The animators use an ink with an adhesive ingredient to make it stick on the slick sheets.
The completed pile of drawings then goes to an animator camera where the frame-by-frame photographing is done.
The result is a highly entertaining and sales persuasive commercial which Michael Brown, Reela Films' production manager, reports is gaining increasing favor among advertisers and viewers alike here and throughout the nation.

A non-animation item about Ozark surfaced in the Hollywood Citizen-News in the “Racin’ With Mason” column of June 11, 1963.

Top Cartoons By Jack Ozark
By ERNIE MASON
READERS POST-TIME—Recently I have noticed quite a few cartoons of race horses, jockeys and trainers done by a Jack Ozark. The likenesses of the subjects are perfect. Is Mr. Ozark connected with anyone locally and do you happen to know where I can get in touch with him? Jerry Herron, Pomona.
I have to agree that Jack Ozark’s turf cartoons are terrific works of art. The talented gentleman currently is doing free lance turf sports cartooning and can be reached here at the press box at Hollywood Park.

Ozark had a conversation some years ago—he died in 2000—with historian Harvey Deneroff, whose father worked at Fleischer with Ozark. View it below.

Dino's Serenade

Can anyone explain to me just who the intended audience was for UPA’s Hamilton Ham series?

The last cartoon was Dino’s Serenade (copyright 1958). The story is by a young John Urie. I don’t want to bash his work because he contributed much to computer animation in the ‘60s and gave work to many young people when he formed his own company. But this short doesn’t seem to do much more than fill time.

Hamilton Ham isn’t even in the cartoon. Dino is an Italian violin player who frolics around while a background singer (actor Hal Peary, in dialect) raptures about any day being a good day for him to make love.

Being a UPA cartoon, cuts and wipes are just too, too pedestrian. We get backgrounds dissolving, eventually becoming a solid pink card.



Dino’s violin case is full of stuff. He pulls out sections of an Italian restaurant and sets them up. Out of nowhere, a waiter comes outside from the restaurant and sets up tables, brings out a bottle of red wine (Dino approves), and pours two glasses (then returns for Dino to give him a tip). The waltz-tempo song about starting “love’s conflagration at any sidewalk café” continues in the background.



Now the cartoon gets creepy. Dino pulls out an immobile female from his violin case and plays for her. Is a blow-up sex doll? Is it a real woman who is asleep?



There’s something else in the violin case—a villain who resembles Reggie Van Gleason. He even does the Gleason “exit” shoulder hunch. What’s he doing in there? Anyway, the villain runs off the now-awakened woman while Dino is completely engrossed in his violin playing.



The waiter takes down the pieces of the front of the restaurant and drop them into the violin case.

What happens now? A dissolve back to the beginning and Dino merrily dances away, as if nothing has happened.

After watching this cartoon, I think he’s right. Nothing has happened.

Jimmy Murakami is responsible for the designs, while Fred Crippen gets the direction credit. There are no animation credits so whether Crippen animated this himself, I don’t know.

The internet says the cartoon was released to theatres on January 16, 1959 but to the right you see an ad from December 27, 1958 which shows the cartoon was appearing in one theatre in Wausau, Wisconsin then.

To be honest, if I want Dino, I’ll either take the Flintstones’ dinosaur (animated by George Nicholas) or the “Everybody Loves Somebody Sometime” King of Cool.