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Looney Tunes

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Cartoons

   Looney Tunes is a Warner Brothers animated cartoon series which ran in
   many movie theatres from 1930 to 1969. It preceded the Merrie Melodies
   series, and is both Warner Bros. Animation's first animated theatrical
   series and the second longest continuous animated series in any medium.
   The regular Warner Bros. animation cast also became known as the
   "Looney Tunes" (often misspelled, intentionally or not, as "Looney
   Toons").

History

   In the beginning years, both Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies drew
   their storylines from Warner's vast music library. However, eventually
   the three series distinguished themselves by Looney Tunes becoming the
   umbrella for the studio's various recurring characters, while Merrie
   Melodies continued with the use of one-shot characters. Also, from 1934
   to 1943 Merrie Melodies were produced in colour and Looney Tunes in
   black and white; after 1943, however, both series were produced in
   colour; the only real difference between the two series was in the
   variation between the opening theme music and titles. Both series by
   this time also made use of the various Warner Bros. cartoon stars. By
   1943, the theme music for Looney Tunes was " The Merry-Go-Round Broke
   Down" by Cliff Friend and Dave Franklin; the theme music for Merrie
   Melodies was an adaptation of " Merrily We Roll Along" by Charles
   Tobias, Murray Mencher and Eddie Cantor. The reason for Looney Tunes'
   changeover to color was Warner Bros' decision to re-release only the
   colour Merrie Melodies for their Blue Ribbon Classics series of
   cartoons, noted by the special "Blue Ribbon" title card.

   In 1930, Warner Bros. became interested in developing a series of
   musical animated shorts in order to promote their music. They had
   recently acquired the ownership of Brunswick Records along with four
   music publishers for US $28 million. Consequently, they were eager to
   start promoting this material in order to cash in on the sales of sheet
   music and phonograph records. Warners made a deal with Leon Schlesinger
   to produce cartoons for Warner Bros. Schlesinger hired Rudolph Ising
   and Hugh Harman to produce their first series of cartoons. Bosko was
   Looney Tunes first major star, debuting in the short Sinkin' in the
   Bathtub in 1930. When Harman and Ising left the Warner Bros. in 1933
   over a budget dispute with Schlesinger, they took with them all the
   rights of the characters and cartoons which they had created.
   Schlesinger had to negotiate with them in order to keep the rights to
   the name Looney Tunes as well as for the right to use the slogan That's
   All Folks! at the end of the cartoons.

   A bland white-washed version of Bosko called Buddy became the star of
   the Looney Tunes series for the next few years. With the animators
   working in the Termite Terrace studio, 1935 saw the debut of the first
   truly major Looney Tunes star, Porky Pig, who was introduced along with
   Beans the Cat in the Merrie Melodie cartoon I Haven't Got a Hat
   directed by Friz Freleng. Beans was the star of the next Porky/Beans
   cartoon Golddiggers of '49, but it was Porky who emerged as the star
   instead of Beans. This was followed by the debuts of other memorable
   Looney Tunes stars such as Daffy Duck (in 1937) and the most famous of
   the Looney Tunes cast, Bugs Bunny (in 1940). Bugs appeared mostly in
   the colour Merrie Melodies and formally joined the Looney Tunes crew in
   his first appearance, A Wild Hare.In the Avery/Clampett Cartoon Crazy
   Cruise Bugs Bunny made his first cameo in 1942 and at the end of the
   Frank Tashlin 1943 cartoon Porky Pig's Feat he made another cameo.
   Schlesinger sold his interest in the cartoon studio in 1944 to Warner
   Bros.

   The Looney Tunes series' popularity was strengthened even more when the
   shorts began airing on network and syndicated television in the
   mid-to-late 1950s under various titles and formats. However, since the
   syndicated shorts' target audience was children and because of concerns
   over children's television in the 1970s, the Looney Tunes shorts began
   to be edited to remove scenes featuring innuendos, racial remarks,
   curse words,ethnic stereotypes and extreme violence.

   The original Looney Tunes theatrical series ran from 1930 to 1969 (the
   last short being Injun Trouble, starring Cool Cat). During part of the
   1960s the shorts were produced by DePatie-Freleng Enterprises after
   Warner Bros shut down their animation studios. The shorts from this era
   can be identified by the fact that they open with a different title
   sequence featuring stylized limited animation and graphics on a black
   background and a re-arranged version of "The Merry-Go-Round Broke
   Down," arranged by William Lava. (When Seven Arts Associates merged
   with Warner Bros. in 1967, the logos were updated, replacing all
   regular WB elements with the then-new Warner Bros.- Seven Arts logo, as
   well as new theme music.) Theatrical animated shorts then went dormant
   until 1987 when new shorts were made to introduce Looney Tunes to a new
   generation of audiences. New shorts have been produced and released
   sporadically for theaters since then, usually as promotional tie-ins
   with various family movies produced by Warner Bros. This lasted until
   2004.

   In 1976, the Looney Tunes characters made their way into the amusement
   business when they became the mascots for the two Marriott's Great
   America theme parks (Gurnee, Santa Clara). After the Gurnee park was
   sold to Six Flags, they also claimed the rights to use the characters
   at the other Six Flags parks, and continue to do so to this day.

   In 1988, a number of Looney Tunes characters appeared in numerous cameo
   roles in Who Framed Roger Rabbit; the more notable cameos featured Bugs
   Bunny, Daffy Duck, Yosemite Sam, Sylvester, and Tweetie. This is
   notable because this is the only time in which any Looney Tunes
   characters have shared any screen time with their rivals at Disney -
   particularly in the scenes where Bugs Bunny and Mickey Mouse are
   skydiving, and when Daffy Duck and Donald Duck are performing their
   now-famous "Duelling Pianos" sequence.

   In 1988, Nickelodeon aired all the unaired cartoons in a show called
   Looney Tunes on Nickelodeon until 1999, when it was removed off the
   network for Cartoon Network. To date, Looney Tunes on Nickelodeon is
   the longest-airing animated series on the network that was not a
   Nicktoon.

   In 1996, Space Jam, a feature film mixing animation and live-action,
   was released starring Bugs Bunny and basketball player Michael Jordan.
   The movie was somewhat successful despite its odd plot, and it
   introduced a new character named Lola Bunny.

   In 2003, another feature film was released in an attempt to recapture
   the spirit of the original shorts, the live-action/ animated Looney
   Tunes: Back in Action. The film was a box-office disappointment,
   putting the theatrical future of Bugs and company in limbo.

   In 2006, Warner Home Video released a new, Christmas-themed Looney
   Tunes direct-to-video movie called Bah, Humduck! A Looney Tunes
   Christmas featuring a wide array of characters working in a mega-store
   under the Scrooge-esque Daffy Duck. The movie parodies the famous book
   by Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol.

   Since the days of the Nintendo Entertainment System, the Looney Tunes
   characters have been featured in numerous video games, such as a
   same-titled one that came out on Game Boy in 1992. It was later remade
   for the Game Boy Colour in 1999; it was not a best seller and received
   bad reviews.

   The Looney Tunes characters have had more success in the area of
   television, with appearances in several originally produced series,
   including 1991's Taz-Mania (starring The Tasmanian Devil), 1995's The
   Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries (starring Sylvester the cat, Tweety Bird
   and Granny), 2002's Baby Looney Tunes (which had a similar premise to
   Muppet Babies), and 2003's Duck Dodgers (starring Daffy Duck and Porky
   Pig). The Looney Tunes characters also made frequent cameos in the 1990
   series Tiny Toon Adventures, where they played teachers and mentors to
   a younger generation of cartoon characters, plus occasional cameos in
   the later shows Animaniacs and Histeria! Most recently, Loonatics
   Unleashed, a futuristic version of the characters, is currently airing
   on Kids' WB! It has a large fanbase, although the show was greeted with
   negative criticism from audiences familiar with the original versions
   of the characters.

   Although the cartoons are now seldom seen on mainstream TV, thanks to
   revival theatrical screenings, and the Golden Collection DVD box sets,
   the Looney Tunes and its characters have remained a part of Western
   animation heritage.

Controversy

The stereotypes

   A handful of Looney Tunes shorts from the World War II era are no
   longer aired on American television nor are available for sale by
   Warner Bros. due to the racial stereotypes of African-Americans, Jews
   (especially in the earlier cartoons), Japanese, Chinese people, and
   Germans (especially during WWII) included in some of the cartoons.
   Eleven cartoons were withdrawn from distribution in 1968 and are known
   as the Censored Eleven. This has caused dismay among some animation
   enthusiasts, who feel that they should have access to these shorts.
   There has been some success in returning these cartoons to the public;
   in 1999 all Speedy Gonzales cartoons were made unavailable because of
   their alleged stereotyping of Mexicans, but because the level of
   stereotyping was minor compared to the World War II era cartoons
   mentioned above as well as the protests of many Hispanics who said they
   were not offended and fondly remembered Speedy cartoons from their
   youth, these shorts were made available for broadcast again in 2002.

   In addition to these most notorious cartoons, many Warner cartoons
   contain fleeting or sometimes extended gags that reference then-common
   racial or ethnic stereotypes. The release of the Looney Tunes Golden
   Collection: Volume 3 includes a disclaimer at the beginning of each DVD
   in the volume given by Whoopi Goldberg which explains that the cartoons
   are products of their time and contain racial and ethnic stereotypes
   that these days would be considered offensive, but the cartoons are
   going to be presented on the DVD uncut and uncensored because editing
   them out and therefore denying that the stereotypes existed is almost
   as bad as actually showing them.

   A written disclaimer, similar to the words spoken by Goldberg in Volume
   3, is shown at the beginning of each DVD in the Looney Tunes Golden
   Collection: Volume 4 set:

     The cartoons you are about to see are products of their time. They
     may depict some of the ethnic and racial prejudices that were
     commonplace in American society. These depictions were wrong then
     and they are wrong today. While the following does not represent the
     Warner Bros. view of today's society, these cartoons are being
     presented as they were originally created, because to do otherwise
     would be the same as claiming that these prejudices never existed.

Dubbed versions

   WB has also had controversy over Turner Entertainment’s " dubbed
   version" prints, used on many pre- 1948 cartoons beginning in 1995.
   These versions were actually new ones derived (hence the "dubbed"
   moniker) from earlier-generation prints of whatever versions of shorts
   were available, even if they were the altered "blue ribbon" prints.
   These "dubbed versions" had many alterations. They have a generic end
   card (with either orange or red rings), with a disclaiming copyright to
   Turner (see screenshot), thus replacing the original colored cards (ala
   Blue Ribbon Merrie Melodies). Many animation fans have believed that
   changing the end card was a bad move on many of the pre-1948 cartoons,
   especially The Old Grey Hare, which features the card shaking from an
   off-screen explosion. Due to the generic end card, this ending gag was
   obliterated in the dubbed version, though there is also a second dubbed
   version around which preserves the gag, and has been seen in the United
   Kingdom. In this version, the original end card shakes, and the Turner
   disclaimer fades up at the end.

   In almost all cases, the original end title music was kept, although
   sometimes an earlier or later version of the closing theme would be
   heard on the titles.

   These "dubbed versions", which continue to be shown on cable and
   broadcast television to this day, are not representative of the
   original theatrical release versions of the "Looney Tunes" and "Merrie
   Melodies" shorts. Despite Warner Bros./Turner's best efforts to include
   the best available versions of the shorts possible on DVD, several
   "dubbed version" cartoons have been released on DVD, either in special
   2-disc editions of the WB/Turner classic films or on their Looney Tunes
   Golden Collection 4-disc DVD sets.

Colorization

   In 1967, the then- Warner Bros.-Seven Arts company reissued all the
   black-and-white Looney Tunes in a primitive colorization process. The
   original prints were sent to South Korea where artists re-traced each
   cartoon frame-by-frame in colour.

   These cartoons continued to be seen over the decades, and even some of
   the hand-colored cartoons ended up on low-budget bargain-bin home video
   labels (the hand-colored versions were themselves copyrighted, but it
   has been suggested they too have fallen into the public domain).

   Then, in the 1990s, Warner Bros. re-did the classic black-and-white
   shorts yet again in colour, but this time using a digital colorization
   process rather than re-coloring them frame-by-frame as in 1967. The
   digital colour versions have aired on the Turner networks ( Cartoon
   Network and Boomerang). Incidentally, the 1967 hand-drawn colour
   versions continue to be seen on the Turner networks to this day.

Ownership

   In 1957, a company then known as Associated Artists Productions
   acquired for television most of Warner Bros.' pre-1948 library,
   including all Merrie Melodies (except for " Lady Play Your Mandolin")
   and colour Looney Tunes shorts. AAP was later sold to United Artists,
   who merged the company into its television division - United Artists
   Television. In 1981, UA was sold to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and 5 years
   later, Ted Turner acquired the MGM library - which also included US
   rights to the RKO Pictures library, in addition to its own pre-1986
   material, the classic Warner Bros. library, and some of UA's own
   product - in an attempt to take over MGM. Turner's company, Turner
   Broadcasting System (whose Turner Entertainment division oversaw the
   film library), merged with Time Warner in 1996, thus the classic
   library was once again under ownership of WB (although technically they
   are owned by Turner).

   All the while, WB was able to retain the rights to "Lady Play Your
   Mandolin" and the black-and-white Looney Tunes, even though they all
   fell into the public domain (WB holds the original film elements)--a
   majority of these public domain shorts have been released on many
   low-budget independent home video labels. As of 2006, all WB's animated
   output (including the post-'48 shorts WB also kept) are under the same
   Time Warner umbrella of ownership.

   UA (under the pre-WB/Turner-merger management of MGM/UA Home Video)
   officially released numerous compilations of the classic pre-'48
   cartoons on VHS and LaserDisc, most of these under the title The Golden
   Age of Looney Tunes. Today, Warner Home Video holds the video rights to
   the entire Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies animated output by virtue of
   WB's ownership of Turner Entertainment--this is why their Looney Tunes
   Golden Collection DVD box sets include cartoons from both the pre-'48
   Turner-owned and post-'48 WB owned periods.

Awards

   One of the Looney Tunes have been selected to the National Film
   Registry:
     * Porky in Wackyland (1938) selected in 2000

   Academy Awards for Best Short Subject (Animation):
     * For Scent-imental Reasons (1949)
     * Speedy Gonzales (1955)
     * Knighty Knight Bugs (1958)

   Retrieved from " http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Looney_Tunes"
   This reference article is mainly selected from the English Wikipedia
   with only minor checks and changes (see www.wikipedia.org for details
   of authors and sources) and is available under the GNU Free
   Documentation License. See also our Disclaimer.
