The Extras
The Extras
Looney Tunes Collector's Choice Volume 3 Blu-ray Review
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Animation historians Jerry Beck and George Feltenstein of the Warner Archive join the podcast to discuss the LOONEY TUNES COLLECTOR’S CHOICE VOL 3 Blu-ray, which released on March 10, 2024. We talk about the selection process, discuss a few key restorations, and preview some of the 25 cartoons to give you an idea of what you can expect. Cartoons discussed in detail in the podcast include "Honeymoon Hotel," "Mr. and Mrs. Is the Name," "Cinderella Meets Fella," "Pre-Hysterical Hare," "Riff Raffy Daffy," "War and Pieces," Wet Hare," "Mexican Joyride," and more. If you’re a fan of Looney Tunes or Warner Bros. Animation, this is one episode you don’t want to miss.
Note: Hare-Breadth Hurry is on LTCC Vol. 2
Support more Looney Tunes Collector's Choice releases by purchasing Volume 3 right away!
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LOONEY TUNES COLLECTOR’S CHOICE VOL 3 Blu-ray
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LOONEY TUNES COLLECTOR’S CHOICE VOL 2 Blu-ray
LOONEY TUNES COLLECTOR’S CHOICE VOL 1 Blu-ray
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Hello and welcome to the Extras. I'm Tim Millard, your host, and joining me today to talk about the Looney Tunes Collector's Choice Volume 3, which just recently came out on Blu-ray, are animation historians Jerry Beck and George Feltenstein of the Warner Archive. Well hi, george. Jerry, it's great to have you on the podcast to talk some more Looney Tunes Great to be here I echo Jerry's sentiments 100%.
Speaker 3Well hi, george. Jerry, it's great to have you on the podcast to talk some more Looney Tunes. Great to be here. I echo Jerry's sentiments 100%.
Speaker 1Well, it appears you have another hit on your hands with Looney Tunes Collector's Choice Volume 3. I mean 1 and 2 has sold terrific and from what I can see, it appears Volume 3 is selling well and is a real hit with reviewers. How did you go about selecting another 25 of these cartoons from the vaults and I watched them and they're all so fantastic.
Speaker 2Well, I'm glad you think so. They are, I'm glad you think so. I think that all of the Warner Brothers cartoons created during that golden era are great. There are obviously some that are better than others and some that are masterpieces of cinema. In my opinion, we've been doing this for a long time, george and I. That's right, and at least I mean I don't even know, george you would know how many years exactly we've been doing just the discs, part of this.
Speaker 3I mean, if you go back to the laser discs, it was uh, I think I was about six years old at the time.
Speaker 2It was about 34 years ago yeah, I mean well, in the in more current era of uh of dvd which I think started in 2003 for the looney 2003, yeah, and seven years of infighting here at the company Right, whether it should be for moms and kids or collectors.
Speaker 2Right. But all that said, we've had a great opportunity to restore the films, put out as many as we could, using, you know, our noggins and our history and our love of these films and characters to determine what cartoons we would put out. You know, george, prior to the DVD era he mentioned the LaserDiscs we put out all, I think all the cartoons that we could that Turner would allow, so to speak. Back in those days, I mean, that was like every oddball Merry Melody and all that stuff.
Speaker 2This newer era, with DVD and then Blu-ray, we've had to cherry pick a little bit because of how much we can do each time around and how much space there is on these discs and the costs of restoration and all that kind of thing. And despite the hundreds that we've put out, there are still a few that somehow we missed or somehow we couldn't get to or one reason or another. And that's really the background of the Collector's Choice series that we're doing right now to really get out all those others. And surprise, surprise, as you found, tim, the ones that we didn't even get to are great. Yeah, so many good ones.
Speaker 1You know there's no need for us to go through all 25 of these necessarily, so we'll just highlight some of them, but one of the ones that I think is a great example of what you just said is this the first color Mary Melody Short Honeymoon Hotel. I mean, it's hard to believe that that hasn't been out before, and when I watched it for how old it is it looks amazing.
Speaker 2Yeah, that's pretty surprising. Of course that was the first Warner Brothers color cartoon and you know viewers will notice that it's primarily red shades and blue shades, I think, or it might be green shades, I think, one or the other. Yeah, and that was the two color. George can talk more about that. But it's the two-color process that was available to the studios at that time and obviously they did what they could with the limited colors but they did a fantastic job. It's a quintessential 1930s-looking cartoon, you know, with bugs and that 1930s look. George, do you want to say something about Technicolor?
Speaker 3Well, I think that this is really important. One of the things that's great about Honeymoon Hotel is that it represents exactly why Looney Tunes and Merry Melodies were created. And Merry Melodies were created. They were created specifically to promote music that the Warner Brothers music publishing companies, which at that time were Remick, Harms and Whitmark they were these three huge publishing companies that Warner Brothers bought when sound came in and then, when they would write music for new films, they would be published by one of those entities and Warner Brothers was promoting its songs to make them more popular. That's why Looney Tunes and Merry Melodies were created. That's why there are cartoons called Plenty of Money and you and we're in the Money and Sitting on a Backyard Fence.
Speaker 3And, of course, Honeymoon Hotel, and then Jerry and my, I would say, penultimate favorite, possibly I Love to Singa. That was what their initial purpose was, and it wasn't until 1935 when we first saw Porky Pig, then we later saw Dabby Duck, then we later saw Egghead evolve into Elmer and Bugs Bunny evolve into really Bugs Bunny. That's when they started to build the foundation of stars, of stars. Also, and just to deal with the color issue, when the Technicolor Corporation developed three-strip Technicolor with red, green and blue. Walt Disney had a three-year exclusivity on the use of that process, which began with 1932's Flowers and Trees. So as soon as the exclusivity period was over, then Warner Brothers' merry melodies were all in three-color technicolor, while the Looney Tunes were specifically in black and white until I think mid-1942 or three I think, and there became no differentiation between the Looney Tunes and Merry Melodies. But back to these shorts, which are really quite wonderful. Jerry and I always have a great deal of fun trying to pick out what we think will be a diverse program. It's also frustrating because we wish we could be releasing 250 at a time instead of 25. But costs are high and by releasing as much as we have in less than a year, 70 cartoons, that's a lot and we're very, very grateful because the strata here was films that had not been released on DVD or Blu-ray before and presenting them in high definition.
Speaker 3Now we've been questioned or taken to task a little bit about certain cartoons which were used as bonus material, unrestored, unremastered and thrown on some of the Golden Collection DVDs. We didn't consider them to have been released because that wasn't part of our programming in creating those golden collections. Someone else decided to do that which created a great deal of confusion. There's one other cartoon which was remastered on a DVD but looked awful, and that is Riff Raffy Daffy, and I think it's important to talk about that here, riff-raffy-daffy.
Speaker 3And I think it's important to talk about that here because we came to the conclusion, in wanting to make it look great, we discovered that the original negative has been lost for close to 60 years, and that was shocking to me. We were able to trace it back and see that people were making backup elements in the mid-1960s, but there's no trace of the original negative. So we used a nitrate studio print, which was not ideal and didn't rise to our level of perfection, but it looks better than it ever has before. So we decided that it was worth moving forward, because when we were starting to work and we found out there was no original negative, we considered pulling the cartoon and we decided to use every tool at our disposal to make it look the best that it could be.
Speaker 3So people tend to agree that it looks better than it ever has, but there's this heartache for those of us that love these films that we can't find something better. I'm hoping that it's in the wrong can. It's marked, as you know, real seven of the man I love, with Ida Lupino or something you know. It's just in the wrong can someplace.
Speaker 2And people should know out there that that sort of thing has happened. Oh boy it sure has. Yeah, so it's not. It's not a crazy thought. Crazy thought that, hey, maybe it's mislabeled. That's happened and the good news is that's how films are eventually found.
Speaker 1You know, is that we find them eventually, but well, there was another one, george, that I wanted to ask you about. That was kind of like honeymoon hotel and that was the one from 1935. Mr and Mrs, is the name Right? That's kind of the one of the other, you know, maybe second oldest. That's part of this collection. It has a very similar look and feel too.
Speaker 2Well, yeah, that's another, you know, early color, maybe it's even two color cartoon. One of the big differences that one is also from the I believe the original Cameron Egg Exactly Looks particularly sharp. Interesting notes about that one is that the little boy, in particular Little Mermaid Boy, pretty much the same model of their current at that time star character, which was a character named Buddy, a little boy character and it's pretty much all the fans and I'd agree it's pretty much it's Buddy as a mermaid underwater. You know it's a weird thing to say. It's almost as if you know if they had done that with Porky Pig or something, but it does.
Speaker 2I don't know why they did that exactly, but it looks great. It's got a lot of funny things in it. There's caricatures of Harpo Marx. It's a great again, another perfect period piece from that era and in a way I'd like almost to be a signal that we haven't forgotten these cartoons. We haven't put out as much of these 30s musicals as I'd like and as I think a lot of fans would like, and we haven't forgotten them and we hope to get a chance to put out more.
The Evolution of Looney Tunes
Speaker 1Yeah, I mean that's. One of the nice things about the way you're doing these is that each one of the volumes have had shorts from various decades, so as you're watching it like I watched it back to back to back. It becomes this kind of wonderful evening of diversity. So you're not just only watching, you know ones from the thirties.
Speaker 2Well, you know it's funny, when I was putting together the the package and we looked at it from afar for a second, I didn't realize till then that that the dates on the cartoons ranged perfectly from the early early from 1934, not the beginning of Looney Tunes, but the beginning of color and the latest short on there is from 1964, exactly 30 years and it really does span that period. You really get a good feel of where they went, where they come, get a good feel of where they went, where they come. I mean, you've got everything in here, from those early musicals to the wackiness in the 40s and 50s and some really unique shorts from the 1960s. I'm personally getting a lot of good feedback for putting those on, george. Not that we wouldn't have, but we hadn't before. You know there's a lot of people who are like I don't like the 60s. There's some great stuff there and we have some great ones on here.
Speaker 3Well, and the other thing is and this is very important just because we, Jerry and I, may like a cartoon or not like a cartoon, there are some of the I really really shouldn't be calling them films, because I think that's really even more important. Sometimes people take the term cartoon as diminishing, because these are short American films of great historic significance and great entertainment. But I think one of the things is, just because Jerry or I may prefer a cartoon or not like another cartoon, what we're out to do here is give a diverse representation from the early decades to the later decades, and there are some people that prefer and I think it reflects when they grew up and how they saw them. Some people prefer the cartoons from the late 60s. Jerry and I may have other opinions of those cartoons, but the idea is to get all of them in the best possible shape and out there for people to enjoy.
Speaker 3We're trying to have a balance.
Speaker 2Yeah, and I love the idea that there are people who may prefer those later ones and are now being exposed to some of the earlier ones that they probably never would have watched or had no access to. A lot of people. I know younger people who grew up watching Bugs Bunny Roadrunner Hour. You know one of their favorite cartoons because it was run so often on that show was Wet Hair. One of the last Bugs Bunny cartoons ever. That's on this set. It's Bugs Bunny versus a logger who's cutting off water for Bugs to take a shower. Anyway, it's a strange late cartoon run many, many times and is a nostalgic memory. And it's that way because it really hasn't been seen that often since the Bugs Bunny show went off the air and we never put it on video. So I'm getting cheers for that particular film and the people who love that film have never seen things like Honeymoon Hotel and Mr and Mrs the Name, and so it's exposing people to the whole range of Looney Tunes and creating new fans because of that.
Speaker 1Yeah, I think that's one of the marvels of these three volumes is that they are the ones you haven't. For many of us that you haven't seen or been exposed to, or if you did, it was so long ago that you've forgotten them. And you know, the the gold collection brought out the ones that were the most popular, the probably the most requested, but these now are bringing out a whole different batch, which really makes them special. And I think, uh, george, from the response we got you know when the listeners called in for the 15th anniversary, you know appreciation, so many people talked about just that, about how much they're loving these volumes because of the variety.
Speaker 3Well, there's been a great frustration just between Jerry and myself that this whole incredible library of animated films created under the aegis of Warner Brothers, has been dormant in the home entertainment market for many, too many years. I'll say that the propulsion never should have stopped. I wasn't in a position to be able to do anything about that because my role was primarily in theatrical features, and then, when Warner Archive came along, we were not allowed to have access to the animation. And with the growth and success of Warner Archive it became a significant enough business within the home entertainment division that we were given a broader opportunity to open the door for Warner Brothers cartoons, and we hope to keep that door open as long as possible.
Speaker 1Jerry, I wanted to go back and ask you about something that obviously those who know their animation history a little bit more this might be a little bit more of an obvious question. History a little bit more this might be a little bit more of an obvious question, but for those who are buying these volumes who don't know the history as much, there are early appearances of Egghead and Elmer and I thought maybe you could explain, like how are those two characters one in the same or different?
Character Evolution in Looney Tunes
Speaker 2Because I thought it was fascinating to watch these.
Speaker 2Yeah, it's pretty odd. It's taken years for me to figure it out and look at things. The reality is there's two separate characters, one's named Egghead and one's called Elmer, elmer Fudd. But they share a similar look in their design. But it's not. The thing is one looks very closely, listens, listens to their voices, looks at their image. They're not exactly the same.
Speaker 2Uh, egghead was, uh was more of a tex, avery, looney character. Uh, elmer's sort of more of a I want to say a dullard. You know, he's sort of a square and that's really where the elmer Fudd that we know comes from. It's just in the early phases they had them both that way and every once in a while we've now found because so many people are as interested in this as I am we have found all kinds of merchandising letterhead where they mixed it up, where they'll have a picture of what is Egghead labeled Elmer, and they'll do vice versa. So even then there was confusion. But the reality is in the films the characters are different, have a little bit of a different personality and have a little bit of a different look to them. Elmer is really the guy in the early ones who has this collar, you know, up high, and Egghead doesn't. You know, if you look at a cartoon like Egghead Rides Again. Or you know some of those early ones, Daffy Duck and Egghead, you know he's this character with a big bulbous nose and the other and Elmer is this other character with the little top hat and a high collar, and that's really the close, quick, you know way to determine who's who in these early ones. But unfortunately they themselves, you know, almost created the confusion.
Speaker 2You know, again, in the beginning people really weren't paying attention. They didn't debut. Here's a little history lesson. I'll try to make it brief. But back in those days, back in the 30s and 40, attention, they didn't debut. Here's a little history lesson. I'll try to make it brief.
Speaker 2But back in those days, back in the 30s and 40s, they didn't pitch a cartoon to the producer and they came in with a pitch board and pictures and hey, here's what he looks like, here's what he does, he lives in this environment. They didn't do it. They do that today. That's what they've been doing for the last 40, 50 years for television and other things. But back in those days the cartoonists ran the studio. If they came up with some funny ideas, they created a character for it. If that character got laughs, they did another one and they would refine that character and refine it.
Speaker 2All of our favorite characters, especially Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, were evolved on screen. We saw them as you see, you know, as you watch them and as they came out. So that's just the way it was done then and that's why there's this confusion. Ultimately they established Elmer you know as the character. We know him as he is in A Wild Hare, the first official Bugs Bunny cartoon, and he took over and Egghead sort of faded away but but it still lingers, occasionally pops up on a show like Tiny Toons or something like that. So that's there's my history lesson for today on that.
Speaker 1Well, one of the reasons why I ask is that three on here directed by tech savory that I thought kind of fall right into that discussion. You've got egghead rides again 1937, uh, that he directed. Then you've got a feud there was, which he directed, that one's elmer. So you get it's labeled.
Speaker 2It's actually, you know. He's labeled Elmer Fudd in the cartoon, so we know that that's Elmer, right, yeah?
Speaker 1but then you've got uh, cinderella meets Fella, which is also, that's Egghead. I think it says Elmer in, does it in? Oh see.
Speaker 3I'm confused. It's really confusing because they they say Elmer and there's like a little sign I, I believe.
Speaker 2There's also the Elmer's pet rabbit is on here too. He's an established Elmer at that point.
Speaker 3But not established Bugs Bunny yeah.
Speaker 2I mean it's it's. It's confusing. I'm going to go back and look at Cinderella now.
Speaker 1Well, I mentioned the first three cause they were all directed by Tex Avery and he, so he directed old characters. And I thought first three because they were all directed by Tex Avery and so he directed both characters and I thought all three of those were really great. I mean a few. There was a great way to start off this volume. I thought it's hilarious. So well done Tex Avery, of course beloved, but I know it just led me to think OK, how are these characters a little bit different? What's the difference there?
Speaker 2So Well, just for the record, it's a random mix, literally, and I think, like the volume two, we it's just. They're in alphabetical order, which I think is fantastic, you know, because it really gives you the thirties next to a fifties, next to a forties, next to a sixties. It's, it's, its, it's just the way we used to watch them on Channel 5. You know, very random.
Speaker 1Can we talk about Cinderella meets Fela for a second? I mean the ending.
Speaker 2Okay, he says pulling out his handy-dandy reference.
Speaker 3Specifically, what about the ending was?
Speaker 2exciting. What about the ending? Is it that you wish to uh?
Speaker 1well, I mean she's. She goes from being on screen. Right, she's cinderella. Yes, then she's watching.
Speaker 2I mean it's so meta right now, all of a sudden, she's watching in a theater the short and then, and then he calls out to her, then she, she comes up on stage. I mean it's fantastic, almost like he's having a mystery science theater conversation with the screen on his head, and he put that in the films. The characters acknowledge they're on screen, that they're in cartoons, that they could come out into the audience, that they can talk to the audience. These cartoons I've said this before, probably on this show were never meant to be seen again. They were designed for theaters. They were meant to be seen at that time, in that situation, and they're interactive with the audience. They're fantastic. Can you imagine? This is why they became so big, the Warner cartoons. This is why they were so different from what Disney was doing and the other studios were doing. They played with your head and that's how they got famous, you know? Yeah, I love that.
Classic Warner Bros. Cartoons Analysis
Speaker 3I love it too. I mean, I can honestly say that every one of the cartoons in this collection and in the two collections prior I love them. I you know they vary between cute good to unbelievable genius. There's just such a variety and you really get to see the growth, the development. And I we didn't plan it this way, but going alphabetically is kind of like putting your iPhone music on shuffle you know, you just don't know what's coming next, rather than sitting through 12 cartoons with one character in a row. It's much more entertaining this way. And yet people have also the opportunity to select whatever they want to watch and the whole format seems ideal for home entertainment and that you own them with the best possible quality.
Speaker 2You know that cartoon in particular, Cinderella Meets Feller, and there are many others that do that sort of movie gag. The thing is, that's what, to me, makes them part of film history, cinema history, Warner Brothers history, cinema going history Something we might be losing these days, I don't know, but you know they were part of the golden age of Hollywood. Uh, you know, I just uh, to me makes them extra, you know, extra special.
Speaker 1Yeah, I mean I wanted to call that one out because I mean you have to. I mean I think on this set it's like such a a unique one, um, but that's just my opinion, of course. And I think, uh, hey you, you mentioned a couple others in the kind of the announcement. George, you said there were hilarious rarities with Bobo the Elephant and Quentin Quayle, so I thought maybe we should talk about that a little bit too. Those are some early ones and were those characters that are not as popular, not as popular?
Speaker 2Those. I can let George talk, if you are directing that question to George, either one.
Speaker 2You take it, Jerry, you know Warner Bros has so many great characters that are famous, Every one of them a star, Even the smaller things, the supporting players. You know whether it's Marvin Martian or you know the Tasmanian Devil, a villain only in five cartoons. Back in the Golden Age they had this great ability to create characters and, of course, occasionally they would create cartoons that the characters didn't take off. All the directors had a wonderful opportunity there. They had to do X number of Bugs Bunny's because Bugs Bunny was the star. They had to do X number of Bugs Bunnies because Bugs Bunny was the star. They had to do a few Porky Pigs, a few Daffy Ducks every year. They had a little quota system, but they also had the opportunity to do two or three, just whatever you want. Well, whatever you want, kind of things. I don't think it was even planned this way, but the whatever you want was valuable, because what happened was they would do a cartoon with some new situation, creating a new character for that situation, and then, nine times out of 10, that character, that cartoon, that situation would become now some kind of a standard thing. It would become a star character. That's how, literally, every character that we know of and love came to be, whether it's Foghorn Leghorn, Pepe Le Pew, Speedy Gonzalez, on and on and on, all came out of these little one-shots. We don't look at them that way. Oh, that's the first Pepe Le Pew cartoon. Well, the thing is it was a one-shot cartoon. People loved it.
Speaker 2The response came back make another one of those. And they made another one in two cartoons, Bobo's, a little elephant character that Robert McKimpson created and got into all kinds of little. It just thought it was a funny idea to have this little smart aleck elephant. And you know, there wasn't any great demand for the character after making two of them which were made like years apart, and so they're rarely shown. And that's the thing about those one-shot ones they're rarely shown. Now, Quentin Quayle is an oddity because, again, no reason why they couldn't couldn't have continued these characters which essentially in that one cartoon is very dated in that it's they're based on the baby Snooks you know Fanny Bryce radio show of the 1940s. Unless you watched Funny Girl, you don't know who Baby Snooks is.
Speaker 3Well, they don't even deal with Baby Snooks and Funny Girl. They do in Funny Lady, though. Oh, is that the one?
Speaker 2Yeah, I know, I know, Because I remember seeing Barbara dressed in that little baby. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the cartoon is just literally a parody of that very, very popular radio show. I remember as a kid I never understood this cartoon. Why is the character talking like that? It didn't make any sense to me whatsoever. It's Chuck Jones, which makes it great already.
Speaker 2In my opinion, the title and I'm not going to even begin to explain or even understand it is a play on a controversy or a term back in the 1940s which was kind of an adult thing. But I'm not going to get into it now because I don't know it enough to explain it. So it's a very strange cartoon, you know, but nothing's wrong with it, no reason we can't show it or play it, and it's one of those ones we just never got around to putting out. And that's again quintessential I use that term a lot, but quintessential. Perfect cartoon for this set, for the collector's choice, because it's the kind of thing we would have ignored. We did ignore and shouldn't ignore, and I'm so happy we have it restored and back now. I hope that answers your question.
Speaker 3I mean, that's really what motivates us to try to put together, you know, an elaborate smorgasbord of animation.
Speaker 2You know one thing, I'm going to bring this up. But one thing I feared on the selection we had was there was few cartoons on here that I personally I've even been public about it, george, don't worry.
Speaker 2I know, I know that I've been public about that are like I considered the weakest of certain cartoons, of the Bugs Bunny cartoons. They were never on any of the sets. Just honestly, personally, I felt these are weak and let's hold them off. And, on the other hand, the completest that I am as a collector has always wanted them on video. So I could have them and I got to tell you I got two surprises out of the three of those cartoons re-watching this set, I'm going to mention their titles. One of them is Prehistorical Hair, a cartoon that's got a lot of problems. Part of the problems, one of the problems, george will admit this it's one of the few cartoons that wasn't scored by the Warner Brothers, that's right.
Speaker 2One of those. What is it? John Seeley? Seeley Six, six. We call them this, the seely six, stock music.
Speaker 3That's one problem that was due to a musician strike that affected all the studios, and I think it was 1958.
Speaker 2Yeah, so that's an issue. That was an issue already and then and then in this cartoon the storyline storyline has Bugs Bunny going at least. They're looking at a movie that transports us back to prehistoric days and we see Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd as cavemen. Okay, problem number two the caveman known as Elmer Fudd Stone in this particular cartoon right, is not. This is one of the first cartoons after Arthur Q Bryan.
Speaker 2The original Elmer Fudd voice had passed away, so they recruited another actor, dave Barry, who did many, many voices, by the way, george Dave Barry, it was in Warner cartoons all along doing mainly. One of his most famous things he did in the Warner cartoons is he's the imitator of Humphrey Bogart, right, just like Nate Ball Bunny. Yeah, fellow American down on his luck. That was this guy, dave Barry, and they called him in for these special things. So they had him come in to do Elmer and Elmer just does not sound right. So you don't have bad music. Elmer doesn't sound right and Bugs and Elmer are drawn as Neanderthals, which you know already. Again, that's not Bugs Bunny and Elmer to me.
Speaker 2So I had issues with this cartoon. Now watching it on Blu-ray blew my mind because the background art in this cartoon is amazing and it's a weird thing to talk about. I'm not going to go into it, but I couldn't believe my eyes because I'd only seen it on TV in 16 and all that sort of thing. And man, it looks, it's gorgeous looking. I can. I have watched it more than once now, just looking at the backdrops. They did a really good job on that and just the fact that it changed my mind, that my consciousness has been raised I'm happy about that in that particular cartoon the other one that, oh the other one was a cartoon by Chuck Jones that I actually always had considered my least favorite Chuck Jones cartoon. It's called Hair Breath Hurry and it's a cartoon where Bugs Bunny takes the place of the Roadrunner. Essentially it's a Roadrunner cartoon but it's got Bugs Bunny in it and I always thought that's really okay. I give it a.
Speaker 2Chuck was an experimenter. He did all kinds of experimental things in these cartoons. You know I chalked it up to. Why not? You know, let's go for it. Numbers and things have found a very interesting fact and I love this and it makes me actually at least love this cartoon Maybe not love love it, but I can now watch it in its proper context. It turns out at one time George knows this there was going to be, in addition to the Bugs Bunny show, there was going to be a proposed Roadrunner show, and they made a pilot of which we released. Warner Brothers released, because it didn't turn out to be a TV show that got picked up. Warner Brothers refashioned it as a featurette that was released to theaters called the Adventures of the Roadrunner, which we've put out on DVD, and what it turns out is is that the production numbers match up, that this was going to be for the second episode of the Roadrunner show. This would have been the bridging material or at least that was the proposal.
Speaker 2That was what was on the boards. When that didn't happen, when that show was not going to be, they took the boards that they had already made and they condensed them, rejiggered them and made it into a short, which was a great thing that they did, because they didn't waste art, they didn't waste time, they didn't waste story. They had a short ready to go. It was odd. It wasn't meant to be a short and now it makes sense. To me it makes more sense because it's like the intermediary stuff in a TV show. I know it's a strange thing. I hope people can wrap their heads around that. But hair breath hurry. I'm so happy you're on Blu-ray.
Speaker 1Well, I wanted to ask you about the other bugs on here as well, the Elmer's pet rabbit. Okay, it's get those yellow gloves.
Speaker 2Oh yeah, yeah, this is kind of the one that he has the yellow gloves. Well, I'm not sure why you're bringing it up, but it's been controversial in the fandom circles that the latest Bugs Bunny cartoons that have been made by the studio for HBO Max under the label Looney Tunes Cartoons, they redesigned them in a tech-savory Bob Clampett way and they gave him yellow gloves. So a lot of fans were like why'd they do that? And they're all upset and people like me would come on. Well, they they early Bugs Bunny cartoons. He had yellow gloves, so it's, you know, don't get too excited. But uh, uh, I mean, what's your question?
Speaker 1I read those two and I was like what is this? You know, what is this discussion about? The yellow gloves? And I, you know, when I first watched it I didn't even notice it really. I mean, it didn't really, you know. And then, after I was like reading a little bit about, I was like what's with these yellow gloves and all this conversation and is that important?
Speaker 2I don't know Is it important? No, I don't think so, but you know I mean it's. You know it's just cartoons. In the end, you know this is entertainment, these are comedies. You know things are done to make you laugh, basically. And you know entertain and we got to remember that.
Speaker 1You know what you know, Jerry. People take your opinion very seriously, so I was going to ask you about this supposed uh collection that includes jerry's least favorite bugs. You know uh cartoons, which you just mentioned, uh, prehistoric hair and all, and it's interesting to hear your take on seeing these now in hd and how even that is changing or influencing you. And also, you know, I don't know, years later maybe there's a different way of appreciating these too. Oh yeah, oh yeah.
Preserving Classic American Cinema
Speaker 2I mean, we all grew up watching them on television nine times out of 10, maybe, unless you were watching it on CBS, where they were running 35-millimeter film prints that were edited sometimes, but our regular local stations ran 16-millimeter dupes. Right, george? These were taken off of the AAP copies were actually Technicolor prints with their titles cut off and then duped down, you know, and duped in color. They look good, but they're so far removed from what these cartoons are. We're seeing them the way people saw them in theaters in the first place on day one of their release.
Speaker 3Yeah, you know what Jerry's saying. This is very important. The 16 millimeter syndication prints weren't even Technicolor Right, they were Eastman color and they faded because of that and we were used to watching pink cartoons. That was, I think, the first breakthrough of what we were doing on Laserdisc, because those masters, we would never use them. Now they were done off Technicolor prints to one-inch videotape. What we've been able to do now, coming off the negatives where they exist in most cases, it's just mind-blowing what we're seeing. We're seeing things we've never seen before because the clarity is tremendous and at the same time, we make sure that we're holding to a standard where you see cell dust and you see improper anomalies that were in the original photography and we're not going to erase them or make them look like, you know, contemporary soap opera or whatever. They need to look like film and they need to really have their aesthetic so we can get as close to what people saw on the motion picture screen when first released.
Speaker 2And you know that's the what they saw on the motion picture screen when first released. And you know that's the what they saw on the motion picture screen on first release is what made characters like Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck and Porky Pig superstars. This is what made them that way. It's, you know, as big as they still are. That's forgotten. You know, sometimes people forget, sometimes the companies forget what made these things popular in the first place. We're able, thanks to George, that many of our greatest films, you know, from Citizen Kane to the Singing in the Rain, and you know, are available for us to be seen the way they were originally seen. But the cartoons, we have been doing that on, unfortunately, a slower pace throughout the years. You know what?
Speaker 3We're pretty close to having almost the whole thing done. We're making headway and the thing is, what we've been trying to do for decades now is to enlighten other people, to understand that these are pieces of American cinema, classic pieces of American cinema, and, just like I always say with older films, not every old film is a classic. They made bad movies in the 30s and 40s, just like they made masterpieces. But everything needs to be preserved and needs to be saved.
Speaker 3And prioritizing what you're going to produce, what you're going to preserve, that's constantly a battle and as technology improves, we keep needing to make things better. So when I go back and I look at those five Laserdisc box sets we did which were taken off of prints albeit in most cases they were Technicolor prints but therefore also very soft, because Technicolor prints are not ideal for transfer there was a softness to them but the colors were for its time. We thought they were amazing what we've been able to achieve subsequently and the Golden Collection is now past 20 years old in its inception, you know we look at that and say, my God, we've come such a long way and these Blu-rays are an example of what can be done when you go back to the original elements and put together an entertaining program, and that's really what it's all about.
Speaker 2And George, I want to lead you by saying what can people do so that we can continue doing this, Because we need to continue doing this. What can the fans do to help us?
Speaker 3We humbly ask that you continue to support these releases, because the more that there is consumer support for these releases, the more that we will be able to have the justification to the many channels within the organization that need to approve these things, that we will get the ability to give more, and I'm feeling very, very optimistic that things will continue to move on a forward trajectory.
Speaker 1Well, I asked you guys last time of a question that I want to ask you one more time here, and that was of these 25, is there a personal favorite? Not the best cartoon, not the most you know beloved cartoon or anything, but just when you're watching it for one reason or another remind you of your childhood or your youth or whatever. Is there one here that just jumped out to you? And we'll start with you, george.
Looney Tunes Cartoons
Speaker 3Well, the one that I was just it has always been a favorite and I was thrilled that we could put it on here was Mexican Joyride. People don't appreciate Arthur Davis's cartoons enough. In my opinion he directed this and this is almost a precursor to one of my true, all-time favorite of all the Warner Brothers cartoons and that is Bully for Bugs. It's a kind of similar story and setup and this came first, but I love it. And Daffy is, of course. He sings. Anytime Daffy sings, I love it. But the whole cartoon is just so damn funny Pardon my French. It's just, it's a masterpiece and I think we've given it a showcase. It's one of the real standout cartoons among the 25, in my opinion.
Speaker 2Boy, oh boy, that obviously I think I would have picked that as well. Uh, so I'm gonna go in some other opposite direction, because I love all of them and it's very difficult, uh, to pick. And if I were to go some things in the opposite direction I want to mention uh, it's funny, it's not a classic at all. Uh, it's the last chuck jones Roadrunner cartoon called War and Pieces that's on here. It's one of the latest, like 1964 release, but I love that it's on here. It's one that people have actually been asking us for years to put on here. It's not shown that much.
Speaker 2I'm not sure why it's so much better than some of the Roadrunner cartoons made in later years, not by Chuck, by other people. It's just very attractive. It's kind of a swan song. I know why we've overlooked it for a long time, for a lot of reasons, and I'm just kind of. It's one of those things where I, by having it on here, I know that there's a lot of fans out there who are all like thank you and I, I and I. That's what we're here to do. We're here to, you know, supply cartoons that the people who know their cartoons are looking for. I mean, that's my answer. I love all 25. So I can't pick a baby, although, by the way, I would have said Mexican Joyride had George, not because that is a standout cartoon and it looks jaw-droppingly great.
Speaker 3And I'll just add a little footnote to Mexican Joyride by putting it on this release we were able to get the original nitrate negative scan it in 4K for preservation. There were no other 35 millimeter materials anywhere on this cartoon. There might have been a few years ago that went bad or whatever. So the original negative was safely kept, as was the original soundtrack. But it was our requiring this cartoon to be on this collection that led to the preservation of this cartoon. That led to the preservation of this cartoon. So the original negative went back into cold storage and protection.
Speaker 3But now we have a gorgeous presentation that can be seen in all media but you can own by having a Blu-ray on your shelf. No one can take it away from you. It won't suddenly disappear and that's the beauty of it. So it isn't just that we made the cartoon part of the lineup, we also saved the cartoon because until we asked about it we didn't know that there weren't any intermediate elements. We wouldn't have used intermediate elements anyway. We always want to go for the negative but seeing that there was nothing else, this could have befallen the same fate as riffraffy daffy. You know, nitrate stock is subject to deterioration and all sorts of other terrible things. So just the fact that this cartoon is on this collection led to it also getting a proper preservation, and that needs to be celebrated.
Speaker 2The fans don't know how fragile these original elements are. We simply see them on TV or they put them out on video, or they have in the past, and it's easy to think, oh, they've got them or they're there, and the unfortunate truth is there's deterioration, there's all sorts of things that befall these original elements. It makes it difficult. The thing I find interesting on different discs that we've worked on I'm thinking of a particular popeye, the one where we only had two color elements around that one, and then there's a blitz wolf on on the, on the tech savory. It's like. I mean I remember when we we saw those on uh on blu-ray for the first time and we saw the, the scans, I was like, well, this can't. I mean, these cartoons were on TV for years and I've seen 16 millimeter copies.
Speaker 2Then what happens is you go back. I have to refresh my memory. I'll go back and look at another. You know an old Turner version of the cartoon or a 16 millimeter dupe I happen to have or something. And then I start to notice, oh, wow, what we're looking at with the scan is a cleaned up, beautiful version of what exactly I have here. The same thing that was distributed to television for decades, the same thing that somebody duped prints of for years, but I never noticed the slight imperfections that I'm now seeing on the beautiful scan. They've always been there. There isn't a better copy or a better master. This is the way it is. We are now seeing, well, the best version of what exists. Does that sound right, george?
Speaker 3version of what exists. Does that sound right, george? Absolutely, you said it more eloquently than anyone could.
Speaker 1It's an amazing how fast time flies when you two are on talking about these Looney Tunes films, these shorts, and how fun it is. And you know again, we didn't go through all of them. There's so many other great surprises for the fans to enjoy when they get this, so thanks for coming on and talking about these with us.
Speaker 3Oh, it's always a pleasure, Tim. We're grateful to have the opportunity to talk about something that's near and dear to our hearts.
Speaker 2Absolutely.
Supporting the Warner Archive Looney Tunes
Speaker 1Well, it's always great to have animation historians Jerry Beck and George Feldenstein on to talk about these Looney Tunes collector's choice releases and I really, really enjoyed this volume three. I just love the variety that they have and just kind of getting these one shots and treasuries and rarities from the vault. So I hope you'll support by buying volume three, not waiting for a sale, because that's really how the studio knows that there's an appetite for these when people are willing to spend the money right away. So there are links in the podcast show notes if you want to support the work that the Warner Archive is doing, that Jerry and George are doing, so that we can get more volumes out in this collection. Also, if you're enjoying the show and you are a Looney Tunes fan, you may want to follow us on Facebook or Twitter so you can look for those links as well, so that you'll get all the updates on volume three or on any upcoming volumes. And if you enjoyed the podcast, please think about following or subscribing at your favorite podcast provider. Thank you so much and until next time.
Speaker 1This is Tim Millard. Stay slightly obsessed about Looney Tunes.