WHICH American animator created Daffy Duck and Droopy the dog? a) Tex Avery b) Walt Disney c) Matt Groening. - Chronicle Live News WHICH American animator created Daffy Duck and Droopy the dog? a) Tex Avery b) Walt Disney c) Matt Groening. ON April 1, 1957, the normally serious BBC TV news programme Panorama convinced thousands of English viewers that what type of food grew on trees? Share Get daily updates directly to your inbox + Subscribe Thank you for subscribing! Could not subscribe, try again laterInvalid Email ON April 1, 1957, the normally serious BBC TV news programme Panorama convinced thousands of English viewers that what type of food grew on trees? a) Spaghetti b) Curry c) Cheese. A SPHEKSOPHOBIC fears which insects? a) Spiders b) Flies c) Wasps. How many pockets does a billiard table normally have? a) Five b) Six c) Seven. IN which US state was the American Declaration of Independence signed on July 4, 1776? a) Louisiana b) Washington c) Pennsylvania.

WHO, in 1990, became the first chancellor of a united Germany? a) Helmut Kohl b) Gerhard Schroder c) Jimmy Carter. WHICH country was previously called Persia? a) Iran b) Iraq c) Afghanistan. HOW old was Tony Blair when he became British prime minister in 1997? a) 41 b) 39 c) 43. IN Western culture what is the birthstone for May? a) Emerald b) Diamond c) Ruby. IN the Bible to whom did God give the 10 Commandments? a) Judas b) Moses c) Jesus.

Answers: 1a 2a 3c 4b 5c 6a 7a 8c 9a 10b Like us on Facebook Most Read Most Recent Most Read Most Recent A Quickie Look at the Life & Career of Tex Avery - Bright Lights Film Journal A Quickie Look at the Life & Career of Tex Avery Gary Morris September 1, 1998 As if radically rethinking the Hollywood cartoon weren’t enough, our boy Tex can also be thanked for inventing or perfecting Porky Pig, Daffy Duck, and perhaps the greatest character in animation, Bugs Bunny. Pity the poor cartoon director. In spite of the many thousands of seven-minute theatrical cartoons that poured out of Hollywood during the heyday of the 1930s-’50s, few of their creators are household words, and most are unknown except among devotees. Animation may be unique in the way the fictional characters have eclipsed the men – they were mostly men – who made them. Woody Woodpecker is far more famous than his author, Walter Lantz.

And even many fans would be hard pressed to identify the artist behind such popular two-dimensional personalities as Casper the Ghost, Roadrunner and Wile E. Coyote, or Superman. There are a couple of exceptions to this rule besides the obvious one, Walt Disney. One is Joseph Hanna and William Barbera, who as Hanna-Barbera flooded 1960s American television with Tom and Jerry, the Flintstones, the Jetsons, and other baby-boomer staples. The other is Tex Avery. A contemporary of Disney’s, Avery created or developed some of the most timeless characters in cartoon history with Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, and Droopy Dog, along with the inimitable catch-phrase “What’s up, doc?” And like Disney, his name has come to symbolize a distinct, instantly recognizable, and widely merchandised style that has outlived the man himself and continues to be an important cultural presence. Avery’s influence on animation equaled Disney’s during his lifetime and continues unabated today with two shows currently running on American television that carry his name.

The Wacky World of Tex Avery features new animation in the Avery mode, and The Tex Avery Show replays some of the 136-odd seven-minute cartoons he created during his heyday from 1935 to 1955 at Warner Bros., M-G-M, and Universal. In a field teeming with talent, Avery stood out. Born in 1908 in Taylor, Texas, Frederick “Tex” Avery was related to both Daniel Boone and the infamous Judge Roy Bean, who allegedly assured prisoners that they would receive a fair trial before they were hanged. In retrospect, this was a fortuitous provenance – Avery’s humor was as savage as Judge Bean’s – and American history, particularly the “tall tales” that were common in Texas, was a favorite subject he treated with suitable irreverence. After graduating from high school in 1926, he took courses at the Art Institute of Chicago, worked loading fruits and vegetables in the docks of Los Angeles, and slept on the beach. His attempts to sell a comic strip to the newspapers failed, but his sand sketches landed him a job with a minor cartoon studio doing inking and cel painting.

From there he went to Walter Lantz’s unit at Universal, where he spent five years doing “in-betweening,” drawing sequential poses for a character and generally assisting the animator, learning his art but also its limits. By mid-1935 he had moved from Lantz to Warner Bros., where he would be a full-time cartoon director. But it was more than the need to grow artistically that pushed him. Money disputes with Lantz were one reason for the change. But something else happened that Avery said “made me think animation owed me a living.” Avery had developed a reputation as a raconteur, ladies’ man, and athlete. During a rough-housing session among the animators, he was hit in the eye with a paper clip and lost half his sight. This grim event was a turning-point: by all accounts, along with his eye he lost much of his fun-loving spirit, put on weight, and turned for solace to a driving perfectionism that provided both inspiration and frustration during his tenure at Warners, where he stayed from 1935 to 1942, and at M-G-M (1942-1955). One of the challenges for Warner Bros.

during this time was how to match the success of Disney, whose “personality animation” had taken commercial animation from stick figures and simple backdrops to credible characters and realistic imagery. Avery joined Chuck Jones and Bob Clampett in creating a cutting-edge unit called “Termite Terrace.” From this ramshackle building on the Warners lot came Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig, Daffy Duck, Elmer Fudd, and most of the great Warners characters./div> Avery, at 27, was the grand old man of the group, but his ideas about how to transform the theatrical cartoon were more radical than those of his younger comrades. In his pursuit of the gag, he added more jokes but cut out unnecessary exposition, often acting out the characters’ parts himself and sometimes supplying the voices for the more buffoonish types. Above all, he steered the Warner Bros. house style away from Disneyesque sentimentality and made cartoons that appealed equally to adults, who appreciated Avery’s speed, sarcasm, and irony, and to kids, who liked the nonstop action.

Disney’s “cute and cuddly” creatures, under Avery’s guidance, were transformed into unflappable wits like Bugs Bunny, endearing buffoons like Porky Pig, or dazzling crazies like Daffy Duck. Even the classic fairy tale, a market that Disney had cornered, was appropriated by Avery, who made innocent heroines like Red Riding Hood into sexy jazz babies, more than a match for any Wolf. Avery also endeared himself to intellectuals by constantly breaking through the artifice of the cartoon, having characters leap out of the end credits, loudly object to the plot of the cartoon they were starring in, or speak directly to the audience (often shown as silhouettes at the bottom of the frame). Such unheard-of techniques pegged Avery as a modernist and suggested his affinity with Pirandello and Brecht – not bad for a rowdy boy from Texas. In 1941, at age 33, Avery moved to M-G-M, where his talent for sight gags, blackouts, rabid pacing, violent humor, and sexy characters found its fullest expression.

He tried to duplicate his earlier success with characters like Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, but “Screwy Squirrel” was far from endearing, even by Avery’s standards. Screwy’s purpose, according to critic Greg Ford, was to “shatter audience complacency,” which he did with some of the rudest gags on record. More successful was the series of World War II walking pin-ups that Avery created for American G.I.s stationed abroad. Again using the fairy-tale framework that served him well at Warners, he changed Cinderella and Red Riding Hood into gorgeous sexpots who tantalize “the Wolf” (unnamed) and the audience with their lurid charms. These characters were the basis for “Jessica Rabbit” in Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, but equally fun for audiences were the Wolf’s reactions to Cinderella/Red’s come-ons.

Avery devised a series of wild reaction gags of the Wolf that eventually caught the attention of the censors; images like the Wolf suddenly stiffening in mid-air were rightly interpreted as “phallic gags.” The Wolf’s lust was never consummated, but you’d never know it from the sexy aura of cartoons like Swing Shift Cinderella and Red Hot Riding Hood. Avery enjoyed equal success with Droopy Dog, a tiny, impossibly unruffled character who barely acknowledges the brutal assaults on him and always triumphs. At both Warners and M-G-M, Avery ruthlessly satirized sacred cows, everything from the capitalist concept of progress (The House of Tomorrow) to literary classics (Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men becomes Lonesome Lenny) to Frank Sinatra (Li’l Tinker). The sheer breadth of his targets and his exhausting perfectionism may have influenced his move from M-G-M in 1954 to the studio of one of his earliest collaborators, Walter Lantz at Universal. After directing only four cartoons there, he went into animating television commercials for bug spray and corn chips, and eventually found himself doing drudge work for former competitors Hanna-Barbera.

He was working for them when he died of a heart attack in 1980, at age 72. Part of his decline can be blamed on historical circumstance: the theatrical cartoon was being phased out of theatres by the 1950s. More important, though, he was simply burned out, a term he used frequently to describe himself. His pursuit of the perfect gag has a romantic resonance to it, since like any ideal it was bound by its nature to fail. But like the characters, the work always outlives the author, and a bit of Avery continues to live whenever someone says, “What’s up, doc?” 1000+ images about Tex Avery Cartoon on Pinterest | Tex avery, Hoods and Looney tunes Forward "What's up, doc?" Bugs Bunny is, perhaps, the most recognizable and famous cartoon character. Looney Tunes were first created as lead-ins to feature films. Bugs first appeared as a n-name rabbit in 1938 in "Porky's Hare Hunt." Tex Avery later named him Bugs Bunny after the infamous West Coast mobster. Decades later, Looney Tunes cartoons became a Saturday morning staple. Bugs Bunny is still tops.

See More Daffy Duck | The Warner Animation Wiki | Fandom powered by Wikia The Warner Animation Wiki Dee Bradley Baker ( Space Jam ) Daffy Duck is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons, often running the gamut between being the best friend or arch-rival of Bugs Bunny . Daffy was the first of the new breed of " screwball " characters that emerged in the late 1930s to supplant traditional everyman characters, such as Mickey Mouse and Popeye , who were more popular earlier in the decade . Daffy would appear in 129 shorts in the Golden Age, third among Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies cartoons behind Porky Pig's 152 and Bugs Bunny's 166 appearances. Virtually every Warner Bros. cartoon director put his own spin on the Daffy Duck character, who may be a lunatic vigilante in one short but a greedy gloryhound in another. Bob Clampett and Chuck Jones both made extensive use of these two very different versions of the character.

Daffy was #14 on TV Guide 's list of top 50 best cartoon characters, [1 ] and was featured on one of the issue's two covers as Duck Dodgers with Porky Pig and the Powerpuff Girls (all of which are Time Warner -owned characters). [2 ] Contents Edit Daffy first appeared on April 17, 1937, in Porky's Duck Hunt , directed by Tex Avery and animated by Bob Clampett. The cartoon is a standard hunter/prey pairing for which Leon Schlesinger 's studio was famous, but Daffy (barely more than an unnamed bit player in this short) represented something new to moviegoers: an assertive, combative protagonist, completely unrestrainable. As Clampett later 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." [3 ] This early Daffy is less anthropomorphic and resembles a "normal" duck.

The Mel Blanc voice characterization and the white neck ring contrasting with the black feathers, are about the only aspects of the character that remained consistent through the years. Blanc's characterization of Daffy holds the world record for the longest characterization of one animated character by his or her original actor — 52 years. The origin of Daffy's voice is a matter of some debate. One oft-repeated "official" story is that it was modeled after producer Schlesinger's tendency to lisp. However, in Mel Blanc's autobiography, That's Not All Folks!, he contradicts that conventional belief, writing "It seemed to me that such an extended mandible would hinder his speech, particularly on words containing an s sound. Thus 'despicable' became 'desthpicable'." Daffy's slobbery, exaggerated lisp was developed over time, being barely noticeable in the early cartoons. In Daffy Duck and Egghead , Daffy does not lisp at all, except in the separately drawn set-piece of Daffy singing "The Merry Go Round Broke Down", in which just a slight lisp can be heard.

Edit [1] [2] Daffy Duck as he first appeared in Porky's Duck Hunt It was Tex Avery who created the original version of Daffy in 1937. Daffy established his status by jumping into the water, hopping around, and yelling, "Woo-hoo! Woo-hoo! Woo-hoo! Hoo-hoo! Woo-hoo!". Animator Bob Clampett immediately seized upon the Daffy Duck character and cast him in a series of cartoons in the 1930s and 1940s. Clampett's Daffy is a wild and zany screwball, perpetually bouncing around the screen with cries of "Hoo-hoo! Hoo-hoo!" (In his autobiography, Mel Blanc stated that the zany demeanor was inspired by Hugh Herbert 's catchphrase, which was taken to a wild extreme for Daffy). Clampett physically redesigned the character, making him taller and lankier, and rounding out his feet and bill. He was often paired with Porky Pig . Daffy would also feature in several war-themed shorts during World War II .

Daffy always stays true to his unbridled nature, however: for example, attempting to dodge conscription in Draftee Daffy (1945), battling a Nazi goat intent on eating Daffy's scrap metal in Scrap Happy Daffy (1943), and hit the head of Adolf Hitler in Daffy the Commando 1943 . [ edit ] Daffy from 1946 - 1964 Edit For Daffy Doodles (his first Looney Tunes cartoon as a director), Robert McKimson , Sr. tamed Daffy a bit, redesigning him yet again to be rounder and less elastic. The studio also instilled some of Bugs Bunny 's savvy into the duck, making him as brilliant with his mouth as he was with his battiness. Daffy was teamed up with Porky Pig; the duck's one-time rival became his straight man . Art Davis , who directed Warner Bros.

cartoon shorts for a few years in the late 1940s until upper management decreed there should be only three units (McKimson, Friz Freleng and Jones), presented a Daffy similar to McKimson's. McKimson is noted as the last of the three units to make his Daffy uniform with Avery's, with even late shorts such as Don't Axe Me (1958) featuring traits of the 'screwball' Daffy. While Daffy's looney days were over, McKimson continued to exploit the duck's versatility and charisma however, making him as ruthless or benevolent as his various roles required him to but still contained Looneyness in him. McKimson would use this Daffy from 1946 to 1961. Friz Freleng combined this Daffy with Chuck Jones' version in a more sympathetic light, such as in Show Biz Bugs . In this film, Daffy is a jealous and arrogant competitor to Bugs, but his shabby treatment by the theatre management and audience is depicted as being unfairly out of proportion to the genuine talent he has.

[ edit ] Chuck Jones' Daffy from 1951 - 1964 Edit [3] [4] Daffy Duck and Porky Pig in Robin Hood Daffy While Bugs Bunny became Warner Bros. ' most popular character, the directors still found ample use for Daffy. Several cartoons place him in parodies of popular movies and radio serials. For example, Drip-along Daffy ( released in 1951 and named after the popular Hopalong Cassidy character) throws Daffy into a Western , while Robin Hood Daffy (1958) casts the duck in the role of the legendary outlaw Robin Hood . In Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century (1953) — a parody of Buck Rogers — Daffy trades barbs (and bullets) with Marvin the Martian , with Porky Pig retaining the role of Daffy's sidekick. Other parodies were Daffy in The Great Piggy Bank Robbery (1946) as "Duck Twacy" ( Dick Tracy ) (by Bob Clampett) and as Stupor Duck ( Superman , now a WB property himself) (by Robert McKimson).

Bugs' ascension to stardom also prompted the Warner animators to recast Daffy as the rabbit 's rival, intensely jealous and determined to steal back the spotlight, while Bugs either remained indifferent to the duck 's jealousy or used it to his advantage. Daffy's desire to achieve stardom at any cost was explored as early as 1940, in Freleng's You Ought to Be in Pictures , but the idea was most successfully used by Chuck Jones , who redesigned the duck once again, making him scrawnier and scruffier. In Jones' famous "Hunting Trilogy" (or "Duck Season/Rabbit Season Trilogy") of Rabbit Fire , Rabbit Seasoning , and Duck! Rabbit! Duck! (each respectively launched in 1951, 1952 and 1953) Daffy's vanity and excitedness provide Bugs Bunny the perfect opportunity to fool the hapless Elmer Fudd into repeatedly shooting the duck's bill off. Jones' Daffy sees himself as self-preservationist, not selfish.

However, this Daffy can do nothing that does not backfire on him, more likely to singe his tail feathers as well as his dignity than anything. [4 ] Film critic Steve Schneider calls Jones' version of Daffy "a kind of unleashed id ." [5 ] Jones said that his version of the character "expresses all of the things we're afraid to express." [5 ] This is evident in Jones' Duck Amuck (1953), "one of the few unarguable masterpieces of American animation," according to Schneider. [6 ] In the episode, Daffy is plagued by a godlike animator whose malicious paintbrush alters the setting, soundtrack, and even Daffy. When Daffy demands to know who is responsible for the changes, the camera pulls back to reveal none other than Bugs Bunny. Duck Amuck is widely heralded as a classic of filmmaking for its illustration that a character's personality can be recognized independently of appearance, setting, voice and plot. [6 ] In 1999, the short was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry .

Friz Freleng used the Jones idea for Daffy in Show Biz Bugs (1957) wherein Daffy's "trained" pigeon act (they all fly away as soon as Daffy opens their cage) and complicated tap dance number is answered by nothing but crickets chirping in the audience, whereas Bugs' simple song-and-dance numbers brings wild applause. McKimson made more benevolent use of Daffy, in Ducking the Devil for example his greed becomes a vital tool in subduing the Tasmanian Devil and collecting a big cash reward. McKimson also played with Daffy's movie roles however. In 1959, Daffy appeared in China Jones (a parody of a television series of the day, China Smith , starring Dan Duryea ) in which he was an Irish private eye , with an Irish accent, instead of the usual lisp, in his voice. [ edit ] Daffy's pairing with Speedy in 1965 - 1968 Edit When the Warner Bros.

animation studio briefly outsourced cartoon production to DePatie-Freleng Enterprises in the 1960s, Daffy Duck became an antagonist (or inconsistent friend) in several Speedy Gonzales cartoons, his mean spirit taken to an extreme. For example, in Well Worn Daffy (1965), Daffy is determined to keep the mice away from a desperately needed well seemingly for no other motive than pure maliciousness. Furthermore, when he draws all the water he wants, Daffy then attempts to destroy the well in spite of the vicious pointlessness of the act, forcing Speedy to stop him. The Warner Bros. studio was entering its twilight years, and even Daffy had to stretch for humor in the period. It's worth mentioning, though, that in many of the later DFE cartoons (such as Feather Finger and Daffy's Diner ) Daffy is portrayed as a tragic/luckless character rather than the full-blown villain he is in cartoons like Well Worn Daffy and Assault and Peppered . According to animation historian Jerry Beck, television companies wanted more cartoons featuring Daffy Duck and Speedy Gonzales.

And, because of their declining budgets, the most economical thing for WB to do was to pair the two characters together.[ citation needed ] Edit Dell Comics published several Daffy Duck comic books , beginning in Four Color Comics #457, #536 and #615, then continuing as Daffy #4-17 (1956-59), then as Daffy Duck #18-30 (1959-62). The comic book series was subsequently continued in Gold Key Comics Daffy Duck #31-127 (1962-79). This run was in turn continued under the Whitman Comics imprint, until the company completely ceased comic book publication in 1984. In 1994, corporate cousin DC Comics became the publisher for comics featuring all the classic Warner Bros. cartoon characters, and while not getting his own title, Daffy has appeared in many issues of Looney Tunes. [ edit ] Other actors who voiced Daffy Edit In 1950, Mel Blanc recorded Daffy Duck's Rhapsody, a comic song written by Warren Foster , Billy May and Michael Maltese .

Daffy plays a piano duet with Donald Duck in the 1988 Disney and Amblin Entertainment film, Who Framed Roger Rabbit . Daffy made a cameo in a 1998 episode of The Drew Carey Show , in a method of live-action/animated film . Daffy appears in the Robot Chicken episode "Rodiggiti" voiced by Bill Farmer . In a segment that parodies 8 Mile , Daffy's role is similar to David "Future" Porter. A poster of Daffy is prominently displayed in Michael Garibaldi 's quarters in the science fiction TV series Babylon 5 . In one episode, Zack Allen jokingly explains to G'Kar that Daffy is the 'ancient Egyptian god of frustration'. Garibaldi is also shown entertaining Ambassador Delenn with Duck Dodgers in the 24 & 1/2th Century, which she finds difficult to understand when Duck Dodgers accidentally puts his rocket into reverse. Babylon 5 is also a Warner Bros. property.

In Family Guy , after holding an exploding bomb from Adam West, Meg has Daffy Duck's bill on the wrong side of her head, moves it to its proper position, and then states, “Of course, you realize this means war!”. A sound clip of Daffy Duck grunting from one cartoon was reused for Linus Van Pelt fidgeting in anger in Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown (and Don't Come Back!!) (1980) In the film Gremlins 2: The New Batch , one of the gremlins is named Daffy as an homage to the 30's and 40's Daffy Duck.[ citation needed ] In The Office episode " Diversity Day ", Michael signs his diversity form with Daffy's name. In the Eminem song "Despicable", Em claims he is as "Despicble as Daffy Duck when He's spittin'"(In a Daffy Duck style voice) Marker Text Tex Avery born in Taylor on February 26, 1908, Frederick bean “Tex” Avery is one of the most important figures in the history of animation.

directing cartoons at Warner brothers and MGM from 1935 to 1955, he developed such legendary characters as Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Droopy and Chilly Willy. he also pioneered a style of fast-paced slapstick comedy that introduced many of the basic comedic elements still found in cartoons today. his peers considered him a creative genius and his films continue to enjoy critical and popular acclaim. Avery spent his childhood in Taylor, growing up in homes on eighth and hackberry streets. he attended high school in Dallas before moving to California after graduation. in 1935, Avery took a job at Warner bros. where he presided over the innovative crew of "termite terrace" and introduced the world to daffy duck and bugs bunny. searching for the perfect expression to capture bugs bunny’s carefree attitude in a wild hare (1940), Avery recalled a phrase popular among students at north Dallas high school: “what’s up, doc?” he spent seven years at Warner brothers and then moved to MGM in 1942, where he perfected his unique style of rapid-fire, logic-defying gags.

after a lifetime spent reinventing the American cartoon, Avery died in Los Angeles in 1980. Tex Avery’s influence on his craft is difficult to overstate. he created some of the most enduring characters and compositions in history and directed cartoons that were funnier, faster and wilder than anyone had ever seen. an enormously talented writer, artist and director, Tex Avery left his stamp not just on the world of animation, but on the wider universe of American popular culture. 175 years of Texas independence * 1836 – 2011 -- marker is property of the state of Texas Historical Narrative by Mike Duncan and Wendy Thompson Texas State University - April 16, 2013 Overview Tex Avery is one of the most important figures in the history of American animation. Directing cartoons at Warner Brothers and MGM from 1935-55, he rejected the cute realism made popular by Walt Disney and invented an entirely new genre of fast-paced slapstick comedy, creating legendary characters like Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and Droopy Dog in the process.

He also introduced many of the most basic comedic elements still used in cartoons today: wildly exaggerated takes, breakneck pacing and gags that ignored the laws of both physics and logic. He was revered by his peers as a creative genius and his films have been shown around the world continuously for over 75 years. An enormously influential writer, artist and director, Tex Avery left his stamp not just on the world of animation, but on the wider world of American popular culture. Context Frederick Bean “Tex” Avery was born in Taylor, Texas in 1908. His parents, George Avery and Mary Augusta Bean, were not native to Texas. When George Avery was a boy, his family moved from Alabama to Milam County, part of a large influx of Southeasterners who migrated west after the Civil War to take advantage of the rich soil to grow cotton. Listed in the 1880 census as a farmer, George’s father Needham Avery bought additional land in nearby Taylor, which he later sold to his son. The 1889 census shows George Avery residing in Taylor and working on the railroad, probably for the International – Great Northern, which operated in Taylor around that time.

Shortly after little Frederick Bean was born, the Avery's lived at 118 Eighth Street, but by 1914 the family had moved to Hackberry Street and George was running a lumber company in south Taylor. Avery did not talk much about his early years, but the outrageous sense of humor he later developed was flavored by a childhood spent absorbing Texas tall-tales. By the time he was thirteen—possibly inspired by the popular Mutt and Jeff comics he would have found at Candy Jim’s store in downtown Taylor —Avery had been bitten by the cartooning bug. After the family moved to Dallas, Avery’s passion for cartooning blossomed. Now attending North Dallas High School, Avery filled the 1926 edition of the yearbook with funny cartoon depictions of school activities. When he was not participating in athletics or hunting—traditional Texas pastimes that would show up repeatedly in his later films—Avery hounded the local newspaper cartoonists for work. Finding no encouragement in Dallas, he enrolled in a summer drawing course at the Art Institute of Chicago. After the class turned out to be a disappointment, he briefly returned to Dallas before setting out for Los Angeles in 1928.

Like his grandfather, Avery chose to head west in search of better fortunes. As he shopped his comic strips to the local Los Angeles newspapers, Avery quickly earned the nickname “Tex” for the twang in his voice and boisterous southern charm. But selling the strips proved difficult and he took a job in Universal Studios’ animation department to help pay the bills. This temporary job soon became Avery’s defining passion and he never went back to newspaper cartooning. After Universal laid him off in 1935, the brash young animator successfully bluffed his way into a position as a director at Warner Brothers. Put to work in a little bungalow on the Warner Brothers lot dubbed “Termite Terrace,” Avery was assigned a small team of animators that included Chuck Jones and Bob Clampett, both of whom would go on to become legendary directors in their own right after apprenticing under Avery. Leading this talent rich unit, Avery presided over one of one of the most innovative periods in animation history. Enjoying full creative control over his films, Avery immediately set to work re-inventing American cartoons. At the time, Walt Disney dominated the market with a distinctive brand of cute and realistic cartoons. But Avery recognized how limiting the Disney style was.

For him, the great power of animation was that you could literally do anything you wanted. There was no reason for a director to acknowledge any constraint on the imagination. Acting on this insight Avery, “steered the Warner Brothers house style away from Disneyesque sentimentality and made cartoons that appealed equally to adults, who appreciated Avery's speed, sarcasm, and irony, and to kids, who liked the nonstop action.” With each new film, Avery pushed the limits of what was possible in a cartoon and audiences loved him for it. During his seven year stint at Warner Brothers, Avery created some of the most famous characters in the history of animation. In 1937 he directed Porky’s Duck Hunt, introducing the world to Daffy Duck, whose lunatic antics were an immediate sensation. Three years later, Avery released the seminal A Wild Hare, starring a supremely cool-under-fire gray rabbit named Bugs Bunny. Seeking the perfect line to capture Bugs’s preternatural calm, Avery harkened back to an expression common among his fellow classmates at North Dallas High.

With Elmer Fudd’s shotgun pointed directly at his face, Bugs absent-mindedly chewed a carrot and asked: “What’s up, Doc?” The line brought the house down and cemented Bugs as a cartoon superstar. By itself, the creation of Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck is enough to establish Avery’s historic credentials. But he was just getting started. After directing more than 60 films for Warner Brothers, creative disputes lead Avery to take a new job MGM in 1942. At MGM, he, “reached his apogee as a director by intensifying the pacing and exaggeration of the cartoons.” In Dumbhounded, one of his first films for MGM, Avery created yet another enduring cartoon icon: Droopy Dog. The unflappable little basset hound became famous for delivering deadpan quips as Avery spun rapid-fire, logic-defying gags all around him. While at MGM, Avery also explored themes not commonly associated with cartoons today, including a famous series of risqué shorts that recast Little Red Riding Hood as a sultry lounge singer and the Wolf as a smitten paramour.

The Wolf’s wildly exaggerated reactions to Red’s dancing were a hit with the adult audiences—especially soldiers—who made up most of the audience for cartoons during the period. Avery also peaked creatively with stand-alone films like King Size Canary and Bad Luck Blackie, both commonly listed amongst the greatest animated shorts of all time. In 1955, after a sensational 13 year run, MGM closed Avery’s animation unit and he moved on to directing television advertisements. In the late 1970s he started to work with his old MGM colleagues William Hannah and Joseph Barbara again, but his return was short lived. In 1980, Tex Avery died of cancer in Los Angeles. Significance Tex Avery’s contributions to American animation are difficult to overstate. If the only thing he ever did was create Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, his place in American pop culture history would be secure, but Avery’s legacy is much richer than that. It wasn’t just the characters that made him an animation legend, it was the boundaries he pushed, the styles he invented and the technical skills he pioneered.

His Texas roots informed his unique sense of humor, fostered his love of outrageous storytelling and drove him to make his films funnier, faster and wilder than anything else on the market. Avery’s first great contribution was to make cartoons funny. Before he came along, the primary objective of an animated short was to provide an entertaining story, with comedy deployed only occasionally and often without success. Bucking this trend, Avery focused exclusively on making the audience laugh as much as possible. This lead him to develop a, “particular comic approach…more gag-oriented than character-oriented,” to generate those laughs. If it is difficult today to picture a time when cartoons were not primarily joke-driven, it is because the comedic style Avery invented became so pervasive that it is now practically synonymous with the word “cartoon.” Avery’s second great contribution was to make cartoons faster-paced. Because he wanted to inject as much humor into his cartoons as possible, Avery studied how quickly he could animate a gag, finding that a joke supposedly requiring thirty feet of film could be laid out in eight. He also discovered that the human eye only needed five frames of film to register a gag.

As Avery himself said, “We gunned things up to the point where we could get twice as much stuff in a cartoon, getting from one situation to another. A guy would no sooner get hit with an anvil than he takes one step over and falls in a well.” Avery spent his entire career pushing for faster and faster speeds, and the entire industry was forced to keep up. The pacing of a pre-Avery cartoons is painfully slow. Saving audiences from the tedium of plodding gags is one of his most enduring legacies. Finally, Avery established once and for all that cartoons were a realm of infinite possibility. In an Avery film, characters, “may be chopped in half, beheaded, fragmented, burned to cinders, disemboweled, turned inside out or twisted into pretzels.” A few frames later they would appear unhurt and ready for the next gag. This style of impossible slapstick is now so embedded in the culture of animation that it is hard to imagine it not always being present.

But it wasn’t always present—it was introduced by Tex Avery, who, “belongs to that very limited group of movie artists (Chaplin, Keaton, Laurel, Allen) who built this century’s visual comedy from scratch, inventing procedures and styles which have since become common knowledge.” He freed future animators from the tyranny of reality, leaving them to play in a universe where anything can happen at any time. When Tex Avery died in 1980, his friend and colleague Chuck Jones tried to explain Avery’s historical importance but admitted, “It is difficult to be profound, analytical or discerning about the art of Tex Avery, because profundity tends to interrupt laughter and that is a poor trade indeed.” So Jones summed up the life and career of his old mentor by stating simply: “Avery was a genius.” A genius born and bred in Texas. Clara Stearns Scarbrough, Land of Good Water Takachue Pouetsu: A Williamson County, Texas, History (Georgetown: Williamson County Sun Publishers, 1973), 237. U.S.

Bureau of the Census, 1880 Census.; Williamson County Deed Records, County Clerk’s Office, Williamson County Justice Center, Georgetown, Texas: 56/552. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Official Census City of Taylor, Texas Williamson County 1883 and 1889. 1 Clara Stearns Scarbrough, Land of Good Water Takachue Pouetsu: A Williamson County, Texas, History (Georgetown: Williamson County Sun Publishers, 1973), 237. 2 U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1880 Census.; Williamson County Deed Records, County Clerk’s Office, Williamson County Justice Center, Georgetown, Texas: 56/552. 3 U.S. Bureau of the Census, Official Census City of Taylor, Texas Williamson County 1883 and 1889. 4 Scarbrough, 237. 5 1910 Taylor City Directory. 6 1914 Taylor City Directory.

7 Joe Adamson, Tex Avery: King of Cartoons (USA: Da Capo Press, 1975), 40; Interview with Heck Allen, quoted in Adamson, 144. 8 Jean-Paul Gabilliet, Of Comics and Men: A Cultural History of American Comic Books, trans. Bart Beaty and Nick Nguyen (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2010), 6; Michna, 21; 1915 Taylor City Directory, 112. 9 Lenburg, 14. 10 North Dallas High School. The Viking (1926), 55, 62, 101, 111, 115, 119, 121, 123, 136, 139, 140, 142.

11 John Canemaker, Tex Avery: The MGM Years, 1942-1955 (Atlanta: Turner Publishing, Inc., 1996), 11, quoted in Sara Petty interview by author, February 26, 1996; Ibid., quoted in Dorothy Guillot, “Stars of the Animateds and How They Grow,” The Dallas Morning News, April 2, 1933, 3. 12 Lenburg, 15. 13 Adamson, 171. 14 Michael Barrier, Hollywood Cartoons: American Animation in its Golden Age (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 329. 15 Scott Curtis, “Tex Avery’s Prison House of Animation, or Humor and Boredom in Studio Cartoons.” In Funny Pictures, ed. Daniel Goldmark and Charlie Keil (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2011), 213.

16 Floriane Place-Verghnes, Tex Avery: A Unique Legacy (1942-1955) (Malaysia: John Libby Publishing, 2006), 180. 17 Gary Morris, “A Quickie Look At The Life & Career of Tex Avery,” Bright Lights Journal No. 22 (September 1998), (accessed April 15, 2013). 18 Adamson, 50-54. 19 Interview with Tex Avery, quoted in Adamson, 164. 20 Canemaker, 16. 21 Barrier, 413-415. 22 Jerry Beck, The 50 Greatest Cartoons: As Selected by 1,000 Animation Professionals (Atlanta: Turner Publishing, 1994). 23 Burt A. Folkart, “Breeder of This Bunny Gave ‘What’s Up, Doc?’ to World,” Los Angeles Times, September, 1, 1908, pg. A20. 24 Place-Verghnes, 129-130.

27 Interview with Tex Avery, quoted in Adamson, 188. 28 Place-Verghnes, 181. 29 Adamson, 35. 30 Citing Giannalberto Bendazzi, quoted in Place-Verghnes, 130. 31 Chuck Jones, “A Farewell to A Funny Genius,” Los Angeles Times, August 31, 1980, pg U7. Bibliography 1914 Taylor City Directory. Adamson, Joe. Tex Avery: King of Cartoons. USA: Da Capo Press, 1975. Barrier, Michael. Hollywood Cartoons: American Animation in its Golden Age. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999. Batte, Lelia M. History of Milam County, Texas. San Antonio: The Naylor Company, 1956. Beck, Jerry. The 50 Greatest Cartoons: As Selected by 1,000 Animation Professionals. Atlanta: Turner Publishing, 1994. Canemaker, John. Tex Avery: The MGM Years, 1942-1955.

Atlanta: Turner Publishing, Inc., 1996. Curtis, Scott. “Tex Avery’s Prison House of Animation, or Humor and Boredom in Studio Cartoons.” In Funny Pictures, edited by Daniel Goldmark and Charlie Keil, 211-227. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2011. Gabilliet, Jean-Paul. Of Comics and Men: A Cultural History of American Comic Books. Translated by Bart Beaty and Nick Nguyen. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2010, 6. Folkart, Burt A. “Breeder of This Bunny Gave ‘What’s Up, Doc?’ to World.” Los Angeles Times, September, 1, 1908, pg. A20. Guillot, Dorothy, “Stars of the Animateds and How They Grow,” The Dallas Morning News, April 2, 1933, pg. 3. Jones, Chuck. “A Farewell to A Funny Genius.” Los Angeles Times, August 31, 1980, pg U7. Lenburg, Jeff.

Tex Avery: Hollywood’s Master of Screwball Cartoons. New York: Infobase Publishing, 2011. Michna, Irene K. Images of America: Taylor. Charleston: Arcadia Publishing, 2011. Morris, Gary. “A Quickie Look At The Life & Career of Tex Avery,” Bright Lights Journal No. 22 (September 1998), (accessed April 15, 2013). North Dallas High School. The Viking. Dallas, 1926. Official Census, City of Taylor, Texas Williamson County 1883 and 1889. Place-Verghnes, Floriane. Tex Avery: A Unique Legacy (1942-1955). Malaysia: John Libby Publishing, 2006. Scarbrough, Clara Stearns. Land of Good Water Takachue Pouetsu: A Williamson County, Texas, History. Georgetown: Williamson County Sun Publishers, 1973. Taylor Daily Press. Taylor and Neighbors Then and Now 1876-1994. Missouri: D-Books Publishing, Inc., 1994.

United States Census, 1880. Williamson County Deed Records, County Clerk’s Office, Williamson County Justice Center, Georgetown, Texas: 56/552. Tex Avery | Looney Tunes Wiki | Fandom powered by Wikia Avery ended up directing only four Bugs Bunny cartoons: A Wild Hare, Tortoise Beats Hare , All This and Rabbit Stew , and The Heckling Hare . During this period, he also directed a number of one-shot shorts, including travelogue parodies ( The Isle of Pingo Pongo ), fractured fairy-tales ( The Bear's Tale ), Hollywood caricature films ( Hollywood Steps Out ), and cartoons featuring Bugs Bunny clones ( The Crack-Pot Quail ). Avery's tenure at the Schlesinger studio ended in late 1941, when he and the producer quarreled over the ending to The Heckling Hare. In Avery's original version, Bugs and hunting dog were to fall off of a cliff three times, milking the gag to its comic extreme.

According to a DVD commentary for the cartoon, historian and animator Greg Ford explained that the problem Schlesinger had with the ending was that, just prior to falling off the third time, Bugs and the dog were to turn to the screen, with Bugs saying "Hold on to your hats, folks, here we go again!" It's thought that this was the punchline to a well-known risqué joke of the day. Schlesinger intervened (supposedly on orders from Jack Warner himself, although it's doubtful Warner would be screening cartoons unless alerted to this particular content), and edited the film so that the characters only fall off the cliff twice (the edited cartoon ends abruptly, after Bugs and the Dog fall through a hole in a cliff and immediately stop short of the ground, saying to the audience, "Heh, fooled you, didn't we?"). An enraged Avery promptly quit the studio, leaving three cartoons he started on but did not complete. They were Crazy Cruise , The Cagey Canary and Aloha Hooey . Bob Clampett picked up where Avery left off and completed the three cartoons. Speaking of Animals While at Schlesinger, Avery created a concept of animating lip movement to live action footage of animals.

Schlesinger was not interested in Avery's idea, so Avery approached Jerry Fairbanks, a friend of his who produced the "Unusual Occupations" series of short subjects for Paramount Pictures. Fairbanks liked the idea and the "Speaking of Animals" series of shorts was launched. When Avery left Warner, he went straight to Paramount to work on the first three shorts in the series before joining MGM. Avery at MGM By 1942, Avery was in the employ of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, working in their cartoon division under the supervision of Fred Quimby. Avery felt that Schlesinger had stifled him. At MGM, Avery's creativity reached its peak. His cartoons became known for their sheer lunacy, breakneck pace, and a penchant for playing with the medium of animation and film in general that few other directors dared to approach. MGM also offered him larger budgets and a higher quality production level than the Warners studio. Plus, his unit was filled with ex-Disney artists such as Preston Blair and Ed Love. These changes were evident in Avery's first short released by MGM, The Blitz Wolf, an Adolf Hitler parody which was nominated for the Academy Award for Animated Short Film Tex Avery with Fred Quimby.

(Cartoons) in 1942. Avery's most famous MGM character debuted in 1943's "Dumb-Hounded". Droopy (originally "Happy Hound") was a calm, little, slow-moving and slow-talking dog who still won out in the end. He also created a series of risqué cartoons, beginning with 1943's "Red Hot Riding Hood", featuring a sexy female star who never had a set name but has been unofficially referred to as "Red" by fans. Her visual design and voice varied somewhat between shorts. Other Avery characters at MGM included Screwy Squirrel and the "Of Mice and Men"-inspired duo of George and Junior. Other notable MGM cartoons directed by Avery include "Bad Luck Blackie", "Cellbound", "Magical Maestro", "Lucky Ducky", "Ventriloquist Cat" and "King-Size Canary". Avery began his stint at MGM working with lush colors and realistic backgrounds, but he slowly abandoned this style for a more frenetic, less realistic approach.

The newer, more stylized look reflected the influence of the up-and-coming UPA studio, the need to cut costs as budgets grew higher, and Avery's own desire to leave reality behind and make cartoons that were not tied to the real world of live action. During this period, he made a notable series of films which explored the technology of the future: The House of Tomorrow, The Car of Tomorrow, The Farm of Tomorrow and TV of Tomorrow (spoofing common live-action promotional shorts of the time). He also introduced a slow-talking wolf character, who was the prototype for MGM associates Hanna-Barbera's Huckleberry Hound character, right down to the voice by Daws Butler . Avery took a year's sabbatical from MGM beginning in 1950 (to recover from overwork), during which time Dick Lundy, recently arrived from the Walter Lantz studio, took over his unit and made one Droopy cartoon, as well as a string of shorts with an old character, Barney Bear. Avery returned to MGM in October 1951 and began working again.

Avery's last two original cartoons for MGM were "Deputy Droopy and Cellbound", completed in 1953 and released in 1955. They were co-directed by Avery unit animator Michael Lah. Lah began directing a handful of CinemaScope Droopy shorts on his own. A burnt-out Avery left MGM in 1953 to return to the Walter Lantz studio. After MGM Avery's return to the Lantz studio did not last long. He directed four cartoons in 1954-1955: the one-shots "Crazy Mixed-Up Pup", and "Shh-h-h-h-h", and "I'm Cold" and "The Legend of Rockabye Point", in which he defined the character of Chilly Willy the penguin. Although "The Legend of Rockabye Point" and "Crazy Mixed-Up Pup" were nominated for Academy Awards, Avery left Lantz over a salary dispute, effectively ending his career in theatrical animation.

He turned to animated television commercials, most notably the Raid commercials of the 1960s and 1970s (in which cartoon insects, confronted by the bug killer, screamed "RAID!" and died flamboyantly) and Frito-Lay's controversial mascot, the Frito Bandito. Avery also produced ads for Kool-Aid fruit drinks starring the Warner Bros. characters he had once helped create during his Termite Terrace days. During the 1960s and 1970s, Avery became increasingly reserved and depressed, although he continued to draw respect from his peers. His final employer was Hanna-Barbera Productions, where he wrote gags for Saturday morning cartoons such as the Droopy-esque "Kwicky Koala". On Tuesday, August 26, 1980, Avery died of liver cancer at St. Joseph's Hospital in Burbank, California at age 72. He is buried in Forest Lawn - Hollywood Hills Cemetery. Legacy The Title Sequence to The Tex Avery Show, which showcased his works.

Although Tex Avery did not live to experience the late-1980s renaissance of animation, his work was rediscovered and he began to receive widespread attention and praise by the modern animation and film communities. His influence is strongly reflected in modern cartoons such as Roger Rabbit, Ren and Stimpy, Oggy and the Cockroaches, Animaniacs , Freakazoid, SpongeBob SquarePants, and the Genie character in Disney's Aladdin. In fact, an Averyesque cowboy character bore his name in the otherwise unrelated series "The Wacky World of Tex Avery". His work has been honored on shows such as "The Tex Avery Show" and "Cartoon Alley". His characters (particularly Bugs Bunny and the risqué antics of Red Hot Riding Hood) were referenced in the Jim Carrey film "The Mask". In the mid 1990s, Dark Horse Comics released a trio of three-issue miniseries that were openly labelled tributes to Avery's MGM cartoons, Wolf & Red, Droopy, and Screwy Squirrel. It should also be noted that Tex Avery, unlike most Warner Brothers directors, kept many original title frames of his cartoons, several otherwise lost due to Blue Ribbon Reissues .

Rare prints and art containing original titles and unedited animation from Avery's MGM and Warner Bros. cartoons are now usually sold on eBay or in the collections of animators and cartoon enthusiasts. In 2008 France issued three stamps honoring Tex Avery for his 100th birthday, depicting Droopy, the redheaded showgirl, and the wolf. Today, the copyrights to all classic color cartoons directed by Avery at Warners and MGM are owned by Turner Entertainment , with Warner Bros. handling distribution. (WB owns the black-and-white cartoons directly.) Turner and WB are both units of Time Warner . The cartoons he directed at the Lantz studio are owned by their original distributors, Universal Studios. A few of Avery's WB and MGM shorts are in the public domain, but WB and Turner hold the original film elements. All of his MGM shorts were released in a North American MGM/UA laserdisc set called "The Complete Tex Avery".

While one cartoon on the set was an edited version, this being the blackface gag in "Droopy's Good Deed", others, including the "politically incorrect" "Uncle Tom's Cabana" and "Half-Pint Pygmy" were included intact (although these were removed from the Region 2 DVD release, now out of print). . Several of his cartoons were released on VHS, in four volumes of "Tex Avery's Screwball Classics", two Droopy collections, and various inclusions on MGM animation collection releases, with many gags edited out for television showings left in. Avery's Droopy cartoons are available on the DVD set "Tex Avery's Droopy: The Complete Theatrical Collection". [6] The seven Droopy cartoons produced in CinemaScope were included here in their original widescreen versions (albeit letter-boxed), instead of the pan and scan versions regularly broadcast on television. Also, some of his works could be found on home video releases (from VHS to Blu-ray) of Warner Bros.' Merrie Melodies and Looney Tunes shorts, and the same is true of his few Lantz Studio cartoons.

Although his complete collection of MGM cartoons were released by fans on DVD as bootlegs, [7] [8] Warner Home Video and Turner currently have no plans to officially re-release the cartoons themselves on DVD or Blu-ray, although a selection of Tex's films did appear, un-restored, on the Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 2 release. [9] Films directed or co-directed by Tex Avery Tex Avery | The Cartoon Network Wiki | Fandom powered by Wikia Share Frederick Bean "Tex" Avery (February 26, 1908 – August 26, 1980) was an American animator, cartoonist, voice actor and director, famous for producing animated cartoons during The Golden Age of Hollywood animation. He did his most significant work for the Warner Bros. and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios, creating the characters of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Droopy, Screwy Squirrel, and developing Porky Pig and Chilly Willy (this last one for the Walter Lantz Studio) into the personas for which they are remembered.

Avery's style of directing encouraged animators to stretch the boundaries of the medium to do things in a cartoon that could not be done in the world of live-action film. An often-quoted line about Avery's cartoons was, "In a cartoon you can do anything."[2] He also performed a great deal of voice work in his cartoons, usually throwaway bits (e.g. the Santa Claus seen briefly in "Who Killed Who?"), but Tex also voiced Junior from George and Junior and occasionally filled in for Bill Thompson as Droopy. In 1996 Cartoon Network produced an animated showcase series that featured MGM and WB cartoons created by Avery, titled The Tex Avery Show . The series aired on the network until June 2004, when it was moved to Cartoon Network's sister network Boomerang . Cartoons directed or co-directed by Tex Avery Warner Bros. Tex Avery | Wikicartoon | Fandom powered by Wikia [ show ] Themes From Texas Tex Avery was born in Taylor, Texas on February 26, 1908. [1] Almost as important as the location of his birth was its time period of the early nineteen-hundreds.

Up until 1927, when he graduated high school and left Texas, Avery was immersed in a society with segregated education, resistance to woman’s suffrage, enthusiastic involvement in World War I, and a resurging Ku Klux Klan. [2] Additionally, he was growing up in a culture rich with American folk stories and absurd, exaggerated tall tales. Although his stay in Texas was short, only nineteen years, it was significant enough to impact his perspective on life and create a lifelong yearning for his home state. Patriotism: One of Avery’s prevalent Texas inspired themes is the praise and satire of patriotism and American society. Since much of the developed world was torn apart by World War II, Americans were increasingly proud of their rapidly expanding capitalism and financial well being. [3] Avery used this idea of ever expanding consumerism to parody American society in The … of Tomorrow series in which typical Americans are depicted purchasing the newest goods no matter whether they are useful or not.

He used this idea of wasteful "affluenza" further by setting the general tone of money hording, and wealth in general, as evil; poverty, on the other hand, is almost always something that afflicts the hero of Avery’s cartoons rather than the villain. A good example of this is Uncle Tom’s Cabaña . In this cartoon Avery depicts the antagonist as evil Simon Legree, a man who is literally “rolling in dough.” The victim is little old Uncle Tom, a kind man who is starving and extremely impoverished. This consistent portrayal of money is a reflection of Avery’s childhood in Texas. While the oil economy of Texas enjoyed a slight boost in the early 1920s, during World War I most Texans had to conserve resources with “wheatless Mondays, meatless Tuesdays, and porkless Thursdays and Saturdays” [4] . Even after he left Texas, Avery witnessed American poverty in the Great Depression, a reoccurring reference in his cartoons. The hard times that Avery saw and faced early in his life seem to have affected his views on frugality and greed and consequently influenced his characters and stories. Women: A more clear effect of Avery’s Texan roots is the portrayal of women in his cartoons.

Women are usually depicted as intellectually inferior to men and completely dependent upon them. He most commonly used them as sex symbols with super-feminine qualities. One instance of feminine lightheadedness occurs in The Car of Tomorrow, in which a car is advertised that can display erratic turn signals in sync with a confused woman driver. Even more abundant are the showgirls that show up as sex symbols in Avery’s cartoons. This occurs in Red Hot Riding Hood , Uncle Tom’s Cabaña , and many other shorts where an oversexed, hyper-feminine woman is depicted singing some nostalgic song in a night club. However, even though this is a clearly jaded view of women, it is not surprising given the strong history of poor women’s rights in Texas. As James Ferguson, governor of Texas from 1915 to 1917, was often quoted in response to woman’s suffrage, “Women’s place is in the home”. [5] Clearly, this aspect of Avery’s work has strong ties to his childhood. Racism: In a similar vein, many of Avery’s cartoons also exhibit racism and stereotyping towards blacks. Since he grew up undergoing a segregated education, his interaction with minorities was at a minimum.

[6] Furthermore, after World War I in Texas, the Ku Klux Klan and social tension towards minorities were growing rapidly. [7] In a contemporary sense, Tex Avery was not racist but was merely giving witness to the trends of society and racial stereotypes with his cartoons. This is not to say that he did not agree with many of these biased views, he just was not trying to undermine other races. Throughout many of his cartoons, blacks are depicted as savage, primitive, and of a lower social status than whites or even women. He stereotypes blacks heavily by adorning characters that are turned a dark shade with sudden bones and savage jewelry. This occurs in Magical Maestro , when an opera singer is sprayed with ink and suddenly begins singing the blues. Even with this prominent racial humiliation, Avery’s intent is still clear; his goal was always comedy, not a strict adherence to any prejudices he might have had. Unique Style Rhythm and exaggeration: Tex Avery cartoons exhibit maddening speed and an inexhaustible amount of gags. There is such of an overload of visual and narrative information that it is somewhat tiring to watch a long session of his cartoons.

This method of performing gags ridiculously fast makes even mild or dry gags seem hilarious due to their speed. Gags are carefully timed and build upon one another in a crescendo of speed and exaggeration. In Tex Avery cartoons, nothing is done on a small scale. Big is earth-size, fast is almost instantaneous movement from one country to another, and violence is excessive. One explanation for this comedy is that portraying impossible feats that cannot be performed in live-action film is funny. In Dumb-Hounded a wolf character runs from America to the North Pole in a matter of seconds. He continues to run around the globe in an increasingly desperate and rapid pace. In Bad Luck Blackie the cartoon starts by using bad luck to call down flower pots from the sky. By the end of the short steam rollers, cruise ships, and air planes are falling from the heavens. Reflexivity: Avery's cartoons contain a large amount of reflexivity because they acknowledge they are cartoons. The characters are always conscious of this fact and frequently use this to their advantage. This effectively distances the audience from the animated world and shows how blatantly artificial it is.

By alerting the audience that it is obviously watching a cartoon, Avery changes the perspective from a story in another world into a chaotic upheaval of images come to life. He does this with a variety of methods, including blatant signs, dialogues between the characters and the audience, and even having characters run off the film strip. Screwball Squirrel in his self-titled short manipulates the paper nature of drawings to "flip" to a future panel in the animation. The wolf in Dumb-Hounded runs so fast across the screen that he slides out of the frame revealing the border of the film strip. In Red Hot Riding Hood the characters complain to the director about how tired they are of "acting out" the same old story. This provokes a response from the ominous director. In The Early Bird Dood It the characters stop during a chase scene to comment on a billboard advertising their cartoon. Droopy in Northwest Hounded Police takes a moment after a few similar chase scenes to tell the audience, "I surprise him like this all through the picture." Cartoon Physical Laws: The laws of nature are transformed in Avery cartoons to the point where they show little resemblance to actual physical laws.

Similarly, figuration is so bizarre that it is clear the resulting animated world is very distant from our own. The choices for how nature acts are of the moment, always changing, and usually unexpected. Anti-Disney Avery's style of directing broke the mold of strict realism established by Walt Disney, and encouraged animators to stretch the boundaries of the medium to do things in a cartoon that could not be done in the world of live-action film. An often-quoted line about Avery's cartoons was, "In a cartoon you can do anything," and his cartoons often did just that. Films directed or co-directed by Tex Avery Warner Bros.

Question: Which American animator created Daffy Duck and Droopy Dog?
Answer: Tex Avery