Bugs Bunny

[Ccook]

This past July marked 65 years ago when Bugs Bunny, quite possibly the most popular cartoon star of all time, made his official debut in the animated arena. Was his success as cut and dried as it would appear?

At first it was dicey. Before Leon Schlesinger's studio would father this superstar in the works, Bugs would undergo what many believe to be his gestation period which would last a good two years. A white rabbit would be the focal antagonist in Ben Hardaway and Cal Dalton's Porky's Hare Hunt (1938), and while this rabbit was a wiseacre, he was completely irrational. Daffy Duck, who had been created a year before, was irrational, but his was a root cause: a stop-gap defense against the hunters who would shoot him for game ("I'm not crazy," Daffy would tell us, "I just don't give a darn!"). This rabbit was a basket case for the sake of being a basket case.

But for some reason this rabbit, with the Mortimer Snerd voice, clicked. A second cartoon, Chuck Jones' Presto Change-O (1938), followed. This rabbit didn't talk; he laughed at the pranks he'd crack at the expense of two recurring dogs (a boxer and a cocker spaniel), but was still devoid of rationale. Hardaway and Dalton would color this rabbit grey in Hare-Um Scare-Um (1939) and Jones would use him again in Elmer's Candid Camera (1939). Jones would later call this rabbit "Bugs with his umbilical cord in his hand looking for a place to plug it in." Jones was dissatisfied with this cartoon, calling it slowly paced and tedious.

Enter Fred "Tex" Avery, whose brand of cartoon making for Warners not only broke the rules of the industry, he re-wrote them. He redesigned Elmer Fudd and had Bob Givens do a design for a rabbit for the film that would be called A Wild Hare (1940). Like Daffy, this unnamed rabbit would use his wiles as a stop-gap defense against predators, but unlike Daffy, this bunny would use coolness and a beguiling facade of innocence as his measures. When he first cracked his trademark phrase "What's up, doc?", it was like a sonic boom. It's as if the rabbit read the script in advance and set his plans accordingly. To wit: when he allows Elmer to take a shot at him and sets himself in front of a tree, he suddenly hears birds chirping. Looking upwards, he sees two birds on a high branch. "WHOA! HOLD IT!!" he yells, and takes a wide step to the right. Certainly something the script he read didn't anticipate, but this was typical Avery.

A Wild Hare was nominated for an Oscar, and Warners had a potential star on their hands, but he needed a name. Avery wanted Jack E. Rabbit, steering away from the fuzzy-bunny alliteration of Disney and such, but from what is known, the name "Bugs Bunny" was drawn from a hat by Leon Schlesinger's secretary. (Also suspected: When Hardaway and Dalton made the third film, the model sheet by Charles Thornton read "Bugs' bunny"--"Bugs" being Ben Hardaway's nickname). Avery didn't like someone else imposing a name on his character but he had to live with it. Chuck Jones and Friz Freleng would each do a cartoon with Bugs (Jones' Bugs had no buck teeth in Elmer's Pet Rabbit), and Avery would do The Heckling Hare. It was the last Bugs cartoon he'd do because he left the studio in protest after Warners cut the last 20 seconds of the cartoon. Avery was hired by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer where in his 15-year stint there, he'd create one character with staying power: Droopy.

Bugs, in the meantime, flourished in the hands of Jones (who counted Bugs as his favorite character of all time), Freleng, Bob Clampett, Bob McKimson, and more. He was as lovable as he was irascible, first not anticipating trouble from troublemakers, but once engaged had the time of his life giving his antagonists the works. Bugs would win the Oscar for Outstanding Animated Short Subject in 1959 for the cartoon Knighty Knight Bugs.

Bugs would see tremendous success on TV, with his WW2-era cartoons screened in syndication and later films on network television; he was a Saturday morning staple from 1962 to 1999.

It is to Warners' credit that Bugs was left out of the low-budget cartoons made by DePatie-Freleng from 1964-67 and the re-opened Warners studio from 1967-69. But Bugs didn't lay low; he'd pop up in TV specials, give advice of home safety, and he even tried to help the Trix rabbit get some Trix cereal! Bugs has transcended icon status and is one of those cartoon stars that we actually believe really exists.

[Lutheran]

I didn't know it was in July, I thought it was in June. The reason for this is that every June Boomerrang will run "June Bugs" which is every single episode of Bugs Bunny.

In my opinion, Bugs is the best cartoon ever created.

[Ccook]

I'll drink to that. Disney may have known how to animate 'em, but Warners knew how to make 'em funny.

[Wren]

I have always loved Bugs Bunny, and his character always made me laugh.
Thanks for sharing this, Ccook. :)

[Ccook]

Additional info: One other Bugs Bunny cartoon was nominated for an Oscar--1941's Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt.

[Wren]

On the topic of Bugs Bunny, does anyone remember a segment from the Bugs Bunny/Tweety (or Road Runner) Show where Bugs is singing, "I dream of Jeannie, she's a light brown hare."? :lolhard:

[Ccook]

He sang that in Apes Of Wrath (1958) just before the drunk stork conked him on the noggin and used him as a substitite of a runaway baby ape.

Bugs cracked the line as well masquerading as a genie in 1956's Ali Baba Bunny. ("Me, genie...the light brown hare!" The fact that he was actually grey seemed to be anachronistic but was rendered irrelevent by Hassan's acceptance of him as a real genie.)

[Joshua]

I am absolutely obsess with Bugs Bunny ever since I grew up, I've been watching it during the morning with my father when I was younger. My whole family loves Bugs Bunny. I guess it runs in the family. 0:) During the summer every year, I go to my aunt's house, and all my relatives are there to watch some classic old bugs bunny cartoons from the 80's. :D

-Joshua

[Wren]

Not sure if it was the Bugs Bunny Show or the Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Hour, but there was always a phrase used..."Starring that oscar winning rabbit, BUGS BUNNY!!!"
Did he really win an oscar, or was this just a catch phrase of sorts?
:giggle:

[Ccook]

Bugs did indeed win an Oscar. The 1958 cartoon Knighty Knight Bugs was the winner. (Bugs is sent to fetch the Singing Sword from Sam the Black Knight and his sneezing idiot dragon).

The byline "the Oscar-winning rabbit" was first used on The Bugs Bunny Show in 1960, and it was carried over into The Bugs Bunny-Road Runner Hour in 1968 throughout its run (up to 1984, where the show's titles and themes were changed).

[Wren]

Thanks for the reply and info, Ccook! :)
I remember that annoying sneezing dragon, too! :giggle:

[Ccook]

You're welcome, Wren! :) The dragon, incidentally, was thought to have been unofficially named Gerry as that was what the model sheet had written on it, but I think that as the model was done by Gerry Chiniquy (an animator under Friz Freleng), the dragon was pretty much unnamed.

[Lutheran]

I was watching Bugs the other day on one of my movie channels. It had a compliation of some of the greats.

[Lutheran]

I noticed that Bugs isn't on Boomerang anymore. And they didn't do "June Bugs." :(

[Wren]

Awww...sorry to hear that, Lutheran. :(
What is "June Bugs?"