ThadBlog

Yes even more of that mouse most of you guys love to hate!

Milton Knight broke down the dark Famous Studios classic, “Cheese Burglar” by animators for me last month, and I’ll admit, if I knew a better looking print was available, I’d have used it.

But now there is one around! Bob Jaques included it on a compilation he sent me and I’m pleased to share a decent looking copy of this one with you. There was a good splice in it, so I had to replace it with footage from the older copy. See the difference for yourself! (Note: I did ‘fake restore’ the titles because they were quite splicey… But they are the real deal as far as copyrights go!)

It’s not often I see a cartoon from the Golden Age that I’ve never seen before, so when I do, it’s usually something to get excited about.

Back in junior high, I was on a Herman & Katnip kick for some ungodly reason. I made it my mission to see every single one of those cartoons that was listed to star either one of them. I thought I achieved my goal. I thought wrong.

Andrea Ippoliti has been teasing cartoon fans for quite some time with pictures from various rare cartoons at his very cool blog. The one that intrigued me the most was a post on the cartoon “Saved by the Bell” (NO NOT THAT DAMN TV SHOW)… Which to my surprise featured “Cousin Hoi’man”!

Bob Jaques was nice enough to send me this short, along with a whole pile of great looking Noveltoons (including “Cheese Burglar”, which I may post later). Is it a great short? Nope. But I hadn’t seen it before. And if Thad K hasn’t seen one of these comical color funny animal type pictures he reveres so much… That is saying something!

It wasn’t often in the Golden Age of animation for a single animator to do an entire short by himself. Warners and MGM usually had about four to five animators (not to mention assistant animators and inbetweeners) on a single cartoon, while sometimes at Lantz during the 1940s they could have up to seven or eight! And if the animator drafts are anything to go by, Disney in the early 40s could have as many as twenty-seven animators working on one cartoon short!

Disney’s high maintenance on their earlier shorts means that recognizing an animator’s individual style, particularly ones who had it like Ken Muse or Emery Hawkins, is very hard.

This is why the rarity of a single-animator cartoon at one of the major studios is a God-send. You can learn a lot about how the animator uses the different principles of animation knowing that you are watching a continuous flow of their work. (I am thinking of putting together a few showreels/music videos of single animators in the future.)

Lantz would often have only two animators working on their cartoons in the mid-1950s to mid-1960s, but I believe there was only one time they ever did a single animator short. It’s “Drooler’s Delight” (1949), which is coincidentally the last cartoon to be produced with Lantz’s higher budgets before he had to close down to refinance his studio.

Ed Love animated this entire short by himself. He draws Woody with a slicked-up top comb and very angular. He is not afraid to take advantage of the medium and cartoon physics at any given moment. There is a lot of arm and neck stretching in this short (one of the gags was lifted from The Reckless Driver)

See if you can recognize this unsung animator’s work in the other great Dick Lundy shorts of the late 40s! This short also has one of my very favorite cartoon scores by Darrell ‘Boogie Woogie’ Calker!

I collaborated with Mark Mayerson to identify a few of the animators on Dick Lundy’s Woody Woodpecker short Wacky-Bye Baby. There is some great Ed Love, Fred Moore, and Pat Matthews animation in that one!

Speaking of Moore, this scene from “The Mad Hatter” (1948) seems to be animated by him. If it is, this is the only time we saw a “Moore girl” in a Lantz cartoon!

By the way, Electric Tiki just released the color model for their Andy Panda maquette, based on Moore’s model of the character. I love it! The Woody Woodpecker maquettes are available for pre-order now too. I’ve got the two pictured above reserved already.

Here is an example of the great acting Frank Tashlin was able to put into his films. This scene is from “The Stupid Cupid”, animated by Izzy Ellis and Art Davis, two of the best to ever work at Warners.

Lots of people (myself included) feel that Tashlin was just as exaggerated in his animation as Bob Clampett was. It’s just the differences between their approaches. Tashlin was more sophisticated about it, whereas Clampett had a more high school type of humor. Both are excellent at it though.

This clip is a great example of Tashlin’s exaggeration. Look at how Daffy approaches Elmer, curving his whole long-necked body around him in order to lash out as ferociously as possible.

I don’t think any of Tashlin’s animators could have pulled this off besides Ellis, and particularly Davis. Here’s hoping that these unsung animators gets some recognition in the near future.

I know! It’s about time a Tex Avery MGM breakdown showed up! Mike Kazaleh was nice enough to break down one for me… And incidentally, it was one of the ones I really hoped he would!

Mike also pointed out a new favorite of mine with this breakdown, Grant Simmons… Simmons did a lot of the craziest animation in this era of Avery, and is the one who drew Spike gap-toothed… I absolutely love that and laugh just seeing it! Simmons is definitley an unsung great.

- Spike and Droopy sit at table, and Spike crosses out Droopy with pen : Walter Clinton

- Spike smokes, then shows his many good qualities : Michael Lah

- Spike runs back to table and grabs Droopy : Clinton

- Spike kicks Droopy out the door : Grant Simmons

- Spike runs up to table, faints, looks out window : Robert “Bobe” Cannon

- Droopy dusts himself off : Clinton

- Spike becomes skunk : Cannon

- Spike runs up to Droopy, drags him back to mansion, Droopy is happy : Clinton

- Droopy walks up to a chair, Spike gives him a cigar, turns on the gas, then runs out : Cannon

- Droopy can’t get lighter to work : Clinton

- Spike is incredulous, runs in, grabs lighter, blows up : Cannon

- Pin the tail on the donkey : Clinton

- Spike as a photographer, chops down tree : Lah

- Spike makes a swimming pool, Spike ties a gun to lavatory door : Simmons

- Spike tries to shoot Droopy : Cannon

- Spike puts foam on Droopy, dials the phone, gets netted and thrown into van: Clinton

- “You know what? They think he’s a mad dog… And he is too!” : Simmons