Stage Door Cartoon is a 1944 Merrie Melodies short directed by I. Freleng.
Title[]
The title is a play on the 1943 film Stage Door Canteen.
Plot[]
Elmer, with a fishing pole, faces the audience that he is actually hunting a "certain scwewy wabbit". He hooks a carrot to the fishing hook in an attempt to catch Bugs, who turns the tables on Elmer by attaching the hook to his pants and "reeling" him in. Bugs then throws Elmer back for being too small and ends up getting chased to a Vaudeville theater. When Elmer enter the stage, he started becoming fascinated by the can-can dancers, and went up to the private box to get a better view. When one of the women reveals to be Bugs, Elmer snaps out of it and blasted at the rabbit. After failing to get off the stage while trying to escape Elmer, Bugs gets a chance to do his tap-dance routine, one of his recurring schticks. Elmer sneaks up on Bugs while hiding inside the grand piano, but Bugs begins playing the musical instrument to prevent Elmer from shooting him. Then Bugs then tricks the shy Elmer onto the stage, forcing him into performing a high-diving act. Bugs replaces the tank of water with an ordinary glass to which Elmer landed in.
After retreating into the dressing room, Bugs makes Elmer wear a Shakespearean costume and prompts him through some classic acting emotive poses. Segued into face-making at the audience draws a tomato in the face from the jeering crowd. Then he tricks Elmer into doing a "strip-tease." Finally, Bugs disguises himself as a southern sheriff, just as a real one arrests Elmer for indecent southern exposure. Before leaving the theater, a Bugs Bunny cartoon begins on the movie screen and the sheriff decides to stay and watch it. Elmer appears to get wise when the cartoon shows the scene where Bugs disguises himself as the sheriff. Elmer, thinking the sheriff really is Bugs, calls the sheriff an "impostor" and pulls off his clothes, but to his surprise, finds out he was actually sitting next to the real sheriff the entire time. The sheriff angrily proceeds to lead Elmer out of the theater with his shotgun, "You'll swing for this, suh!" Bugs conducts the orchestra into a big finale. He removes his conductor wig, laughs like and quotes Jimmy Durante.
Caricatures[]
- Red Skelton - "Here I am!"
- Jimmy Durante - "I got a million of 'em!"
- Jerry Colonna - "Silly, isn't he?"
Availability[]
Viddy-Oh! For Kids Cartoon Festivals: Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd Cartoon Festival Featuring "Wabbit Twouble"
Cartoon Moviestars: Bugs Vs. Elmer
The Golden Age of Looney Tunes, Volume 3, Side 2, Bugs Bunny
Bumper Edition (Woolworths Exclusive)
Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 2, Disc Four
Looney Tunes Spotlight Collection: Volume 2, Disc 2
Looney Tunes Collection All Stars Volume 3
Hollywood Canteen (USA 1995 Turner dubbed print)
Homefront
Looney Tunes Spotlight Collection Volumes 2-3 Repack
Looney Tunes Spotlight Collection Volumes 1-3 Repack
Goofs[]
- When Bugs takes Elmer's fishing rod away from him, he pulls on the rod and Elmer goes through the hole that Bugs burrowed through and out of Bugs' home, but when Bugs walks off after throwing Elmer away, the hole that he burrowed through is gone.
- When Bugs is conducting the orchestra at the end of the short, the stand in front of him is black but changes to brown in the next shot.
Notes[]
- This is the first cartoon to feature Bugs' signature song "What's Up Doc?" playing during the title card.
- This cartoon also marks the debut of "Untitled Soft Shoe Number", another original music score by Carl Stalling. Animation of Bugs dancing to this music cue would later be re-used in "Bugs Bunny Rides Again " and "Hot Cross Bunny " (both from 1948).
- Bugs' goofy yell to Elmer, "Here I ya-um!" was a catchphrase used by radio star Red Skelton's country bumpkin character "Clem Kadiddlehopper".
- A sign for "5 Clampett Trained Seals" appears backstage. This was one of the first Freleng cartoons to feature backgrounds by Paul Julian, who enjoyed sneaking such in-jokes into his work.
- According to the Toonheads episode "Before They Were Stars", the Southern sheriff who arrests Elmer is said to be the prototype to Yosemite Sam. This prototype version is a little taller (almost as tall as Bugs), older (the white hair), and is a good-to-neutral character who actually likes Bugs Bunny and his cartoons. Contrast with the official version of Yosemite Sam, who is shorter, meaner, has red hair, mostly plays a Western outlaw instead of a Western character who upholds the law, and hates rabbits (Bugs, specifically).
- Bugs' final line, "I got a million of 'em!" was a Jimmy Durante catchphrase; Bugs also mimics Durante's standard body language while saying it.
- Some aspects in the cartoon would be used in later show business-themed Bugs Bunny cartoons such as "High Diving Hare" and Rabbit of Seville".
- The basic plotline was re-used in the 1949 Bugs-and-Elmer cartoon, "Hare Do" and again in the 1950 Bugs-and-Elmer cartoon, "Rabbit of Seville", albeit with the latter incorporating opera-themed music and gags as well.
- A modified version of the high dive is used in the 1949 cartoon "Hare Do" where Bugs tricks a blindfolded Elmer into riding a unicycle from a wire high above a stage into the jaws of a man-eating lion, with the result having an ending reminiscent to the ending of "A Day at the Zoo" (1939), which featured an earlier version of Elmer Fudd being swallowed up by a lion.
- Five years later, the high-diving gag from this cartoon is later used as the entire plot device for "High Diving Hare" (1949), where Yosemite Sam forces Bugs Bunny to perform the high-diving act when Fearless Freep is unavailable.
- When a Bugs Bunny cartoon began playing smack dab in the middle of the cartoon, this breaks the fourth wall.
- This short was the first to bear the full legend byline "WARNER BROS. PICTURES INC" and "A WARNER BROS. CARTOON", both of which would be used until 1964. However, this short only bears those bylines on the opening titles. The ending titles still have the bylines "Produced by WARNER BROS. CARTOONS INC" and the small "RELEASED BY WARNER BROS. PICTURES INC". Starting with the 1945–46 season, the latter would be removed and the former would change to "A WARNER BROS. CARTOON".
Gallery[]
Quote[]
Elmer Fudd: Hey, wait a minute, you imposter. You no sheriff, you're a rabbit in disguised. Of with it you trickster.
References[]
External links[]
- "Stage Door Cartoon" on the SFX Resource