Bugs Bunny

Template:WBToonChar Bugs Bunny is an animated rabbit/hare who appears in the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of animated films produced by Warner Bros. Cartoons. According to his biography, he was "born" in 1939 in Brooklyn, New York City, New York and the product of many creators: Ben "Bugs" Hardaway (who created a prototypical version of Bugs Bunny known around Termite Terrace as Bugs' Bunny) Bob Clampett, Tex Avery (who directed A Wild Hare, considered Bugs' formal film debut), Robert McKimson (who created the definitive Bugs Bunny character design), Chuck Jones, and Friz Freleng.

According to Mel Blanc, the character's original voice actor, Bugs Bunny's accent is an equal blend of the Bronx and Brooklyn dialects. However, Tex Avery claims that he asked Blanc to give the character not a New York accent per se, but a voice like that of actor Frank McHugh, who frequently appeared in supporting roles in the 1930s and whose voice might be described as New York Irish. Bugs Bunny is one of the most popular and recognizable cartoon characters in the world. In 2002, he was named by TV Guide as the greatest cartoon character of all time.

History

- ===Early influences===

- A number of animation historians believe Bugs Bunny to have been influenced by an earlier Disney character called Max Hare. Max, designed by Charlie Thorson, first appeared in the Silly Symphony The Tortoise and the Hare, directed by Wilfred Jackson. Tex Avery, one of Bugs' creators, did admit to have copied Bugs' design from Max, although Avery's design of Bugs was less cute and innocent looking than Thorson's design of Max, so that Bugs' appearance would fit better with his sarcastic demeanor. Avery has been quoted as saying: "I practically stole it. It’s a wonder I wasn’t sued. The construction was almost identical." In fact, it was the drawing by Bugs Hardaway in 1938 that was chosen from among others as the direction for the character's personality. This drawing came to be known around the "Termite Terrace" as Bugs' Bunny, when the possessive apostrophe was eventually dropped, the name stuck. Bugs himself would eventually appear in three variations on The Tortoise and the Hare. - - Bugs eventually evolved a personality of detachment, often quipping no matter how immediate the danger he was in was. The way Bugs used his carrot is also similar to the way Groucho Marx used his cigar. One of Bugs' most popular catch-phrases, "Of course you realize (or 'know'), this means war!" was originally said by Groucho (and other cast members) in films such as Duck Soup and A Night at the Opera. - - ===Development=== -

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File:Bugsbunnyproto.jpg

Prototype Bugs Bunny made his debut in Porky's Hare Hunt (1938)

- - The prototype Bugs Bunny first appeared in the cartoon short Porky's Hare Hunt, released on April 30, 1938. The short was co-directed by Cal Dalton and Ben Hardaway. The cartoon had an almost identical theme to a 1937 cartoon, Porky's Duck Hunt, directed by Tex Avery and which introduced Daffy Duck. Following the general plot of this earlier film, the short cast Porky Pig as a hunter against an equally nutty prey more interested in driving his hunter insane than running away. But instead of a black duck, his current prey was a tiny, white rabbit. This character introduces himself with the expression "Jiggers, fellers," and Mel Blanc gave the rabbit a voice and laugh that he would later use to voice Woody Woodpecker. In this cartoon, he also reflected a famous Groucho Marx line that Bugs would use many times (from the movie Duck Soup): "Of course, you know this means war!" - - The second appearance was in 1939's Prest-O Change-O, directed by Chuck Jones, where he serves as the pet rabbit of Sham-Fu the Magician, an unseen character. When two dogs enter the house of his absent master while seeking refuge from the local dog catcher, the rabbit starts harassing them, but is ultimately bested by the bigger of the two dogs. - - His third appearance was in another 1939 cartoon, Hare-um Scare-um, directed by Dalton and Hardaway. This short was the first where he was depicted as a gray bunny instead of a white one. The short is also notable for featuring the rabbit's first singing role and also the first time he dresses in drag to seduce his antagonist. Charlie Thorson, lead animator on the short, was the first to give a name to the character. He had written "Bugs' Bunny" on the model sheet that he drew for Hardaway, implying that he considered the rabbit model sheet to be Hardaway's property. In promotional material for the short (such as a surviving 1939 presskit), the name on the model sheet was altered to become the rabbit's own name: "Bugs" Bunny (quotation marks only used at the very beginning), evidently named in honor of Hardaway. - - In Jones' Elmer's Candid Camera the rabbit encountered Elmer Fudd. - In Robert Clampett's 1940 Patient Porky, a similar rabbit appears to trick the audience into thinking that 750 rabbits have been born (however the design is from the cartoon A Wild Hare). - - In his later years Mel Blanc described that a proposed name was "Happy Rabbit," but there is no evidence that this name was ever used by anybody else. - - ===Bugs emerges===

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Bugs Bunny in All This and Rabbit Stew (1941)

- - Bugs Bunny's first official appearance was in A Wild Hare, directed by Tex Avery and released on July 27,1940. It was in this cartoon that he first emerged from his rabbit hole to ask Elmer Fudd, now a hunter, "What's up, Doc?" It was also the first meeting of the two characters in their fully developed forms. It is considered the first fully developed appearance of the character. Animation historian Joe Adamson counts A Wild Hare as the first "official" Bugs Bunny short. It is also the first cartoon where Mel Blanc uses the version of Bugs' voice that would become the standard. - Bugs' second appearance in Chuck Jones' Elmer's Pet Rabbit finally introduced the audience to the name Bugs Bunny, which up till then was only used among the Termite Terrace employees. However, the rabbit here is absolutely identical to the one in Jones' earlier Elmer's Candid Camera, both visually and vocally. It was also the first short where he received billing under his now-famous name, but the card, "with Bugs Bunny," was just slapped on the end of the completed short's opening titles when A Wild Hare proved an unexpected success. He would soon become the most prominent of the Looney Tunes characters as his calm, flippant insouciance endeared him to American audiences during and after World War II. - - Bugs would appear in five more shorts during 1941: Tortoise Beats Hare, directed by Tex Avery and featuring the first appearance of Cecil Turtle; Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt, the first Bugs Bunny short to be directed by Friz Freleng; All This and Rabbit Stew, directed by Avery and featuring a young African-American hunter as Bugs' antagonist; The Heckling Hare, the final Bugs short Avery worked on before being fired and leaving for MGM; and Wabbit Twouble, the first Bugs short directed by Robert Clampett. Wabbit Twouble was also the first of five Bugs shorts to feature a chubbier remodel of Elmer Fudd, a short-lived attempt to have Fudd more closely resemble his voice actor, comedian Arthur Q. Bryan. - - ===World War II===

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Bugs Bunny in the censored scene from Fresh Hare (1942)

- By 1942, Bugs had become the number one star of the Merrie Melodies series, which had originally been intended only for one-shot characters in shorts. Bugs' 1942 shorts included Friz Freleng's The Wabbit Who Came to Supper, Robert Clampett's The Wacky Wabbit, and Clampett's Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid (which introduced Beaky Buzzard). Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid also marks a slight redesign of Bugs, making his front teeth less prominent and his head rounder. The man responsible for this redesign was Robert McKimson, at the time working as an animator under Robert Clampett. The redesign at first was only used in the shorts created by Clampett's production team but in time it would be adopted by the other directors: It was mainly used in the Friz Freleng unit and, starting in 1949, Robert McKimson's as well; Jones would come up with his own slight modification, and the voice as well would vary mildly between the units. - - Other 1942 Bugs shorts included Chuck Jones' Hold the Lion, Please, Freleng's Fresh Hare and The Hare-Brained Hypnotist (which restored Elmer Fudd to his previous size), and Jones' Case of the Missing Hare. He also made cameo appearances in Tex Avery's final Warner Bros. short Crazy Cruise, and starred in the two-minute United States war bonds commercial film Any Bonds Today. -

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Bugs Bunny and a gremlin in Falling Hare (1943)

- Bugs Bunny was popular during the World War II years because of his bombastic attitude, and began receiving special star billing in his cartoons by 1943. Like Disney and Famous Studios had been doing, Warners put Bugs in opposition to the period's biggest enemies: Adolf Hitler, Hermann Goering, and the Japanese. The 1944 short Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips, features Bugs at odds with a group of Japanese soldiers. This cartoon has since been pulled from distribution due to its extreme racial stereotypes. - - Among his most notable civilian shorts during this period are Bob Clampett's Tortoise Wins by a Hare (the sequel to Tortoise Beats Hare from 1941), A Corny Concerto (a spoof of Disney's Fantasia), Falling Hare, and What's Cookin' Doc?; and Chuck Jones' Superman parody Super-Rabbit, and Friz Freleng's Little Red Riding Rabbit. The 1944 short Bugs Bunny and the Three Bears introduced Chuck Jones' The Three Bears characters. - - In the cartoon Super-Rabbit, Bugs was seen in the end wearing a USMC dress uniform. As a result, the United States Marine Corps made Bugs an honorary Marine Master Sergeant. - - In 1944, Bugs Bunny actually made a cameo appearance in Jasper Goes Hunting, a short produced by rival studio Paramount. In this cameo (animated by Robert McKimson with Mel Blanc providing voice), Bugs pops out of a rabbit hole, saying his usual catchphrase; Bugs then says, "I must be in the wrong picture" and then goes back in the hole. He also appeared fleetingly in the 1947 Arthur Davis cartoon The Goofy Gophers. - - ===The post-war era=== - Since then, Bugs has appeared in numerous cartoon shorts in the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series, making his last appearance in the theatrical cartoons in 1964 with False Hare. Considered an ideal actor, he was directed by Friz Freleng, Robert McKimson, Art Davis and Chuck Jones and appeared in feature films, including Who Framed Roger Rabbit (which featured the first-ever meeting between Bugs and his box-office rival Mickey Mouse), Space Jam (which co-starred Michael Jordan), and the 2003 movie Looney Tunes: Back in Action. - - The Bugs Bunny short Knighty Knight Bugs (1958), in which a medieval Bugs Bunny traded blows with Yosemite Sam and his fire-breathing dragon, won the Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons of 1958. Three of Chuck Jones' Bugs Bunny shorts--Rabbit Fire, Rabbit Seasoning, and Duck, Rabbit, Duck!--- comprise what is often referred to as the "Duck Season/Rabbit Season" trilogy, and are considered among the director's best works. Jones' 1957 classic, What's Opera, Doc?, features Bugs and Elmer parodying Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen, and has been deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry. It was the first cartoon short to have achieved this honor. It is also remembered for Elmer's unique take on "Ride of the Valkyries:" "Kill the wabbit, kill the wabbit, kill the wabbit...!" - - Bugs appeared in the 1957 short Show Biz Bugs with Daffy Duck, and it features a controversial finish in which Daffy Duck, in an attempt to wow the (partisan) audience, did a dangerous magical act in which he swallowed TNT, uranium-238, gunpowder, drank gasoline, and swallowed a match. That incident caused some TV stations, and in the 1990s the cable network TNT, to edit out that dangerous act, fearing that young kids may try to imitate it. - - In the fall of 1960, The Bugs Bunny Show, a television program which packaged many of the post-1948 Warners shorts with newly animated wraparounds, debuted on ABC. The show was originally aired in prime-time, and after two seasons it was moved to reruns on Saturday mornings. The Bugs Bunny Show changed format and exact title frequently (the packaging was completely different, with each short simply presented on its own, title and all, though some clips from the new bridging material was used as filler), but it remained on network television for 40 full years. - - ===After the classic cartoon era=== - When Mel Blanc died in 1989, Jeff Bergman, Joe Alaskey and Billy West became the new voices to Bugs Bunny and the rest of the Looney Tunes, taking turns doing the voices at various times. - - Bugs has also made appearances in animated specials for network television mostly composed of classic cartoons with bridging material added, including How Bugs Bunny Won the West, and The Bugs Bunny Mystery Special. 1980's Bugs Bunny's Busting Out All Over, however, contained no vintage clips and featured the first new Bugs Bunny cartoons in 16 years. It opened with "Portrait Of The Artist As a Young Bunny", which features a flashback of Bugs as a child thwarting a young Elmer Fudd, while its third and closing short was "Spaced Out Bunny", with Bugs being kidnapped by Marvin the Martian to be a playmate for Hugo, an Abominable Snowman-like character (a new Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner short filled out the half hour). Also, there have been various compilation films made , including the independently produced Bugs Bunny: Superstar (utilizing the vintage shorts then owned by United Artists), while Warner Bros. assembled The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie, The Looney Looney Looney Bugs Bunny Movie, Daffy Duck's Fantastic Island, Bugs Bunny's 3rd Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales and Daffy Duck's Quackbusters. He also made guest appearances in episodes of the 1990s television program Tiny Toon Adventures as the principal of Acme Looniversity and the mentor of Babs and Buster Bunny, and would later make occasional guest cameos on spin-offs Taz-Mania, Animaniacs and Histeria! - - He appears in the beginning of Gremlins 2: The New Batch, where he tries to ride the opening Warner Bros logo, but is interrupted by Daffy Duck. - - Bugs has had several comic book series over the years. Western Publishing had the license for all the Warner Brothers cartoons, and produced Bugs Bunny comics first for Dell Comics, then later for their own Gold Key Comics. Dell published 58 issues, and several specials from 1952 to 1962. Gold Key continued for another 133 issues. DC Comics, the sister/subsidiary company of Warner Bros., has been publishing several comics titles since 1994 that Bugs has appeared in. Notable among these was the 2000 four issue mini-series Superman & Bugs Bunny written by Mark Evanier and drawn by Joe Staton. This depicted a crossover between DC's superheroes and the Warner cartoon characters. -

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Bugs Bunny's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame

- - Like Mickey Mouse for The Walt Disney Company, Bugs has served as the mascot for Warner Bros. Studios and its various divisions. He and Mickey are the first cartoon characters to have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. - - In the 1988 animated/live action movie Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Bugs is shown as one of the inhabitants of Toon Town. However, since the movie was being made by Disney, Warner Brothers would only allow the use of their biggest toon star if he got an equal amount of screen time as Disney's biggest star, Mickey Mouse. Because of this, both characters are always together in frame when on the screen. They appear in a scene where they are skydiving while Eddie has no parachute, so Bugs offers him a "spare" which turns out to be a spare tire. They appear in the end as well, along with all the other toons. - - Bugs Bunny came back to the silver screen in Box Office Bunny in 1990. This was the first Bugs Bunny cartoon short since 1964 to be released to theaters, and it was created for the Bugs Bunny 50th Anniversary celebration. It was followed in 1991 by (Blooper) Bunny, a short that has gained a cult following among some animation fans for its edgy humor. - - Bugs made an appearance in the 1990 drug prevention video Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue. - - In 1997, Bugs appeared on a U.S. postage stamp, the first toon to be so honored, beating even the iconic Mickey Mouse. The stamp is number seven on the list of the ten most popular U.S. stamps, as calculated by the number of stamps purchased but not used. A younger version of Bugs is the main character of Baby Looney Tunes, which debuted on Cartoon Network in 2002. - - Also, Bugs has appeared in numerous video games, including the Bugs Bunny's Crazy Castle series, Bugs Bunny's Birthday Blow Out, Bugs Bunny: Rabbit Rampage and the similar Bugs Bunny In Double Trouble, Looney Tunes B-Ball, Space Jam, Looney Tunes Racing, Looney Tunes: Space Race, Bugs Bunny Lost in Time, and its sequel, Bugs Bunny and Taz Time Busters, and Looney Tunes: Back in Action and the new video game Looney Tunes: Acme Arsenal.

Personality and catchphrases

Bugs has feuded with Elmer Fudd, Yosemite Sam, Marvin the Martian, Beaky Buzzard, Daffy Duck, Witch Hazel, Rocky and Mugsy, Wile E. Coyote and a host of others. Bugs usually wins these conflicts, a plot pattern which recurs in Looney Toons films directed by Chuck Jones. Concerned that viewers would lose sympathy for an invariably triumphant protagonist, Jones had the antagonist characters repeatedly attempt to bully, cheat or threaten Bugs. When offended by the antagonism, Bugs' catchline was "Of course you realize, dis means war!" (this line was taken from Groucho Marx) Other directors, such as Friz Freleng, characterized Bugs as altruistic. When Bugs meets other successful characters, (such as Cecil Turtle in Tortoise Beats Hare, or, in World War II, the Gremlin of Falling Hare) his overconfidence becomes a disadvantage.

Bugs Bunny's nonchalant carrot-chewing standing position, as explained by Chuck Jones, Friz Freleng, and Bob Clampett, originated from a scene in the film It Happened One Night, in which Clark Gable's character leans against a fence, eating carrots rapidly and talking with his mouth full to Claudette Colbert's character. This scene was well-known while the film was popular, and viewers at the time likely recognized Bugs Bunny's behavior as satire.

The carrot-chewing scenes are generally followed by Bugs Bunny's most well-known catchphrase, "What's up, Doc?". The phrase was written by director Tex Avery for his first Bugs Bunny short, 1940's A Wild Hare. Avery explained later that it was a common expression in Texas, where he was from, and that he did not think much of the phrase. When the short was first screened in theaters, the "What's up, Doc?" scene received a tremendously positive audience reaction. As a result, the scene became a recurring element in subsequent films and cartoons. However, the phrase is not beyond editing, the most notable of which being whenever Bugs greets Daffy: "What's up, Duck?"

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Bugs says "And That's The End", from the closing title of the 1945 Looney Tunes short Hare Tonic and the 1946 short Baseball Bugs.

Several Chuck Jones shorts in the late 1940s and 1950s depict Bugs travelling via cross-country (and, in some cases, intercontinental) tunnel-digging, ending up in places as varied as Mexico (Bully For Bugs, 1953), the Himalayas (The Abominable Snow Rabbit, 1960) and Antarctica (Frigid Hare, 1949) all because he "should'a taken that left toin at Albukoikee." He first utters that phrase in Herr Meets Hare (1945), when he emerges in the Black Forest, a cartoon seldom seen today due to its blatantly topical subject matter. When Goering says to Bugs, "There is no Las Vegas in 'Chermany'" and takes a potshot at Bugs, Bugs dives into his hole and says, "Joimany! Yipe!", as Bugs realizes he's behind enemy lines. The confused response to his "left toin" comment also followed a pattern. For example, when he tunnels into Scotland in 1948's My Bunny Lies Over The Sea, while thinking he's heading for the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, California, it provides another chance for an ethnic stereotype: "Therrre's no La Brrrea Tarrr Pits in Scotland!" (to which Bugs responds, "Uh...what's up, Mac-doc?"). A couple of late-1950s shorts of this ilk also featured Daffy Duck travelling with Bugs.

Bugs Bunny has some similarities to figures from mythology and folklore, such as Br'er Rabbit, Nanabozho, or Anansi, and might be seen as a modern trickster (for example, he repeatedly uses cross-dressing mischievously). Unlike most cartoon characters, however, Bugs Bunny is rarely defeated in his own games of trickery. One exception to this is the short Hare Brush, in which Elmer Fudd ultimately carries the day at the end; however, critics note that in this short Elmer and Bugs had assumed each other's personalities—through mental illness and hypnosis, respectively—and it is only by becoming Bugs that Elmer can win.

Although it was usually Porky Pig who brought the WB cartoons to a close with his stuttering, "That's all, folks!", Bugs would occasionally appear, bursting through a drum just as Porky did, but munching a carrot and saying in his Bronx-Brooklyn accent, "And dat's de end!"

The name "Bugs" or "Bugsy" as a nickname means "crazy" (or "loopy").

A common gag in some of the shorts is the rabbit's ability to "multiply". (In this case, the mathematical term, "multiplication")

Rabbit or hare?

The animators throughout Bugs' history have treated the terms rabbit and hare as synonymous. Taxonomically they are not synonymous, being somewhat similar but observably different types of lagomorphs. Hares have much longer ears than do rabbits, so Bugs might seem to be of the hare family, and many more of the cartoon titles include the word "hare" rather than "rabbit". It is probably easier to make a pun from "hare" than from "rabbit". Within the cartoons, although the term "hare" comes up sometimes (for example, Bugs drinking "hare tonic" to "stop falling hare"), Bugs as well as his antagonists most often refer to the bunny as a "rabbit". The word "bunny" is of no help in answering this question, as it is also a synonym for either hares or rabbits.

Voice actors

Following Mel Blanc, who voiced the character for almost fifty years, other voice actors have portrayed Bugs Bunny:

• Jeff Bergman (1990 - 1992)
• Greg Burson (1993 - 1995)
• Joe Alaskey (Looney Tunes: Back in Action, Daffy Duck for President, Looney Tunes: Acme Arsenal)
• Billy West (1996 - present [alternate to Alaskey])
• Samuel Vincent (Baby Looney Tunes)

Cameos

Bugs Bunny has had cameo appearances in several cartoons, including one Private SNAFU short. For his appearance in The Goofy Gophers his voice was sped up.

• Crazy Cruise (1942)
• Porky Pig's Feat (1943)
• Jasper Goes Hunting (1944, for Paramount)
• The Goofy Gophers (1947)
• The Lion's Busy (1950)
• Duck Amuck (1953)

Current popularity

• In 2002, TV Guide compiled a list of the 50 greatest cartoon characters of all time as part of the magazine's 50th anniversary. Bugs Bunny was given the honor of number 1.
• In a CNN broadcast on July 31, 2002, a TV Guide editor talked about the group that created the list. The editor also explained why Bugs pulled top billing: "His stock...has never gone down...Bugs is the best example...of the smart-aleck American comic. He not only is a great cartoon character, he's a great comedian. He was written well. He was drawn beautifully. He has thrilled and made many generations laugh. He is tops."
• In Animal Planet's 50 Greatest Movie Animals (2004), Bugs was named #3, behind Mickey Mouse and Toto.
• According to Time Warner, Bugs Bunny became the current official mascot for Six Flags theme parks since their 45th anniversary.

Awards

Academy Awards

• Knighty Knight Bugs (1958)

Academy Award nominations

• The Wild Hare (1940)
• Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt (1941)
• Rhapsody Rabbit (1946)

See also

• List of Bugs Bunny cartoons
• Looney Tunes

Bibliography

• Bugs Bunny: 50 Years and Only One Grey Hare, by Joe Adamson (1990), Henry Holt, ISBN 0-8050-1855-7
• Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies, by Jerry Beck and Will Friedwald (1989), Henry Holt, ISBN 0-8050-0894-2
• Chuck Amuck : The Life and Times of an Animated Cartoonist by Chuck Jones, published by Farrar Straus & Giroux, ISBN 0-374-12348-9
• That's Not All, Folks! by Mel Blanc, Philip Bashe. Warner Books, ISBN 0-446-39089-5 (Softcover) ISBN 0-446-51244-3 (Hardcover)
• Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated Cartoons, Leonard Maltin, Revised Edition 1987, Plume ISBN 0-452-25993-2 (Softcover) ISBN 0-613-64753-X (Hardcover)

External links

• Template:Imdb character
• Warner Bros. Studios
• Bugs' Toonopedia profile