ASK SUE-BELINDA
WHEN I was much younger, my grandfather gave me a “book of days”. It was a large book, made of cheap paper, but filled with the most wonderful twaddle recording what happened on what days.
Seeking a little inspiration for a column for this day, I leafed through and discovered that among many interesting and very important events, this was the day, in 1940, on which a cartoon character created by Tex Avery and Bob Givens debuted. It was a character called “Wild Hare”. Does it ring a bell?
What if I were to tell you that Wild Hare was created to be part of the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies stable? No? Still nothing?
What if I told you that after a few weeks and some redesigning they changed the name to Bugs Bunny? (The redesigning was done by Ben Hardaway, whose nickname was “Bugs”. People referred to the redesigned drawings as Bugs’s Bunny and the name stuck!)
Now you’ve got it!
Bugs was part of Leon Schlesinger’s great pantheon of cartoon characters. He was so successful that by 1942 his studio had transcended the Walt Disney studio as the most prolific and successful maker of animated short features (“shorts”).
The Warner Brothers – Harry, Sam, Albert and Jack – arrived in Canada in 1895, two years after their father had arrived to pave the way for them. In 1913 they began producing their own films and in 1917 elected to move to the warmer, drier Hollywood, California, USA where outside shots were generally always possible. By 1923 they established Warner Brothers Pictures Inc.
In 1944 Warner Brothers, having worked in partnership since the 1930s, purchased the very successful Schlesinger Studio outright and renamed it Warner Bros. Cartoons, but the new division did not enjoy much of a profile. Indeed, Jack Warner knew so little of their cartoon business that he mistakenly thought Mickey Mouse was a product of their studios when, as we know, he was the brainchild of Walt Disney himself. By 1979, Warner Brothers had realised what a gold mine Bugs and his fellow animated friends were and reestablished an animation-specific division named simply Warner Bros. Animation. Bugs Bunny would go on to become the official mascot of Warner Brothers.
Bugs might not ever have been created were it not for planning pressure. In 1938 the Brothers sent word they wanted a cartoon ready for screening “ASAP”. In 1938 the cartoon studio had produced “Porky’s Duck Hunt” – Porky Pig had debuted in 1935 – and this feature introduced the world to the rascally black duck Daffy. Pressed for time and low on ideas, someone suggested they “dress the duck in a rabbit suit” and the movie “Porky’s Hare Hunt” resulted.
Bugs’s creators Avery and Givens wanted him to have a special quality so Mel Blanc gave him a fast but offhand manner in speaking.
The creators borrowed from the movie It Happened One Night, a romantic comedy starring Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert. In one scene, Gable leans coolly on a fence snacking on carrots and speaking quite quickly and imperturbably. Not wanting him to appear too suave or slick, they tossed in some of the comedic qualities of Groucho Marx and Charlie Chaplin and Bugs Bunny was born.
His popularity with the American people was used by the American Armed Forces during World War II, when Bugs was used to appear in some Private Snafu shorts. These shorts were training films used to educate troops about the importance of keeping secrets, using sanitation, planning for situations and more. Their use was “classified” under the War Act and even the artists who worked on the series never saw a final product.
It is known that one of these shorts was called Super-rabbit. Filmed in 1943, Bugs stars wearing the uniform of a United States Marine. As a result of this, the USMC gave him the honorary title of Private. As World War II wore on, Bugs gained promotion until retiring at war’s end as a Master Sergeant.
The Bugs Bunny theme was so much a part of American pop culture that even in Seinfeld, then the most popular series of television, the show made mention. Jerry and Eileen are standing outside a theatre when Jerry breaks into the Bugs Bunny theme song.
Blanc may well owe his life to Bugs. Mel, the voice of Bugs, was seriously injured in an accident in 1961. He slipped into a coma and doctors were unable to rouse him. One day a doctor, having tried all medical means, asked, “Bugs Bunny, how are you doing today?” As he turned to walk away, he heard Blanc reply in Bugs’s voice, “What’s up, Doc?” He made a full recovery. As the doctor later said, “I think Bugs was trying to save his life.”
Bugs Bunny was one of the first “animals” to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, being awarded his on December 10, 1985. Mickey Mouse had received his star seven years earlier. Bugs is also the first cartoon character to have appeared on a United States stamp.
So today Bugs Bunny is 80 years young and, with 175 movies to his credit, he’s one of the most successful Hollywood stars ever.