Scribner Bugs Bunny Kool Aid Again

I wish I could see a good copy of this.

Scribner Eye Theories

Traumatic Reactions To Sugar Deficiencies

Rod Scribner Sneaks Entertainment Value into a Koolaid Commercial

By the 1960s, most animation - even animation done by the classic animators - had gotten very conservative. Even squash and stretch eventually became "too cartoony".
Here's Rod Scribner going completely against the style of the times and I don't know how he got away with it.
I'm guessing that Tex Avery must have directed this and just let Rod have fun with it.
Rod sure wasn't inhibited by the 60s model sheets of the WB characters.
He not only makes his key drawings funny, but most of his breakdowns are too.
By making every drawing in his animation a unique creation, he ends up doing a lot more work than if he had just made a few on-model keys. That's a true animator. He can't help creating, rather than merely executing.
I can't believe this got by the ad agency. When I worked on commercials the ad execs would go though every frame of film to make sure that each drawing was uncreative, unfunny and "on-model".
The agency folks always hate anything that "looks weird". They must think that somehow the consumers will decide not to buy their products once they have freeze framed the commercials themselves and checked them against their model sheets.
This commercial would only make me drink even more Kool-Aid than if it was bland and boring.




I was laughing as I went through this scene a frame at a time, but the drawings kept getting funnier and funnier. These almost seem bland to me now - compared to what came next. There are so many crazy drawings in this one commercial that I'm going to have to spread them out over a few posts.

Next

a crazy-ass Bugs and Elmer Koolaid commercial

Good Classic Cartoon Repackaging

This is the way to present classic cartoons. Watching the Bugs Bunny Show on Saturday afternoons at 5 was the highlight of the week for me in the 1960s. These titles and wraparounds just made the whole experience more exciting.



BUGS BUNNY SHOW OPENING TITLES

Bugs Explains How To Write Cartoons With Him In Them

Barbary Coast Bunny 2

The setup is over and now the actual story starts. First Chuck establishes the mood and location. Robert Gribbroek drew these beautiful layouts and Phil De Guard painted them. Nice clear compositions and unusual color schemes.

I love this establishing shot of the interior of the casino. It shows how huge it is in comparison with Nasty way over on the right. The BG is full of design contrasts: The curved winding stairway, the tall vertical window that frames a tiny Nasty at his desk. Organic sinuous chairs, low in the frame contrasted against tall vertical designs on the walls. It's all intelligently planned to tell the story and be striking and beautiful at the same time. Very stylish, without being garish.
Nasty is funny here; we see him marking the cards with those stubby fingers Chuck loves.
Nasty is not as exaggerated as he becomes later in the cartoon. Chuck got more comfortable with the design as he worked his way through the cartoon and he kept drawing more complex variations of him. This could not happen if he was bound to some arbitrary model sheet rules created in another department by people he didn't know.
An almost ignorant shot of the swinging doors to contrast against the previous elegant layouts.
This straight on symmetrical ignorance helps to establish that Bugs is a hick coming to the big city. I like how we don't se him all at once. We just see the hick shoes coming in first. Good suspense.
Nice touches here. Chuck is teasing us by not just showing us Bugs all at once.
The wheat straw in Bugs mouth says it all.
Robert Gribbroek is my favorite of Chuck's designers. He has a perfect balance between creativity and control. He doesn't let creative license turn into outright anarchy, like you see in many of today's cartoons.

The Best Bugs - Pre 'Tude

This is one of my all time favorite model sheets and I can't figure out why they don't draw Bugs like this any more. Look how appealing he is!
It's a model sheet drawn by Bob McKimson for Bob Clampett's unit. There is an earlier version of the same sheet, also drawn by McKimson where he doesn't look as distinct. Clampett went over it and made Bugs' eyes splay at the top and gave his head more planes. Bugs became less egg-shaped. They also beefed up his cheeks, making him cuter. This design is full of tricky subtleties. He's not easy to draw.Maybe that's why he never looked quite like this except in Clampett's cartoons. Chuck came close in a couple cartoons-Hair-Raising Hare for one.It's funny, almost every classic WB cartoonist I met said that once they found this model, they never again strayed from it - when they all obviously did. Tom McKimson told me that he and his brother were the only ones that stuck to the Clampett model for the rest of Bugs' career. Chuck said it too. They also all said that everyone else changed the model except them. Friz never quite got the hang of it.
Shortly after that model sheet, Clampett and his animators made Bugs a little taller.Note how much more active and playful Bugs was in the mid 40s than what he has become. No damn 'tude for one thing! This Bugs is the one that made the character become the most popular in history, not because he had 'tude, but because he was actively mischievous and devious.

This Bugs actually did things in the cartoons. He didn't win by default. He went out of his way to cause trouble - and did it in a very likeable way. The 'tude Bugs is completely unlikable. He doesn't do anything to win. He just wins because the rules say so. It's like he was born an aristocrat who deserves to win because he's the star character.


Here he is cocksure and still playful, which is different than 'tude. 'Tude didn't happen till the 50s when Chuck turned Bugs smug and snooty like himself.

I wonder why they don't make merchandise and t shirts out of this Bugs. Who wants Bugs with 'tude? He may have started it, but now almost every character has 'tude so it's not unique anymore.

Here's Bugs Frog in the latest movie 'tude.

They oughta go back to the Bugs Bunny that made WB cartoons the most popular in the world, the one who did funny things, not the one who just stands around looking smug.

And they really should never team him with Daffy. That worked in 1 cartoon, but quickly became a predictable formula.

IMPORTANT NOTE TO ALL CARTOONISTS!