Introduction
How did animation start at Warner Brothers, and what factors led to its evolution over the ensuing years? It’s a long story. A story that begins with Walt Disney, albeit indirectly.
Charles Mintz, a cartoon producer, was working with Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks on the Alice Comedies from 1924 to 1927 at Walt Disney Studios. Mintz was unhappy with the production costs to make these shorts, as the Alice Comedies were expensive to produce, due to the live-action elements in these cartoons.
In 1927, he told the pair to create a new character and to only use animation. That character was “Oswald the Lucky Rabbit”. After Oswald was created, Mintz signed a contract with Universal on March 4, 1927, one that would guarantee twenty-six Oswald the Lucky Rabbit cartoons. These cartoons were the first animation shorts distributed by Universal Pictures.
In 1928, when the character proved to be more popular than Mintz had anticipated, he decided to start his animation studio, and since he had the contract with Universal, he took away the character that Disney and Iwerks had created.
Universal
From 1927 to 1929, Mintz produced Oswald cartoons for Universal. The leaders of Mintz’s animation department were Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising, both of whom despised Mintz for his tyrannical ways. Harmon and Ising went to the top of Universal’s food chain and told Carl Laemmle that he should get rid of Mintz, allowing them to fully take over on Oswald.
While Laemmle did get rid of Mintz, he also got rid of Harman and Ising as well. Laemmle would later hire Walter Lantz (later of Woody Woodpecker fame) to produce the new series of Oswald shorts on the Universal lot.
As fate would have it, Warner Brothers had decided around this time that they too wanted to have an animation department; specifically one that could go up against Walt Disney’s Silly Symphony and Mickey Mouse cartoons.
The main reason for this was that Warner had bought Brunswick Records – along with four other music publishers – for $28 million (equivalent to $429 million in 2020), and they wanted to use the cartoons so they could promote this material for the sales of sheet music and 78 RPM records.
Bosko and Looney Tunes
Jack Warner hired Leon Schlesinger to produce cartoons for Warner Brothers. Schlesinger brought on Harman and Ising to run his animation department after seeing their independently produced cartoon, Bosko, the Talk-Ink Kid.
This short was never released theatrically, and as part of the deal, Harman and Ising kept the rights to the character to avoid getting screwed over – much the way Disney was getting it in the Oswald debacle. Unlike Mickey, who was a mouse, or Oswald, who was a rabbit, “Bosko” was a stereotypical blackface character. Like Mickey, Bosko had a girlfriend named “Honey” and a dog named “Bruno.” Bosko’s catchphrase was:
“Mmmm! Dat sho’ is fine!”
Eventually, Harman and Ising dropped these stereotypical characterizations, and the next year would see the first release under the Looney Tunes label: Sinking in the Bathtub, which featured Bosko.
Merrie Melodies
Soon after, the Merrie Melodies line of cartoons was introduced. The difference between Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies was the latter used hit songs from the Warner Brothers catalog, especially those featured in their movies. Many of the shorts featured Abe Lyman’s orchestra, who was one of the most famous bandleaders of his day.
In 1931, Harman and Ising introduced a character named “Foxy” for Merrie Melodies. Foxy was a completely derivative take on Mickey Mouse. The other early star of the Merrie Melodies shorts was a dog named “Goopy Geer” who played the piano.
Comics historian Don Markstein remarks about Foxy stating:
“Never in animation, before or since, has a character looked more like Mickey Mouse. Smooth out the tiny points that supposedly turned his big, round ears into fox ears, shave the bushiness off of his tail, and they were ringers. Do the same to his girlfriend (unnamed at the time), and she looked exactly like Minnie [Mouse]. They also acted like Mickey and Minnie did at the time. Despite this lack of originality, Foxy was the first character to originate at Warner (as opposed to being brought in from outside, like Bosko).”
Both Foxy and Goopy only appeared in three short features each. Foxy was discontinued when Ising got a call from his old boss, Walt Disney, telling him not to use the character, and that it was a blatant copy of Mickey Mouse. Ising created a pig character named, of course, “Piggy,” to replace Foxy. Piggy would appear in only two cartoon shorts.
Unlike Foxy, Piggy and Goopy stopped being used in 1933, when Harman and Ising left Leon Schlesinger for greener pastures at MGM, taking their characters with them. Only Bosko would appear at their new home.
Replacements
With all of his star characters and animators gone, Schlesinger needed replacements before his contract with Warner Brothers became imperiled. He would lure several animators from Disney, including Earl Duvall and Tom Palmer.
Schlesinger told the animators to create a star character for the studio. Soon “Buddy” was born. His first animated short was Buddy’s Day Out released on September 9, 1933. Buddy was a white version of Bosko. He had a flapper girlfriend, “Cookie,” and a baby brother, “Elmer.” Between 1933 and 1935, he appeared in 23 animated shorts.
In 1934, Freleng took over the Merrie Melodies series, and King was in charge of Looney Tunes. They were directed by Schlesinger to develop new characters for both series. They would first appear in I Haven’t Got A Hat, released in 1935. Buddy, deemed a flop, was pushed aside for new characters, including “Beans the Cat,” “Oliver Owl” and “Porky Pig.”
During this period the Merrie Melody cartoons were shown in color and the Looney Tunes series were still running in black and white. The members of this cast were moved from Merrie Melodies to Looney Tunes at this point. Beans was supposed to be the star of the show, but it was Porky Pig that audiences gravitated to.
This became apparent in the second cartoon to feature both characters, which also happened to be the first directed by Tex Avery, Gold Diggers of ’49. By 1936, Porky was the only one of these characters still in use.
I Love to Singa
Music sales were a key driving force of these cartoons. A prime example of this was the animated short I Love to Singa (1936), directed by Tex Avery. The song “I Love to Singa” was used 3 times in the movie The Singing Kid, starring Al Jolson, released earlier that year. This short sees a young owl named “Owl Jolsen” who is supposed to sing opera but wants to sing jazz. It’s a bonafide classic short.
“I Love to Singa may be one of the most instantly endearing cartoons Warner Bros. ever created. The story combines two themes that are as popular then as they are now — a child breaking away from his parents and contesting chasing the ‘rags-to-riches’ promise of amateur shows.”
– Daniel Goldmark
The following year brought another popular character to the pantheon of Warner Brothers animation – Daffy Duck. His first appearance was in Porky’s Duck Hunt, where he was the foil for the titular character. Daffy Duck was instantaneously popular with audiences and they responded to his unrestrained and zany actions. Beans the Cat was soon dropped.
Porky Pig and Daffy Duck would appear together, and separately, in 153 and 130 shorts for Warner Brothers, respectively. This was the second and third most of any Looney Tunes-affiliated characters. Bob Clampett, Daffy’s co-creator (with Tex Avery) recalled:
“At that time, audiences weren’t accustomed to seeing a cartoon character do these things. And so, when it hit the theaters it was an explosion. People would leave the theaters talking about this daffy duck.”
Mel Blanc
Both characters were voiced by the legendary Mel Blanc in this short. This was a tradition that would continue for the next fifty-two years. Blanc would reminisce years later on how he came up with Daffy’s voice:
“It seemed to me that such an extended mandible would hinder his speech, particularly on words containing an s sound. Thus ‘despicable’ became ‘desth-picable.’”
1937 also saw the first appearance of “Elmer Fudd” who was named “Egghead” in his early appearances. In 1938, a prototype character for Bugs Bunny, named “Happy Rabbit,” appeared in Porky’s Hare Hunt. Bugs’ first official appearance would occur in 1940’s A Wild Hare. Both Elmer and Bugs were redesigned by Bob Givens for this short.
Bugs Bunny would gain in popularity over the next several years and would appear in 167 cartoons for Warner Brothers. With his creation, a new age was ushered into Warner Brothers animation that would have a lasting impact during the next several decades.
“Bugs was not the creation of any one man; however, he rather represented the creative talents of perhaps five or six directors and many cartoon writers. In those days, the stories were often the work of a group who suggested various gags, bounced them around and finalized them in a joint story conference.”
– Wingate Chase Craig (artist)
Conclusion
During the Great Depression, the industry that Walt Disney forged with a mouse driving a steamboat evolved at a rapid pace. It did this in many new and exciting ways with the animation produced at Warner Brothers being just as entertaining as what came out of Disney’s studio.
