The Fair Haired Hare

The Fair Haired Hare
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Airdate:	14 April 1951
Series:	Looney Tunes
MPAA Number:	13729
Production Number:	1165
Vitaphone Number:	1968
Runtime:	7 minutes, 13 seconds
Copyright Renewed:	27 December 1977
Starring:	Bugs Bunny Yosemite Sam
Crew
Voice Characterizations:	Mel Blanc
Director:	I. Freleng
Written By:	Warren Foster
Producer:	Eddie Selzer (uncredited)
Animated By:	Manuel Perez Virgil Ross Arthur Davis Ken Champin John Carey
Layout Artist:	Hawley Pratt
Background Artist:	Paul Julian
Film Editor:	Treg Brown (uncredited)
Musician:	Carl Stalling

The Fair Haired Hare is a 1951 Looney Tunes short directed by I. Freleng.

Plot

Bugs Bunny, contentedly singing "Home on the Range", adding that rabbits also live on the prairie, is startled after Yosemite Sam builds a cabin above his rabbit hole. Bugs tries to find out what's going on, interrupting Sam's banjo rendition of "Git Along, Little Dogies". Sam attributes this disturbance to mice. Bugs saws a hole and climbs out through a bearskin rug, causing the bunny to struggle to crawl out while calling for help. Sam shoots the rug repeatedly and says, "Playin' possum for twenty years! That'll learn ya!" The two then begin quarreling over who has rights to the property. Bugs claims he was there first and should live there undisturbed. "Oh, uh, there must be some mistake. You see, through some error you built your house on my property. I'm afraid I'll have to ask ya to move it, doc." Sam isn't interested in listening to a rabbit's opinion and instead throws Bugs out of his house. "What?! Ooh, listen, rabbit! Yosemite Sam never makes a mistake! Now get that flea-bitten carcass offin' my real estate! AND STAY OUT!"

Bugs decides this may be a civil matter and decides to go to "the highest court in the country." They literally go to the "highest court" in the land, atop a mountain. There, the judge declares that both Bugs and Sam shall share the land equally ... "and in the event that one of you should pass on, the other shall inherit the entire property." Sam chuckles evilly, making Bugs uneasy.

Sam repeatedly tries to kill Bugs, but all of his schemes go awry:

That night, the two bunk in the same bedroom, their beds on opposite sides of a window. "Good night, varmint!", "Uh, good night." After Sam turns out the light, Sam tries to sneak over to Bugs' bed to klunk him on the head. Bugs turns on the light in time, causing Sam to make the hasty excuse, "Carpet keeps rolling up! Good night, critter!" He does this as he pretends to bang the floor. Sam makes a second attempt, and indeed someone does suffer a concussion — Sam, as Bugs has hit his antagonist on the head. "There, that oughta keep that carpet flat!", "Good night, varmint, critter!"

At breakfast, Sam tries slipping a Mickey Finn into Bugs' carrot juice, while Bugs is in the bathroom. However, Bugs is wise and trades the drug-laced drink with Sam's. When Sam refuses, Bugs plays a game of roulette. "Round she goes!" Sam loses his patience and orders Bugs to drink at gunpoint. Bugs does, but only after Sam drinks his. Nothing happens to Bugs, making Sam realize that he has consumed the poisoned juice, moments before he blasts off into the sky.

Sam runs back and immediately chases Bugs back into his hole. He packs the hole with explosives. However, Bugs diverts the dynamite under the house foundation. Sam then lights the fuse, but realizes too late that his house is about to be blown up. The cabin flies upwards. A dazed Sam, upon realizing his fate, remarks, "I've got a cabin in the sky!"

Availability

(1992) VHS
Bugs Bunny Truth or Hare

(1993) VHS
Stark Raving Looneys

(1993) LaserDisc
Winner by a Hare: 14 of Bugs Bunny's Best

(1993) VHS
Unforgiven (UK rental only)

(1995) VHS
Special Bumper Collection (Vol. 2)

(2020) Blu-ray
Bugs Bunny 80th Anniversary Collection, Disc 2 (restored and HD)

Streaming

Boomerang App ( - 2024)

HBO Max (2020 - 2022) (restored)

Max (2024 - ) (restored)

Censorship

• The version of this cartoon that aired on ABC's The Bugs Bunny and Tweety Show cut the part where Bugs gets stuck in a bearskin rug and Sam shoots at it to release Bugs.

Notes

• This is the first short released in which Yosemite Sam was drawn with his mouth in his red mustache for almost the entire film, barring the scene in court, and the scene after Sam drinks the carrot juice, where his bottom lip can be seen. It is also one of the few cartoons where Sam refers to Bugs by name ("Bugsy").
• Sam's last line is a reference to Cabin in the Sky, a 1943 MGM film based on the Broadway play of the same name.
• The audio for the "Home on the Range" song sung by Bugs would be used for the ending of the TV special How Bugs Bunny Won the West.
• The scene where Sam fires several pistol shots at Bugs (when trapped in the bear skin rug), along with the "playing possum for twenty years" line, would later be partially referenced in "Muzzle Tough".
• The title of this short was previously used as a working title for "A-Lad-In His Lamp."
• This cartoon, alongside "Hare We Go" and "Rabbit Every Monday" are the only cartoons from 1951 to not get a Blue Ribbon reissue. Coincidentally, all of these cartoons star Bugs Bunny.
• This cartoon was originally slated to be included on the Looney Tunes Super Stars' Bugs Bunny: Hare Extraordinaire DVD, but was replaced early in development due to executive backlash from Warner Home Video.

Gallery

Lobby card

Lobby card

External links

• The Fair Haired Hare on the SFX Resource