Bear and Robespierre

When you think of a cartoon where a character comments on the action, another character talks to the audience and another character holds up a sign, you probably think of Tex Avery. He used all these devices, both at Warner Bros. and MGM. They got laughs so seemingly everyone started doing the same thing.

Frank Tashlin was known more for aping live action cinematography, then adding touches you could only do in animation. In Booby Hatched, released in October 1944, he has a few of overhead camera angles, and shooting scenes looking up from the ground. But he also tries out a few Avery touches in a story by Warren Foster.

Robespierre is an unhatched duckling, with only his feet sticking out under the bottom of the shell. He’s lost in the woods in a vicious snowstorm. “I’m lost-ed! Help! Save me!” he yells as he ploughs through the snow. Suddenly he stops, the blowing snow is held in mid-air and the dramatic music ends. He turns to the audience and comments “This is the saddest part of the picture folks.” Then, he turns, the blowing snow and music return and he resumes his trudging.



Tashlin’s animator is up to the challenge of moving a speaking character without a mouth or arms. The egg nods around while the legs bend at the knees.

The camera pans right to a wolf looking forward to a duck dinner. Sign gag.



Robespierre zooms under a sleeping bear in a cave (to the sound of Fingal’s “Cave Overture). Tashlin indulges in some nice timing here. The bear wakes up, widening its eyes. It moves its lips, looks down, lifts its right leg and sees the egg.



Tashlin holds the bear in place for 36 frames. The bear lowers his leg, closes his eyes as if he’s going back to sleep. Tashlin holds the bear for another 17 frames, then it opens its eyes and says to the audience “So I laid an egg.”



For some reason, Tashlin has the bear’s mouth half-covered when the line is said.

Izzy Ellis is credited, while Art Davis and Cal Dalton are likely among the other animators. Dick Thomas is uncredited as the background artist. Carl Stalling opens the short with a minor-key version of “Old MacDonald Had a Farm” and we get some familiar tunes, including “Am I Blue?” (the eggs turn blue) and Raymond Scott’s “Toy Trumpet” (when the mother duck and ducklings are marching).

He Wasn't Odd

Jack Klugman won a pair of Emmys for playing Oscar Madison on The Odd Couple. Surprisingly, they weren’t his first.

Klugman was honoured by the Television Academy in 1964 for his work on The Defenders, starring E.G. Marshall and Robert Reed.

His career went back further, with an attention-grabbing role in Mr. Roberts at the Erlanger Theatre in New York starting in July 1950. He appeared on TV even before that, performing in sketches with Frank Sandford and Nancy Coleman on Hollywood Screen Test on KECA-TV in Los Angeles the previous April. After getting out of the service, he enrolled at Carnegie Tech and took to the stage in a production of The Time of Your Life in October 1946. Eventually, Broadway beckoned with a top-notch part. He was interviewed about it in a syndication story published Aug. 20, 1959.

Musical Star Admits He Can’t Sing
By STEVEN H. SCHEUER
Jack Klugman, who plays an agent and Ethel Merman's love interest in "Gypsy," the biggest musical smash hit Broadway has had in years, credits his performance as an agent in Playhouse 90’s "The Velvet Alley" for the opportunity to play the Broadway role.
Tonight, Playhouse 90 repeats "The Velvet Alley," and you can see for yourself why Klugman was approached to play a major role in a musical.
"I have an agent with guts," is the way Jack prefers to tell it.
In a way, Jack knows what he's talking about. Though he's a veteran of the legitimate theater and has over 400 TV acting roles under his belt, his only previous experience with a musical was in the recent TV version- of "Kiss Me Kate," in which he played one of the comedy gangsters and croaked his way through "Brush Up Your Shakespeare."
Learned Sons
"When I auditioned, for 'Gypsy,' " Jack said, "the only song I knew was 'Brush Up Your Shakespeare' and they refused to let me sing it. So I learned 'Isn't it Romantic' and I sang that at the audition—but rotten! You have never heard anyone sing anything so rotten! Finally, from the dark of the theater a really disgusted voice said: ‘All right! Read lines!’ So I did and then the voice said, almost beggingly: 'Can't you sing anything?'
"I answered, 'Sure, "Brush Up Your Shakespeare’," Jack continued.
"And the voice, full of resignation, said: 'Oh, all right Sing it!' So I did and I was hired.
"Luckily, 'Gypsy' has such strong dramatic values that it doesn't matter that I'm the worst singer on Broadway. I'm not out to prove I can sing," Jack insisted. "I can't."
Free Time
Anyway, Jack has what could amount to a lifetime job in "Gypsy." So all he talks about now is TV. He's writing TV scripts and he expects to do an awful lot of acting on TV this season.
"I've never had so much free time in my life," Klugman said.
"All my days and all day Sunday. And with 200 spectaculars [specials], lots of them on tape, I’ll act myself silly. TV's going to have to turn to Broadway for actors, and I'm ready."
It should be interesting to see what sort of roles Jack Klugman ends up with on TV this fall. Like so many other working actors, his career has run in cycles.
He put in a couple of years in which he played nothing but mean gangsters and was usually the first actor anyone thought of when a part like that came up.
"Finally," Jack said "my agent said 'No more gangsters!' and I started playing nothing but cops. Now nobody casts me as a gangster any more. It's been years. I'd love to play a good nasty part again."
Oddly enough, despite his 400-plus TV roles, Jack has appeared in only one western, a truly fantastic record. "It was a 'Gunsmoke,'" he reminisced, "and one was enough. Can you imagine going on location in 110-degree heat, surrounded by tarantulas?"
Considering that he's now prominently identified with Broadway, Jack Klugman hasn't turned on TV the way so many other performers have done. On the contrary, he feels he's still a part of it.
"I've found more fun and more opportunity and more integrity in TV than in almost everything else I've ever done," he said. "I'm only sorry that it's almost impossible to find any of those good, juicy, controversial scripts they used to do.



Perhaps Klugman’s next significant role on Broadway was replacing Walter Matthau as Oscar Madison in The Odd Couple. This led to Garry Marshall casting him in the TV version. It carried on for several season, boosted by some cast-cutting (farewell, Garry Walberg and Larry Gelman) and being filmed in front of an audience.

Klugman still wasn’t happy. He was interviewed almost annually through the second half of the ‘70s by Marilyn Beck of the Gannett News Service. When he was starring as Quincy, he told Beck almost every year the scripts stunk and he was going to quit. The situation seems no different when he was shooting The Odd Couple. This appeared in print Nov. 24, 1974.

Two Odd Couples May Not Survive Another Season
By Marilyn Beck
Jack Klugman says he can thank The Odd Couple for a lot: “For fame and fortune but more than that for an attitude of arrogance.
“That's right," said the fellow who has carried his portrayal of Oscar Madison, lovable slob, from the Broadway and London stage to five years of video stardom. “The series has made me a very arrogant person. Its success has given me self-confidence and strength for the first time in my life. I used to be afraid to assert myself for fear of hurting someone’s feelings. Now I do what’s best for me. I’m true to myself.”
Arrogance has resulted in some dramatic changes in the life of the veteran actor. He started off the year testing newly discovered muscles of inner strength by parting from Brett Sommers, his wife of 18 years.
“She told a friend that I left because ‘he wanted his freedom — whatever that means.’ And that about sums it up. There was no one else involved. It was just well. Brett’s a strong woman and suddenly I realized I’d be happier setting my own mood, leading a life as a loner.”
He credits Brett with having taught him tremendous lessons about life and acting, and said, “I don’t really know what happened to us. I do know I owe her a lot. But I've got to do what makes me happy now. And I’m much happier living by myself at our Malibu Beach condominium.”
As he moved deeper into discussion of his marital situation, it turned out that Brett had actually been the first one to move out. “She had always warned me that if we ever split, she didn't want the children. So she left me with the house and kids. But I knew she wouldn’t be happy without them, and she wasn't. She came back, and I left.”
The bonds that tied the Klugmans together for nearly two decades of matrimony are obviously still strong. He visits their sons (10-year-old Adam, and David, who is 15) often. “When I go over to the house I usually end up sitting and talking with Brett ’til 2 o’clock in the morning,” he said. “Hell I don’t even do that with my girl friends.”
He had the look of a Basset Hound awaiting a gesture of affection as he said, “You know what happens to me? I go out with a young chick and all of a sudden a voice goes off inside me. ‘Aren’t you ashamed?’ it says. ‘How do you have the guts to pull a line like this?’ So I get up and tell her I’m taking her home.
“It's like Brett is watching over my shoulder,” he complained with a self-conscious grin. “She always told me she wasn’t worried about the young, dumb women taking over with me. It was the smart, homely ones she was worried about.”
Though he expects the estrangement to continue, he said he had no plans for divorce. “Why divorce?” he asked. “Who wants to remarry? Things are fine this way — an easy relationship with Brett, the same joint checking account we always had. Except now I'm free to be me.”
A rumble of laughter accompanied the comment, “See what happens in Hollywood? There's no place else in the world where it's so easy to escape reality.”
There had been times when his family lived in Connecticut that he and Brett had almost split, he admitted. “I'd yell, ‘I’m leaving” and I’d walk. But where the hell was there to go? I’d drive around for a couple of hours, sleep in some crummy motel. And the next day I'd be back home.
“Out here you split and 20 minutes later you’re in paradise, you’re at the beach. Yeah, it does make it much easier to escape out here.”
He would never have asserted himself in such a permanent independent way, he said, if it wasn't for The Odd Couple. “Wow, how self-confidence can change you,” he said with a laugh.
He has spent 29 years developing such professional confidence and looking back recalled that the early years "were hell.”
“Like a lot of others I almost starved waiting for my break,” he said. “I sold blood for $2 a pint. Charlie Bronson and I used to live in a place that had a community kitchen— and would steal food from the icebox. It was either that or go without food for days.”
He spent decades paying his professional dues before Odd Couple stardom came along, gaining a solid theatrical reputation with a decade of summer stock work, over 400 T V guest appearances, featured roles in such films as “Goodbye Columbus” and “There Must be a Pony,” and Broadway performances that ranged from “Golden Boy” to “The Odd Couple.”
“Let me tell you,” he said. “After all that time you learn something: You know what’s best for you. And after you finally land a series— and you’re lucky enough to have a hit— you know what’s responsible for that hit. It’s the star.
“Sure it’s arrogant to say that, but it has to be said. Any hit series has more to do with the stars taking over that it has to do with producers or writers or directors.”
He noted my reaction and he asked, “You don’t understand? You think that’s a terrible thing for me to say? It is, but I’ll tell you why I have to say it: A good performer puts himself into the hands of a producer and he dies. Carroll O’Connor and Redd Foxx know what’s better for them than Norman Lear does though he produces Sanford and Son and All in the Family. Any actor knows what’s best for himself.”
I disagreed but Klugman was not to have his theory denied. It’s hard to argue with success, and he has chalked up five successful seasons as a television star. He’s convinced the responsibility for that victory can be credited strictly to him and costar Tony Randall.
“We’ve got 60 years of combined experience and training in this business,” he said. “We’re the well-oiled team that makes the show go always, throwing ad libs to one another, polishing up a script to cover weak spots.”
If he has ever done battle over the series’ direction, it has never been with Randall, he said. “How can you argue with a guy who doesn’t fight back? Me, I hold a grudge. Man, it can be personal vendetta time where I’m concerned. But Tony, he apologizes even when he’s right. You can’t get mad at someone like that.”
Because he and Randall have maintained a united front against management, “we’ve usually managed to get what we want,” Klugman assured.
“But I want you to know, whatever disagreements there have been have been ironed out before we shoot. There have never been temper tantrums on the set. When the cameras roll it’s time to be professional.”
He expects— he hopes— the Odd Couple cameras to shut down permanently the end of this season. “I want out after this year. I know, with the competition from The Waltons it would take a miracle for the show to survive. But even if it does, I want to move on. My series’ exposure has given me enough of a reputation that I’m able to say to a theater owner, ‘This is the play I want to do.’ And he’ll say, ‘O.K., do it.’ ”
And that’s exactly what Jack Klugman intends to do: Devote his time to growth on the legitimate stage.
He said he’s going to continue to do exactly what he wants to do instead of what others might decide is best for him.
After nearly 30 years of paying his professional dues, that’s what success has done for Jack Klugman.



Somers never divorced Klugman, but she played Oscar Madison’s ex in some funny episodes of The Odd Couple. It has been said that Klugman pushed to get her as a panelist on The Match Game in 1973 (he appeared on the pilot), and it turned out her banter with Charles Nelson Reilly resulted in some of the best moments on the show.

Throat surgery in 1989 didn’t stop Klugman’s career. He sounded like Jack Klugman with laryngitis. He also reunited with Randall in New York stage productions of The Odd Couple and The Sunshine Boys. He died of prostate cancer on Christmas Eve 2012. He lived to 90.

Bosko Kills Planes Dead!

The Harman-Ising team grabbed some familiar gags and situations to throw into Dumb Patrol (1931). An example: they reached back to The Great Train Robbery (1903) to have the bad guy fire his gun at the camera. To no great surprise, there’s a scene with Bosko playing a piano.

They borrowed a gag from Oswald’s Ocean Hop (1927) and Mickey Mouse’s Plane Crazy (1928) for the climax. Bosko creates a make-shift plane from a broom and a dachshund, twisting the wiener dog’s head to get the “plane” aloft (it was the body in the other shorts; there’s a switch on the gag in Bosko’s Hold Anything involving a goat, and a flower in Ain't Nature Grand, both 1930).

The bad guy gorilla shoots a cannon at Bosko’s plane (in reused animation), and the cannon ball is swallowed by the open-mouthed dog (for some reason, the plane now stays in the air without the dog’s head twirling like a propeller).

Bosko develops long spaghetti arms and fires back.



The explosion turns the enemy aircraft into dozens of mini-planes buzzing around (the gorilla conveniently disappears from the picture).



Bosko flies into the scene with an insect spray can.



Harman ends the cartoon the same way he did Crosby, Columbo and Vallee (1932)—instead of a flame, the last plane is killed by spit.



Friz Freleng and Max Maxwell receive the animation credit; Bosko and kinky-haired Honey look a little cruder in this one. The opening is imaginative with explosions behind the opening title card, reversing the black and white colours.

A-Door-ing Bugs Bunny

Riff-Raff Sam keeps pulling off door after door to get into a desert fortress where Bugs Bunny is holed up in Sahara Hare (1955). Naturally, the rabbit is responsible for the multiple doors.



Of course, Bugs adds something extra.



“I wonder if he’s stubborn enough to open all those doors?” Bugs asks himself.



Cut to a closer shot. I love the colour change to indicate the explosion.



Virgil Ross is still away from the studio playing piano, so the animators here are Ted Bonnicksen, Gerry Chiniquy and Art Davis. Irv "Wyner" Weiner painted the backgrounds.

Bay Area Benny

Jack Benny was a hit wherever he went. Despite being on radio and TV in the first half of the 1950s, he was able to get away to appear with his act in public.

One jaunt was to San Francisco, where he also recorded two radio shows that aired in the first two weeks of May 1953. One included Gisele Mackenzie, who was included in Jack’s road troupe.

Benny’s arrival in any town began with a news conference and, then, interviews with individual members of the media. Here’s how the San Francisco Examiner reported it on April 3, 1953.

Jack Benny Arrives in S. F. For Stage Stint, Guild Frolic
Jack Benny arrived in San Francisco yesterday to make arrangements for his appearance at the nineteenth annual Newspaper Guild Frolic and the premier of his "Variety Review" at the Curran Theater.
The fast joking comedian and his new all-star variety show will headline the entertainment at the Newspaper Guild Frolic, to be held at the Curran on Monday night, April 20.
Benny's show will open its regular three week run at the theater the following night.
Before leaving the Southern Pacific's Lark for the Fairmont Hotel yesterday, Benny said he was looking forward to appearing in his stage show. It will be his first theater appearance here in eighteen years.
"I enjoy radio and television but I like the stage best," he said. Asked about the new three dimensional movies, he replied:
"I look bad enough on one-D; why should I try three-D?"
Benny, who makes capital of the fact that he watches the pennies closely, shouldered a bag of golf clubs and picked up his own suitcases.
"This isn't to save a tip," he explained. "I just need the exercise."
He brought the golf clubs to his daughter, Joan, 18, a student at Stanford.
"It would have cost at least $1.25 to ship them," he said.
A little later he scooted into Macy's department store where the theme of their eighth annual pre-Easter flower show is emblazoned "Great Musical Moments." Undaunted by the background of $50,000 worth of floral artistry, Benny whipped out one of his violins to give a few pointers on music.
Benny will record two shows for CBS while here. He will be guest of honor tonight at the weekly Gang Dinner of the Press and Union League Club.
Tickets for the Newspaper Guild Frolic are available at the Crane box office, 245 Powell Street. Mail orders for the regular run of the "Variety Review" are being accepted at the Curran Theater.

To give you an idea of the acts that appeared, let’s see what the city’s other paper, the San Francisco Chronicle had to say. This is from April 23, 1953.

Casual Benny Banter Ranks With Kaye Wit
By WILLIAM HOGAN
AS AN OCCASION MEMBER of the “vast radio audience,” I have been able to take the Jack Benny show or leave it alone these many years, of a Sunday evening. But I intend to tune in regularly for now on to find if Benny comes across on the air, or on television, the way he did Tuesday night at the intimate Curran Theater.
Benny is the deftest, subtlest, most accomplished comedian to turn up here at lease [sic] since Danny Kaye. The Variety Revue that surrounds him is crisply paced, the best yet in this upper-crust vaudeville format that has come our way regularly since the Judy Garland show a year or so back.
What makes Benny run? For one thing, it is timing—wonderful timing, and a superb indifference to what’s going on around him. Even when some of his gags are tired.
Benny can simply stand on stage with a bored look, light a cigar, gaze out at the audience (as if he hated it) and draw a roar. He puts on a pair of glasses, explains he doesn’t need them—just uses them for seeing. And somehow breaks up the paying customers. “Cheaper than buying a dog,” he explains, topping himself.
Benny survives a ridiculous interruption in his patter—a corny girl trio—and draws on his timing to exploit the interruption for enormous fun. Few comedians can do so much with so little.

LIKE DANNY KAYE’S, Benny’s comedy style (a very different one) defies analysis. Some of it stems from his radio background; some from his basic training in vaudeville years before. When he appears, an audience is ready to accept him as a character. Yet, at the Curran on Tuesday, few were prepared to find Benny’s casual air something close to a unique comic art—at least comedy technique ground like the Mt. Palomar lens.
Actually, there is little substance to Benny’s hour on stage. He attempts to play his violin; nobody is interested. He talks about people he works with on the radio, his Hollywood neighbors. He discusses his radio props, the Maxwell (now a Chevrolet, he explains; he took it to a Danish mechanic).
He introduces Zeke Benny’s Beverly Hillbilly band in a neatly-staged bit in which he finally does play the fiddle (“You Are My Sunshine”). And that’s about it. Yet the audience, as a result of Benny’s suave, likeable banter (thoroughly clean, incidentally), finds itself having a wonderful time.
The ending of the act is strictly from radio, but ingenious. Benny plays his violin in front of a spotlight. From a soundtrack, his voice give[s] his impression of the evening and the audience.
He’s on just long enough to make an audience want to drop into the Curran again.
AS BENNY SAYS, he may not be good himself, but he can sure pick the winners. The variety show that precedes him is an example of what he means.
The show stopper is Sammy Davis Jr., junior member of the Will Mastin Trio. Davis is on his way to becoming THE great Negro entertainer of our day, a Bill Robinson plus a sharp, imaginative comedy style. His impersonations of Lanza, Laine, Jerry Lewis, Johnnie Ray and others brought down the house. Davis’ dancing is skilled and polished—picked up, he explains, from his partners, his father and uncle.
Giselle Mackenzie [sic], TV and recording personality, brings a specialized, vigorous singing style to the show. She’s another performer who interrupts Benny later on in the proceedings. Other acts, all top-bracket variety turns, include Frakson, a magician; The Martells & Mignon, dancers; The Carsony Brothers, a breathtaking acrobatic act. They set the pace, wind up the audience for the headliner—and Benny comes through, as advertised.
THE MUSICAL DIRECTION by Mahlon Merrick and staging by Macklin Megley—probably best in the business of pacing and designing variety shows—insure the evening of becoming strictly big time. The Jack Benny Variety Review is everyone’s dish—and don’t forget the youngsters.

The trip was a financial success for Benny. The Examiner reported he took in $131,300 over the three weeks, with the profits rising every week. Lou Lurie, who owned the Curran, said Benny could have filled the theatre for another three weeks, but he had a TV show to do, and Phil Silvers had already been booked.

Hens, A Witch and Fertilizer

What’s that, you say? I haven’t written about June Foray for a while?

Yes, you’re right.

If you’re akin to me, whenever you hear her voice, happiness and maybe even excitement pours over you, and you exclaim “It’s June Foray!” A simple pleasure in life, it is, but a pleasure nonetheless. I’ve always liked her work.

I unexpectedly caught her on a broadcast of the Henry Morgan variety show on ABC which emanated from the West Coast (Morgan was based in New York). She wasn’t credited, but you can’t miss June Foray.

Here’s an article on her we haven’t passed along before. It’s from the July 9, 1959 edition of the Valley Times. This is around the time Jay Ward was plying her with martinis to convince her to be part of the cast of a cartoon series in the works about a moose and squirrel. It sums up much of her career to date, though it skips past her work on radio with Steve Allen and on television with Johnny Carson, before both of them became huge TV stars.

PET FANCIER
Tiny Actress In Big Voice Roles
By DAVE HOLLAND
The radio script called for several men’s voices and several women’s voices, so the producer called for several men but only one woman.
She was June Foray of Woodland Hills, an unusually talented actress who easily can produce the voices for any age-any type female any age-any character for which the script might call.
As an example of her artistry, Miss Foray once conducted a three-minute conversation with herself on radio and did such an able job that the listeners never even suspected that they weren’t listening to two women.
It's rather incongruous to imagine a big, screeching voice of a hideous old witch coming from a woman as tiny as Miss Foray, who, if she emerged soaking wet from her new swimming pool, wouldn’t weigh 100 pounds.
Yet, she can accurately mimic sounds ranging from sultry Tahitian beauties to friendly cats, such as she’s doing now, furnishing the voice for “Clementine, the talking cat,” in Jerry Lewis’s new Paramount picture, "Visit to a Small Planet."
Through another of her movie accomplishments, Miss Foray has endeared herself to movie-goers with her portrayal of “Granny” in the Warner Brothers cartoon series, “Tweety.”
Dabbles In Paint
Miss Foray loves to dabble with oil paints in doing portraits and with house paints as she and her writer-husband, Hobart Donovan, portray do-it-yourselfers around their new Woodland Hills home. She began her professional career as a child radio actress in her home town of Springfield, Mass.
Coming to Hollywood, Miss Foray met Donovan, whom she married in 1955 when he was producer-writer-director of the popular NBC “Smilin’ Ed McConnell” radio show in 1945.
Then followed weekly live performances for seven years with the Smilin’ Ed show, during which time Miss Foray did all the female parts, sharing the microphone with Hans Conreid [sic], William Conrad, John Dehner and Marvin Miller, among others.
Five-Year Contract
Signing a five-year contract with Capitol records, lending her talents to those of Mel Blanc, Stan Freberg, Daws Butler, and Pinto Colvig, the voice for "Goofy, Miss Foray continued her interesting career which includes appearances on the radio programs of Bob Hope, Jimmy Durante and the late Fanny Brice.
It was during her stay with Capitol that she did all the female voices on Stan Freberg’s recording of “St. George and the Dragonette.”
Miss Foray’s talents constantly are in demand for radio and TV commercials and she has worked for the Disney Studios in such features as “Cinderella,” in which she portrayed “Lucifer, the Cat,” and in “Peter Pan,” doing the parts of the old Indian squaw and two of the three mermaids.
Owns Pets
Since she does so many impersonations of cats and dogs in her work, it’s only natural that she owns a cat and two dogs.
“Our cat is a very independent ‘Thomas’ named Henry,” Miss Foray said. “One of the dogs is a dachshund named Katrina, and the other is a great big champion mongrel named Mulligan. We call him Mulligan because he’s such a delightful mixture. My husband and I just love him.”
And the public just loves Miss Foray, because she’s such a delightful mixture of the voices it knows so well.

A very brief look at some newspaper stories for 1959 reveals Foray voiced a mouse in a Shirley Temple Storybook episode, voiced Adam Cain on 77 Sunset Strip, provided voices for some Red Cross public service announcements, and looped dialogue for a heroine with the wrong accent on Rawhide (at $150 for two hours). There were several voices for Bar-Sep Productions’ The Sun Sets in Hell. June was part of the English-language dubbing team for the Russian animated feature The Snow Queen.

She found time to appear on You Asked For It and on the local L.A. TV Red Rowe Show. Oh, and she was also involved with the Hollywood Chapter of AFTRA.

Then there were commercials. Let’s find out about one campaign from The Hollywood Reporter of Jan. 29, 1959. The column on the right is from Broadcasting magazine, May 18, 1959.

ON THE AIR
by HANK GRANT
IT ISN’T THE PRINCIPLE—IT’S THE MONEY OF THE THING . . . There’s been plenty of amused comment re that anonymous, sultry-sexy voice on radio’s Bandini fertilizer commercials . . . But this doesn’t bother June Foray (yep, it’s she) who’s even more amused at actors who “snobbishly” turn down blurb offers . . . Actually, June has turned down straight thesping roles, rather than lose a blurb commitment . . . Reason? . . . “Money!” says the petite 95-pounder, “And when acting ceases to be a business, I’ll get out of it! I rarely make less than four figures for a filmed TV commercial, just a couple of hundred for three days week on a drama . . . And yet some actors I know, many of them momentarily strapped, actually instruct their agents never to submit them for commercial jobs!”
June points to Stan Freberg, Mel Blanc and Gloria Wood as three examples of performers who’ve gained, rather than lost, dignity from their blurb chores . . . “All of us can spot the ‘actor’ who’s grudgingly accepted a blurb job. His condescending air is bad enough but his deaf ear is too much—this on a one-minute commercial that many times costs as much as a half-hour film! . . . As for ‘name’ stars who fear loss of prestige, what the difference between a printed endorsement with their picture in a magazine ad and a spoken product-push on air?” . . . Parting June Jab: “For my first radio commercial, I got five dollars and all the cod liver oil I could drink—Now I can buy my own cod liver oil and even pick up the tab for the boys in the back room!”

What about Warner Bros. cartoons released in 1959 (remember, voice sessions could have been done a year earlier)?


Apes of Wrath, directed by Friz Freleng


Really Scent, directed by Abe Levitow


A Broken Leghorn, directed by Bob McKimson


A Witch's Tangled Hare, directed by Abe Levitow


Unnatural History, directed by Abe Levitow


Tweet Dreams, directed by Friz Freleng


People Are Bunny, directed by Bob McKimson

Oh, yes, we referred to a moose and squirrel cartoon show that debuted in 1959. Here’s an all-too-short interview where June talks about it.

The Greatest Cartoons of All Time

You’ve seen all kinds of lists of the best cartoons of all time.

They’re all bunk. What do people like Jerry Beck know? He’s written, what, maybe one or two books? Anyone can write books. Type one word and then the next. Big deal.

It behooves (look it up) us to present to you the REAL top five cartoon series of all time. Every single one of them puts the “Golden” in “Golden Age.” Drum roll, please, professor.


5. LITTLE AUDREY
Fish, mammy housekeepers, truant officers, she loves them all. Her mixed chorus theme songsters remind us she says “Save for a rainy day.” You’ve heard her say that in many a cartoon.
Then there’s her cheering, cheerful laughter. We can’t hear it enough. Don’t worry, Little Audrey. We’re laughing WITH you, not at you.


4. COOL CAT
You know when you see a swirling line and hear Bill Lava’s lush score to open a cartoon instead of concentric circles, you’re in for top-quality entertainment. Pink Panther? A pale imitation of Cool Cat. Pink didn’t have that groovy ‘60s far-out-ness.
Larry Storch forgot he voiced the character? A minor slip.


3. DAFFY AND SPEEDY
A perfect pairing, far superior to Laurel and Hardy, Felix and Oscar, Gilligan and the Skipper. Lightweights, all. Everyone knows ducks chase mice, especially gringo ducks.
That old “Woo-hoo”-ing Daffy? Unfunny and old hat. Better make that “old sombrero.” This is a Daffy for today’s generation, not Bob Clampett’s (and what did he do after Warner Bros., anyways?).
The only thing that could improve this beloved twosome is if they were directed by Tom Palmer.


2. THE BEARY FAMILY
Who could tire of the screamingly-amusing antics of Charlie Beary? Fixing something himself to save money? No one’s ever done that in a comedy. Mother-in-law coming over? Fresh and unique entertainment.
Add the superior directorial touches of Paul J. Smith, and full, symphonic orchestrations of Walter Greene, and you have non-stop hilarity. We’re talking “Laffs” with two “f”s.

Before we get to Number One, let’s give you our Honorable Mentions:


BUDDY
What was Leon Schlesinger thinking, replacing this charmer with a stuttering pig and a smarty-pants wabbit? What does someone wearing a carnation know about screen comedy? Nothing, that’s what. Saying “That’s all, folks” to this series shows Schlesinger is no buddy to us all.


HAM AND HATTIE
UPA was known the world over for their giggle-fests. This series featured characters that were, well, I’m not quite sure what they were doing. But they were loveable and cuddly. UPA cartoons are worshipped for their painstakingly-crafted, rollicking, slapstick comedy.


AMOS ‘N’ ANDY
Van Beuren’s well-drawn, sensitive portrayal of two white guys as African-Americans has won over fans of ethnic humour for generations. You won’t be “regusted” watching this series, which unfortunately ended after its stars checked and double-checked this fine-grained artwork, got into a Fresh-Air Taxi Cab and quit.

And now, the Greatest of All Time:


1. LUNO
Terrytoons had a challenge, trying to overcome such unpopular “Woolworth” series as Mighty Mouse and Heckle and Jeckle. The retired Paul Terry, counting his money while living in an exclusive gentlemen’s club in New Rochelle, must have been overjoyed with this crowning glory to his studio’s reputation.
Luno features the thrilling adventures of a flying horse, an original idea if ever there was one. Yes, Casper had a flying horse but that was a GHOST horse. This is different.
The studio wisely did not restrict these oft-mistaken-for-Disney cartoons to television alone. They were made available to eager theatre owners for the world to see. Their witty writing alone would make the denizens of the Algonquin Round Table (look it up) lower their collective heads in crimson-faced shame.

Oh, one other thing.

APRIL FOOL!!

Actually, we do have one other thing.

Not everyone reading this blog enjoys exactly the same cartoons or any other kind of entertainment. Yet some people go ballistic if someone dislikes (or make fun of) something they really like. Oh, they’re killing a childhood! One that ended years ago.

Here’s the deal. Watch cartoons you like. Don’t waste time getting worked up if someone disagrees. They’re just cartoons. There are more important things in life that should concern you. You’ll be healthier and happier.

And Luno still sucks.