The People of Coronet Land

Buried in the June 4, 1952 edition of the North Park College News is a “did you know?” column about some of the students. One item is “John Lindsay made a movie about how to act toward a girl on your first date.”

This isn’t just any first-date movie. It’s the cult short Dating Do’s and Don’ts, released in 1949 by Coronet Instructional Films.

There’s something fascinating about social guidance films of the late ‘40s and early ‘50s. Maybe the best ones were produced by Sid Davis, John Wayne’s ex-stunt-double, whose films screech warnings of a dangerous world full of child molesters, young druggies, speeding teenagers and the inevitable gory deaths.

In Chicago, there was Coronet, which had a different approach. The company shot dozens and dozens of undramatic films of attractive suburban high schoolers dealing with uncertainty, such as how to date, how to keep a job and how to make friends. They come across as corny and simplistic, with cheap sets and acting that sinks to being laughably inept.

The most famous star to come out of Coronet was Dick York, the first (and better) Darrin on Bewitched. York was a professional radio actor when he starred in Coronet’s Shy Guy (1947), having played the lead character on That Brewster Boy during its two-year run, then stepped into the role of Billy on Jack Armstrong: All American Boy.

Being a Coronet film, there’s a happy ending. York’s shy Phil makes friends after all, though he didn’t do it all himself. Moose-sweatered Chick, played by radio and stage actor Art Young, insisted Phil join him at a malt shop table with a couple of friends. Young surfaces as Skokie bus-riding football captain Ed Anderson in Understanding Your Ideals (1950). (He graduated in Commerce from Northwestern University in 1950 and found work at the J. Walter Thompson ad agency in Chicago. Arthur LeRoy Young, Jr. was born in Chicago on November 22, 1928 and died in Edina, Minnesota, on November 28, 2016 at age 88).



There’s one other big name in this film. The narrator is played by a Chicago radio announcer who eventually rooted out fraudsters by interrogation on 60 Minutes—Mike Wallace. Also appearing, according to a video summary on archive.org, are Frank Ferguson, beak-nosed Mickey Hugh, Bill Fein and Howard Phillips, who later attended De Paul University and was a member of the Beverly Theatre Guild. Wallace, by the way, narrated Coronet’s How to Study (1946).

York was also cast in Bookkeeping and You (1947), How to Judge Authorities (also starring the moose sweater, 1948), Rest and Health (1949), Ways To Better Conversation (re-used from Authorities, 1950), How Friendly Are You? (1951) and who knows how many other films for Coronet. We don’t know because none of the company’s actors are credited on screen.

One of the fascinations I have with the Coronet films is: who were these actors anyway?

Fortunately, someone was keenly interested in these kinds of films. Ken Smith researched and penned a book called “Mental Hygiene, Classroom Films 1945-1970,” published in 1999 when viewing these shorts was difficult; they weren’t on the internet in those low bandwidth days. Smith rightly examines the morality and social conditions of the day in his book, and gives a brief editorial summary of whatever films he was able to view.

Unfortunately, digging out names of obscure cast members was not a priority due to the incredible amount of research that would have to be done. That brings us back to Dating Do’s and Don’ts. Smith revealed a few of the people involved with the film. Unfortunately, he doesn’t give the whole cast, nor does he tell us a lot about the star, even though Smith interviewed him for the book.

Coronet owner David Smart had what Smith called “a pool of teen actors.” And while Chicago had teenagers populating radio shows, it must have been cheaper for him to hire amateur and even inexperienced actors from high schools. One was John Lindsay.

John Dickson Lindsay was born in Chicago on January 9, 1934 to Marcus Granger and Ruth Ann (Dickson) Lindsay; his father was a travelling salesman dealing in paint and varnish.

Various newspapers at the time flesh out his life story. He attended North Park Academy and made the honour roll in November 1948 in his freshman year. He played third base and left field on the baseball team—Coronet liked to hire jocks—and also appeared in school productions, including a Christmas play as a shy guy (Dick York was now in college). He was color bearer for the Illnois Society, Children of the Revolution in 1948. The following year, at age 14, he performed in a documentary for the Community Fund on WBBM radio.

He also appeared in photo shoots in the Chicago Tribune twice in 1950. I’d love to know if any of the others were hired by Coronet.



We’ll leave Lindsay’s story for a moment and look at the other actors in the movie. Ken Smith reveals toothy Ann, Woody’s date at the exciting Hi-Teen Carnival, was played by the improbably-named Jackie Gleason. Lindsay admitted he had a crush on her. She apparently married a chap named Hurley and died in 2004 at the age of 79 (according to Legacy.com).

The narrator of the short was Ken Nordine, who began his radio career in 1938 and spent years at WBBM, creating “Word Jazz.” He died in 2019 at the age of 98. Archive.org also states Dorothy Day played Woody’s mother.

Woody’s older brother, the leather jacketed Bob Woodruff, was part of the Coronet stock company. He was Bob McGraw, the boy with the bro-crush on Joe in Developing Friendships (1950). You can see him as Marvin Baker, the failed basketball player, in Attitudes and Health (1949); Bob the basketball player in How Honest Are You? (1950); the unnamed chairman of the teen canteen committee in Law and Social Controls (1949) and as twins Bob and Walter Addison in How To Keep a Job (also 1949). I haven’t been able to ID him.



As for Lindsay, his first appearance in a Coronet film appears to have been in 1948’s Everyday Courtesy as sweater-clad Bill Anderson. He was a zit-filled kid in Ways To Better Conversation (1950), Howie, the boy (still with zits) who wants to enlist, in Service and Citizenship, Alan in Developing Self-Reliance (both 1951) and Jack Connors in the Dutch restaurant in Mind Your Manners (1953).



He graduated from North Park in 1952, attended Northwestern University, served in the U.S. Army, and went on to a long career in securities investment management, at one time being vice-president of McCormick and Co. and then a senior vice president of the brokerage house, the Illinois Co. Lindsay died on September 8, 2006 in Glenview, Illinois. Ken Smith’s book says he lived less than a mile from the spot where Datings Do’s and Don’ts was shot. His film career was notably absent in his Tribune obituary.

A couple of newspaper stories revealed the identities of others in Coronet films. The Chicago Daily Herald of September 15, 1950 reported:

Five Arlington Heights township high school students have already appeared in the educational films produced by Coronet Instructional Films who have a studio in Glenview. This year three of these students are attending technique classes conducted by the company for students who appear in their films.
Those attending classes at the Little Theater, 25 E. Jackson blvd., Chicago, are Patti Ryden, Barbara Maher, and Bill Klink. Bill appeared in “Do Better on Exams” last year, and this film was shown to high school and college students. Bonnie Peterson, ’50, and Anne Milnamow appeared in films last year.
Coronet films have sent form letters to all high school drama directors announcing auditions for these films. Thirty students tried out last year.

Klink was a high school track, basketball and football player.

And the April 26, 1950 edition of the North Park College News somehow omitted a reference to Lindsay in its story.

Coronet Studios have become quite interested in North Parkers B. J. [a girl], Wanda Peterson, Janie Muir, Barb Brown, Marion Larsen, Ben Benson, Tom Houdek, Bob Spackeen, Jerry Keeney, and Don Birkle were made stars in one day and were paid for it! Tom has done quite a few of the pictures for Coronet. When will Paramount discover him?

Houdek was a track star, volleyball player and tackle at North Park who was later a guard for Oklahoma A&M, then attended the University of Texas. He is apparently still living there, retired from the savings and loan business, at age 89. Judging by two photos in the Chicago Tribune, it would appear Houdek starred as Mike Hanlon, the rejected student, in Feeling Left Out (1951). Spackeen played basketball at Illinois College, graduated from the University of Arizona, moved to Flagstaff and ran as a Republican for the Board of Supervisors.

And to the right is another Coronet actor. I think he’s Wally Johnson in Are You Popular? (1947). He was in stage plays as a child in 1939 and later president of his junior class at Township High in Belleville, Ill. in addition to receiving awards from the Boy Scouts. He sang in high school as well.

Smith’s book and the archive.org search of Coronet reveals a few more actor identifications, which can be matched by watching footage.

Heavy-eyebrowed John Galvarro is Howie’s older brother in Service and Citizenship (1951), while Jim Campbell plays their father. Galvarro’s other roles were as student Larry in both Understand Your Emotions and Are You Ready For Marriage? (both 1950), Howie in How to Say No (1951) before moving on to play Marty DeMalone, the tuna-stealing addict in Encyclopaedia Britannica’s Drug Addiction (1951, also shot in Chicago). He was also Toughy Padget in the soap opera Hawkins Falls, which aired live from Chicago on NBC in 1950, and later directed plays in California. His wife was a model from Vancouver.



Ernie Allen in Exercise and Health (1949) is played by a guy who was a student-on-the-street in How To Judge Facts (1948) and putting money into a candy machine in The Fun of Being Thoughtful (1950).



We mentioned Mickey Hugh in Shy Guy. He was the newspaper editor in How To Judge Facts, Ray Bennett, the student radio show moderator, in the weenie-obsessed Capitalism (1948) and shows up in a non-speaking part in The Benefits of Looking Ahead (1950). By 1949, he was attending Northwestern University and acting in their Little Theatre.



Bill Fein was mentioned in Shy Guy above. There’s conflicting and inconsistent information about him. The Internet Movie Data Base, not quoting any source, says he appeared as Jerry in Are You Popular? (below left). If so, I suspect Fein also starred as unhappy student Howard Patterson (below right) in Snap Out of It! and as Paul, the boy in the clique, in Feeling Left Out (both 1951). Fein had the title role in the Chicago-based radio serial Terry and the Pirates. A squib in the June 27, 1947 edition of Radio Life revealed he was about to enroll at Northwestern University, and he’s in a list of 1950 graduates.



Marty, star and narrator of The Self-Conscious Guy and Marty in How to Say No: Moral Maturity (both 1951). Actor unknown. He seems to have specialised in big-lip anguish.



The most annoying voice in a Coronet film belongs to math student John in The Meaning of Pi (1949). Not only does he have that Midwest drawl where a short ‘a’ is pronounced as two syllables, but his scratchy voice is changing. When he appears as Eddie Proctor in The Fun of Being Thoughtful the following year, his voice has finally cracked, though he still has the drawl. He has a two-word role as Johnny (one of the words is “uh”) in How To Say No. He’s Ed Parker in How To Get Cooperation and Eddie in Developing Friendships (both also from 1950). He also plays Ed, the guy afraid to back up Bill in class in Overcoming Fear. Actor unknown.



A fine piece of acting comes from the guy who stars as Bill in Social Courtesy (1951). He’s been forced to go to a party by an omni-present off-screen narrator. It’s clear he doesn’t want to be there; he’s grumpy and annoyed until the narrator browbeats him enough to be polite. He seems to be happy at the end that people now like him. He’s also Bill, your moderator, in How To Say No the following year. There’s no narrator but he talks directly to the camera a lot. He is Bill in Better Use of Leisure Time, stars as swimming-phobe Bill in Overcoming Fear and has a small role as (what else?) Bill in Developing Friendships (all from 1950). Actor unknown.



Let’s wrap up with three more actors (sorry to those we’re skipping). Besides York, one was a radio veteran. David Rempfer Whitehouse, the son of Professor Horace Whitehouse of the music department at Northwestern University, was born on November 13, 1929 in Evanston. He was 13 and attending Haven school when he was hired in 1943 to take on the part of Russell Miller on Vic and Sade. He had been acting in Northwestern’s Children’s Theatre. Whitehouse graduated from Northwestern with a bachelor of science in engineering in 1952. He was pretty bright. He had given up acting and was on the electrical engineering faculty of MIT when he got married in 1956.

He had a small, unnamed part in Are You Popular?, was the Pete the son in Build Your Vocabulary, student reporter Jim in How To Judge Facts (both 1948), Edward W. Blakeslee, the job-hunter, in How To Keep a Job, the “Edison” jokester in Rest and Health (both 1949), stars as Ken Michaels in Better Use of Leisure Time (1950) and plays Chuck of the future with a moose sweater talking to young Chuck of the present with a moose sweater (Stuart Sklamm) in Good Table Manners (1951).



But, sorry, John, while you’re in a terrific camp classic, my favourite actor at Coronet is one whose name I haven’t discovered. He’s the guy who plays Nick Baxter in What to Do on a Date (1951). Not only is his character awkward, so is his acting. In this epic film, Nick’s buddy Jeff (who is also Jeff Field in 1951’s Learn to Argue Effectively) cajoles the hesitant Nick to call Kay (who is Rose in How Honest Are You?) and invite her to go to the Scavenger Sale at the Community Centre. Amazingly, she says yes. And at the end, she agrees to go out with him again.

Nick shows up again in How Honest Are You? but his tour-de-force role came in 1950 as the star of The Benefits of Looking Ahead. Once again he is Nick Baxter, a grumbling, moping and shouting student failure, with tie askew (Yes, he’s wearing a tie in shop class). He envisions himself as a bum in a rundown rooming house, smoking a cigarette and eating a sandwich, with some kind of make-up smeared on his cheeks to make it look like stubble. His vision ended, he, after busting his project and whining to himself, instantly decides to figure out how his table will look and come up with a plan. As English library music swells in the background, Nick’s table is made perfectly and all is right with Nick at the end, as he fantasizes himself wearing a suit and being a hot-shot executive, conforming to 1950 American society’s norms, while still stiffly delivering his lines.



If you cut through the hokeyness, the basic advice in Coronet’s films is sound—don’t be a jerk to other people. If you don’t cut through the hokeyness, you can enjoy watching jubilation about weenie roasts, people saying “swell” and an obsession with knitted sweaters with moose on them. And, at least now, you can put names to some of the faces on screen that aren’t being called Durwood by their TV witchy mother-in-law.

Before There Was a Rock-'Em, Sock-'Em Robot, There Was...

Dystopia isn’t just for 21st century superhero movies. Battling, out-of-control robots populated cartoons 90 years ago. There was Van Beuren’s The Iron Man (1929); Walter Lantz’s Mechanical Man (1932); Ub Iwerks’ Techno-Cracked, Harman-Ising’s Warners’ short Bosko’s Mechanical Man, Columbia’s Technoracket (all 1933) and the title character in Terrytoons’ The Mechanical Cow (1937).

Uncle Walt tried it, too, in Mickey’s Mechanical Man (1933). For some reason, Mickey has built a robot to take on the King Kong-ish “The Kongo Killer,” and alternates between playing a happy, childish song on a piano to urging his metallic charge to “sock ‘em.” Why this violent streak, Mr. Mouse?

The “out-of-control” part comes when Minnie blows her car horn. The robot goes wild at the sound. You pretty well know how this cartoon’s going to end.

The climax of the cartoon has energy and action, which gives the animators a chance to show their stuff. The mechanical man sprouts boxing gloves from all kinds of places inside his frame to beat the you-know-what out of the ape. Here are some examples. The scene is animated on ones.



Wilfred Jackson directed this short.

Because this is an animated cartoon, it naturally contains a portion of Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2, which Mickey played in The Opry House (1929). It probably appeared more in cartoons more than robots; I think every studio but Iwerks found a use for it.

Wolfie Flips For Red (Cinderella)

Wolfie lands on the ground in a clump and has to straighten himself out in Swing Shift Cinderella (1945).



He pulls upward and tugs a few times.



Success! These are 14 consecutive frames. Wolfie flips over twice before landing. Note the dry brush and how he follows the laws of squash and stretch at the end.



Ed Love, Ray Abrams and Preston Blair animated this Red Riding Hood cartoon for Tex Avery, though the real Red disappears at the start and Cinderella (with Sara Berner doing her Bette Davis voice) substitutes for her the rest of the way.

Rochester and Albuquerque

A stroke of genius wafted over the radio airwaves on March 28, 1937. The Jack Benny show included an incidental character who got laughter and applause. The reaction no doubt spurred Benny and his writers to find other situations for him. The character was an unnamed porter played by a film and stage actor named Eddie Anderson.

Finally, on June 20, the character now was employed by Benny and named Rochester. Because the show didn’t always have an element of Jack’s “home life” (it was stage-bound much of the time, like other comedy/variety shows), Rochester didn’t always appear; in fact the Rochester character only showed up once before becoming somewhat regular at the end of the year. But Benny and the writers knew he had comic appeal. Eventually, a “phone call to the studio from Rochester” bit was included on the show to squeeze him in if there was no “home life” scenario that week.

Audiences came to love Rochester because he was the employee who constantly one-upped his boss, the same as the rest of the cast. He had the audacity to wear Jack’s clothes, smoke his cigars and empty his fridge (and bar), and didn’t seem too concerned he’d get caught, coming up with lame and funny explanations. As the show evolved into a sitcom after the war, he and his “boss” were like friends and mutually respected each other.

On that first appearance, there’s a running gag where Rochester, the redcap, doesn’t know anything about a train stop at Albuquerque. He thinks Jack has made up the name and won’t take it seriously. The interesting thing is, like much of the Benny show, there was a touch of real life behind it. Jack was on a train that week and he did stop in Albuquerque two days before the Sunday broadcast. The Albuquerque Tribune of March 27 reported and made a revelation about the show. The Benny-Allen feud that started over “The Bee” ended on March 14th in New York. At least temporarily.

Jack Benny Asserts He Can Play the Bee All Right
"What do you mean am I ever going to learn to play ‘The Bee’? I already can play it. Improve? What's wrong with it the way it is?" Jack Benny queried defensively here yesterday afternoon.
Off the screen and off the air Jack Benny is a business man. Yesterday when he and Mary Livingston passed through here on the Chief his business was preparing his Sunday night's broadcast, in which, incidentally, Albuquerque will play a minor role.
The program will be worked around Mr. Benny’s train trip to Hollywood and the stop-over here will be used in the script which Mr. Benny Is preparing en route. While here, he wired Hollywood to here train bells, whistles, escaping steam and other locomotive noises ready for the broadcast.
Aside from defending his musical accomplishments, Mr. Benny seemed to be taking life pretty seriously. He refused to take any stand on Fred Allen, except that contrary to rumors, he and Mr. Allen will not make a picture together in the near future at least.
Mr. Benny will, however, start work soon on "Artists and Models," a picture about which Mr. Benny knows no more than anybody else.

As a side note, it’s interesting to see the show was still being written on Friday. NBC issued news releases promoting programmes and I’ve run into cases where the summary doesn’t quite match what appeared on the air. I suspect this paragraph in the March 28 edition of the Sunday Times of New Brunswick, N.J. is from a release.

The opening portion of the program will be devoted to a dramatization of the cast’s transcontinental railroad trip. Among the episodes to be covered will be the celebration of Jack Benny Day in Waukegan, a discussion of how the various members of the troupe spent their vacations in New York, a poker game, a dining-car sketch and an interlude with the conductor who thinks that Mary Livingstone ought to get a new straight-man.

Other than being on the train from Chicago, none of the rest of the above plot took place. There’s a Yiddish dialect routine with Pat C. Flick and a routine with Verna Felton and Blanche Stewart involving a stage mother who coerces Jack to hear her operatic daughter. And there’s Rochester.

Benny and cast made another train trip a year later and again stopped in Albuquerque. By then, Rochester was already known. The Journal interviewed Eddie Anderson and Jack for its March 28, 1938 edition.

JACK BENNY'S "FIND" COMES BACK THROUGH TOWN THAT MADE HIM ON RADIO
The Negro boy who began his rise to radio renown by good-humored jibes at Albuquerque less than a year ago came back to town Tuesday morning on the Chief.
And also on and with Jack Benny.
And Eddie Anderson—Rochester, the Pullman porter, to you dial twisters—"ain't been so excited since I was colored."
While Eddie attempted to establish kinship with a group of Navajo Indians who toothily consented to pose for the cameramen, he paid his respects to Albuquerque.
“Do I remember this city, Boy, I'll never forget it as long as I live," said the ginger-cake boy with unfailing cheer. "It got me my big chance in radio. Say, I love everybody here."
In Eddie's first radio broadcast when he was "discovered” by Benny a year ago, it will be recalled that he tore off some gags not exactly calculated to flatter the finer sensibilities of the Chamber of Commerce.
Benny All Apologies

For instance, when Jack asked him, in the skit, "how far is Albuquerque,” Rochester answered with mirthful impudence:
"Is dat on dis line? Shux. dey ain't no such a thing as Albuquerque."
When Jack persisted in plying the radio reporter with the question, Rochester was increasingly scornful.
"Lissen, dere he go again. Talkin' 'bout Albuquerque. He must be crazy."
As for Jack Benny, acclaimed by many as Radio Comedian Number One? And acclaimed by America's tailors as Well Dressed Man Number One?
He was all apologies. This was the first time he had ever failed to emerge from his stateroom in Albuquerque. He misunderstood the schedule and thought it was an hour earlier.
About this best dressed business. At ease in his bed, wearing horn-rimmed glasses, crinkled blue pajamas and a slight beard stubble, he said; graciously:
"Pshaw. There's not a man in my show that's not better dressed than I." I don't see where they get that. My recipe for being the best dressed? Just comb your hair, change shirts now and then, brush your teeth and shine your shoes, that's all."
Talks About Show
Jack preferred to talk about Rochester, his discovery. And his "radio show of shows," scheduled for New York next Sunday night.
The graying comedian expects to present, along with himself. Kate Smith, who will pinch hit for Mary Livingston, his wife; Fred Allen, his perennial "friendly enemy," Bob (Believe-It-Or-Not) Ripley and others. Mary stayed in Hollywood. So did Don Wilson, the announcer, who will be supplanted for the Sunday broadcast by Harry Vonzell.
What about Fred, now, Jack?
"O' I simply can't wait to get to New York and kick him in the pants," he chuckled. "Quite a citizen, that Allen."
What did he think of this year's awards of "Oscar?" (Hollywoodian for the Motion Picture Academy awards?)
"Very good, especially Spencer Tracy," he said. "However, I thought that Barbara Stanwyck should have been given more consideration for her work in "Stella Dallas."
Jack punctuated his observations with warm words of praise for the Santa Fe's Chief.
"Boy, this is the swellest train I ever rode. Yes, I used to fly, but I have about quit."
Jack Benny's last words to the reporter was a request to personally convey his thanks to the Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce.
"For that splendid letter they wrote me last year after Rochester put on his Albuquerque broadcast."

Perhaps it’s significant that Anderson’s quotes are in regular English but the Rochester dialogue is pure minstrel show. Rochester drawled for a while on the Benny show and he engaged in some stereotype behaviour (On one episode, he steals Ronald Colman’s chickens. Why the dignified actor would own chickens defies explanation, except to draw on a tired racial stereotype). The Benny writers pretty much dropped it as time wore on.

Incidentally, where the paper got the Rochester dialogue from the show is a bit of a mystery. The broadcast in circulation is the West Coast version and it doesn’t contain any of the lines above. And while Eddie Anderson appeared in Albuquerque in 1937, Rochester did not. That’s because local station KOB didn’t hook up with NBC until June 1937. Albuquerque fans of Jack had to hear him on KOA in Denver on Sundays at 9:30 p.m. In fact, KOB didn’t even air the Benny show until April 24, 1938. Audiences got “Words and Music from Cheerio,” an NBC Blue network show, before that.

It’s a little difficult hunting for newspaper stories of Anderson’s early days as Rochester. That’s because there was another Eddie Anderson in Hollywood, an assistant director at Warner Bros. We found one with a Benny connection, once removed, in the Moline Dispatch of August 21, 1937. It praised Anderson’s movie work (not mentioning radio), and revealed:

In Over the Goal, however, he’s a college janitor boy who each year manages to wangle raccoon-skin coat from the freshmen who have the job of stealing a rival college’s mascot—which is a big black bear. He’s necessary because the bear knows and will mind him.
Parenthetically, Eddie has been having troubles with the trained bear used, who is not vicious but playful!

It turns out Eddie had some experience to prepare him to be shoved into a scene with Carmichael the polar bear in Buck Benny Rides Again.

One other note about the debut of Rochester: Frank Nelson claimed that he was supposed to the voice of the porter, but turned down the role because he had another commitment on the air so Anderson was hired. A look at the script for that episode says “Nelson” next to the lines for a redcap, but the broadcast has no other voice than Eddie Anderson’s. It would appear Nelson was to be on the show but all the porter lines were consolidated into one character.

It turns out that Frank Nelson, indirectly, was partly responsible for the creation of one of the most popular characters in all of network radio.

Making Those Warners Cartoons

When Tweety Pie won the Oscar in 1948 for the best cartoon, producer Eddie Selzer admitted “I’m afraid that my family was more excited about it than I was.”

Maybe that tells you all you need to know about the boss at Warner Bros. cartoons.

When Leon Schlesinger sold his cartoon studio to Warners in 1944, Selzer was installed to run it. Schlesinger wasn’t an artist, but at least he had a sense of showmanship as a former vaudeville theatre owner. Selzer didn’t even have that. He was a studio publicist who became head of the trailer department. It’s pretty easy to guess the studio gossip after the words “they brought in who??!”

Selzer didn’t have much to say to Miami News columnist Herb Kelly, who dropped into Warners new cartoon studio in Burbank in 1957. Instead, he let Friz Freleng and Warren Foster explain how cartoons were made. Foster, incidentally, would leave Warners for John Sutherland Productions that November. Selzer would retire the following January.

The storyboard is for Apes of Wrath, released in April 1959. This shows you how big the backlog was to release Warners cartoons. The story was published August 15, 1957.

Cartoons Big Business—Here's How
Burbank, Calif., Aug. 15 —This has been the craziest day. It was spent with Bugs Bunny.
We were on Warner Bros. lot here and got lost and walked into the cartoon division of the movie company and met Edward Selzer, its executive producer. "What's up, doc?" we asked, and the little man behind the desk tossed us a carrot.
We were in the madhouse of the movies where characters like Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig, Tweety, Sylvester, Pepe LePew (the skunk), Speedy Gonzalez, Foghorn Leghorn and Henery Hawk are created by a group of men and women who are like a large family. That's how they get along.
The cartoons in the movies have always intrigued us and we see several a week in our job of reviewing films. (Many times they are better than the feature.) You can have a big picture, with a fascinating title and an all-star cast but when the credits come on the screen there is a dead silence in the audience.
But when a movie title is flashed — usually with a horrible pun — a hum can be heard, not only from the kids but from grownups, too.
"WHY IS THAT?" WE asked Selzer, and he gave us the answer.
"When the feature picture starts, the audience doesn't know what they're in for. It may be interesting, maybe not. But when a cartoon is up there before them, they know they are going to be entertained and they know they are going to have at least a few laughs. It's as simple as that."
There's another mystery to the cartoon business, the men who think them up. Maybe you have asked yourself the same question, "How do they get those crazy ideas."
We asked Selzer if it was possible for the thinker-uppers to put down their opium pipes and for him to unlock their padded cells. If it was safe, we'd like to talk to these fellows. The producer hollered down the hallway, "Hey, Warren, hey Friz, got a minute?" No push buttons and fancy gadgets in this division.
Two average-looking men came into the office, the kind of guys you wouldn't look at twice if you saw them walking down Flagler St.
Warren Foster is the story man, Friz Freeling [sic], the director. There are two other teams. They are the combinations who work out a plot, think up the dialogue and mischevious situations and bring you those laughs. Talk to them about their work and they are as plain as the slacks and sports shirts they were wearing. Get them deep into an explanation of their cartoon characters and they become the rabbit or bird or fox they are talking about.
ANOTHER BUGS BUNNY production is in the works, and the early steps are about half finished. On a wall in story man Foster's office are 78 drawings, a little larger than a postal card. Beneath each one are a few words of dialogue.
The plot goes something like this: "The stork is on his way to a Mama Gorilla and becomes delayed when he gets a little drunk. Bugs comes along, the stork snatches him and delivers him to the gorilla's lair as their new baby. Mama Gorilla cuddles him. Papa Gorilla wants to punish him and Bugs starts a family brawl.
The story sounds simple and it is, but there are laughs already and it isn't even finished. As Foster and Director Freeling went over the rough draft of the picture, reading the lines and enlarging upon the situations, they began talking like Bugs Bunny, hopping and waving their arms.
When they finished, they became their normal selves again. The men are buried in their work and they love it.
The actual making of a cartoon is complicated and technical process to those unfamiliar with the industry and it is not our aim to enfuse [sic] you with a lot of stuff that was a mystery to us even after it was explained thoroughly.
In substance there's the way a cartoon is produced:
Each of the three story men must come up with five ideas a year. Besides Foster, the others are Mike Maltese and Tedd Pierce. They are married, they watch their children, they read, they keep their eyes open. A plot comes to than from these or any other of a thousand sources and they take it from there.
Then the directors are called in. The other two are Charles M. Jones and Bob McKimson. The story is kicked around in a conference with Selzer and there is no "yessing" in these sessions. Criticisms are blunt, arguments are hot, but when they leave Selzer's office they are teams again.
ROUGH DRAFTS OF THE cartoons are drawn and the conversation printed below each panel. Then they go to a room where about 40 girls are at work, tracing the drawings onto 8 x 10 sheets of celluloid. The girls wear a white gauze on their right hand, which soaks up perspiration and keeps the celluloid sheet clean. The next step is washing each sheet with a chemical to make it spotless. Each sheet is photographed under the camera and how would you like to have to keep track of about 150,000 drawings? That's how many there are in the average cartoon. Remember, there is action in these and each movement is a drawing of its own.
Dubbing in the dialogue is another art. There are about dozen men in the film colony who have a corner en the voice market. Mel Blanc it tops and he does Bugs Bunny and many others for Warners.
And that brings up an example of how a bluff can work in Hollywood.
Dave Barry, who just closed at the Statler here and who played the Eden Roc in Miami Beach a few months ago, is one of those often called in to do mimicry. He has a long routine, but this one called for the sound of a raven.
Now Dave wouldn't know a raven from a canary, but out here you can't admit that. If you act just a little uncertain you are lost and this was a $1,000 job. Dave went into a huddle with the producer, director and writers. "Do you want me to imitate a male raven or a female raven?" he stalled. "You mean there's a difference?" they chorused. Barry appeared stunned at their ignorance. "A difference?" he said. "Sure there's a difference. Where do you think little ravens come from?"
All agreed he had something there and he got the job.
AFTER THE VOICE HAS been dubbed comes another vital part of a cartoon and that is the music, and Warner doesn't spare the horses there either. Thirty-five pieces for Bugs Bunny and the others. The score is composed, lengthy rehearsals are held and finally the music is synchronized with the action on the screen.
There's no room for temperament or retakes in the cartoon market. It is an expensive operation and the pennies are watched. Bugs Bunny and the others are on the screen for about seven minutes, but it took a full year to make the finished product, and the total cost of putting them up there is $30,000.
And that's a lot of carrots.
The cartoon market is drawing the interest of the stars. Recently one was put out called "The Honeymousers" and was satire on the Jackie Gleason program, Gleason saw it and roared and overruled his legal eagles who wanted to sue Warners.
Now Jack Benny is interested and Warners planning one with him. It will be titled "Jack Benny Mouse" and will kid him about his violin playing, show his vault where he keeps his cheese and have him suspecting Don Wilson of stealing one ounce of the treasure. Benny, his wife, Mary Livingston, Rochester and Wilson will do their voices off-screen.
Benny looks upon the venture as the best free advertising he can get. And if it's for free, Benny wants it. So does Warners.
SYLVESTER IS ANOTHER fall guy in cartoons. The villain must never win. When you see him and the others on the screen for only seven minutes, try to remember it took a year to make the completed product.