Baseball Bugs

Infobox Hollywood cartoon
cartoon_name = Baseball Bugs
series = Bugs Bunny

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caption = The title card of "Baseball Bugs".
director = Friz Freleng
story_artist = Michael Maltese
animator = Manuel Perez Ken Champin Virgil Ross Gerry Chiniquy
voice_actor = Mel Blanc
Bea Benaderet (uncredited)
musician = Carl W. Stalling
producer =
distributor = Warner Bros. Pictures
release_date = February 2, 1946
color_process = Technicolor
runtime = 7 min
movie_language = English
imdb_id = 0038333
preceded_by =
followed_by =

"Baseball Bugs" is a Warner Brothers Looney Tunes theatrical cartoon short released on February 2, 1946 starring Bugs Bunny. It had a similar theme to MGM's 1944 "Batty Baseball", which was directed by former WB cartoon director Tex Avery.

Crew

"Baseball Bugs" was directed by Friz Freleng and written by Michael Maltese. Hawley Pratt and Paul Julian did the layout and backgrounds, while Manuel Perez, Ken Champin, Virgil Ross and Gerry Chiniquy headed the team of animators. Mel Blanc provided voice characterizations, with a cameo by Bea Benaderet as Lady Liberty. Carl W. Stalling was the music director.

The cartoon's title is a double play on words. "Bugs" was then a common nickname for someone who was considered to be crazy, erratic, or fanatical. In addition to its adjective form being the indirect inspiration for the Bunny's name, the noun form was sometimes applied to sports fans.

In keeping with the cartoon's wackiness, certain anomalies are evident to the close observer, starting with the fact that the title card looks more like a softball than a baseball.

Plot

A baseball game is going on in New York City, at the Polo Grounds (although the rooftop facade is more suggestive of Yankee Stadium), between the visiting "Gas-House Gorillas" (a play on the Gashouse Gang nickname for the 1930s St. Louis Cardinals) and the home team, the "Tea Totallers". The game is not going well for the Tea Totallers, as the Gorillas - a bunch of oversized, roughneck players - are not only dominating the Totallers, made up of old men ("I'm only 93 and a half years old!", a joking reference to Fanny Brice's "Baby Snooks" character's catchphrase "I'm only 3 and half years old"), but intimidating the umpire by knocking him into the ground like a tent peg after an unpopular judgment. The old men's uniform style, complete with flat-topped cap, also suggests something from the 19th century. The Gorillas' home runs go screaming out of the ballpark (literally) and the batters form a conga line, with each hitter knocking a ball out.

The scoreboard indicates top of the fourth inning. The Tea Totallers have no runs. The Gorillas show 10 in the first, 28 in the second, 16 in the third, and initially 15 in the fourth, which quickly jumps to 40. Then as the conga line progresses, the fourth-inning score increases to 41 and 42, for a total of 96 runs for the Gorillas at that point.

Deep in the outfield, a lone fan of the Tea Totallers is heard above the roar of the crowd - Bugs Bunny. From his rabbit hole, wearing a straw hat and eating a carrot on a hot dog bun, he talks trash against the Gorillas, claiming that he could win the game singlehandedly with an endless barrage of home runs. He loses a bit of his bravado when he suddenly finds himself surrounded by the Gorillas. His challenge is accepted (or forced on him) by the Gorillas and, as a result, Bugs now has to play all the positions on the opposing team, including speeding from the mound to behind the plate to catch his own pitches. Furthermore, he must pick up where the Tea Totallers left off, i.e. scoreless and down by about 8 dozen runs.

Bugs (as pitcher) first throws his fastball, with a windup that sounds like a revving airplane, and which he throws so hard that it zips by the opposing batter but also knocks Bugs (who has outraced the ball to home plate to be catcher as well as pitcher) off-screen and into the backstop with a loud 'crash' as he catches it. In the course of his dual role, Bugs shouts encouraging words to the "pitcher" (despite the ball already being in flight), then launches into post-catch praise ("That's the old pepper, boy!") before rushing back to the pitcher's mound to make the next pitch, then returning to home plate to catch it.

Bugs then "perplexes" the Gorillas with his 'slow ball', accompanied by a 'sputtering engine' sound, a gravity-defying pitch so slow that the players can't seem to connect with it. Three batters standing in line wail at it in vain, as the umpire counts "1-2-3 strikes, you're out" against each of the three in quick succession, finally ending the inning.

Bugs takes his first at-bat, and selects a bat from the stack brought out by the "batboy" who literally has bat wings. Bugs starts smacking the ball as promised. On the first pitch, he makes a long hit, dashing around the bases while also showing off for the crowd, only to find a grinning Gorilla holding the ball just ahead of the plate. Bugs then pulls out a pinup poster (see illustration), distracting the player and allowing Bugsy to score his first run. The scoreboard now shows the Gorillas as the "home" team, still with 96 runs, and with Bugs Bunny batting in the top of the fifth with one run so far.

Bugs hits another one deep, and while rounding the bases, a Gorilla ambushes the plate umpire and puts on his uniform. Bugs slides into home, obviously safe, but the fake umpire calls him out. Bugs gets in his face and argues the call, pulling his time-honored word-switching gag, resulting in the umpire declaring, "I say you're "safe"! If you don't like it, you can go to the showers!" The board flashes another run.

Bugs knocks the next pitch deep. A Gorilla comes running in, yelling, "I got it!" The ball hits him so hard in the face that it drives him under the ground, and a tombstone pops up with the epitaph "He got it". Another run appears on the board for Bugs. Bugs lines another one deep. This outfielder, who is smoking a cigar while playing the field, also takes it in the face, smashing the cigar and driving the fielder up against the fence, in front of a billboard that reads "Does your tobacco taste different lately?" (an old radio advertisement catchphrase). Another run on the board for Bugs.

Bugs hammers the next pitch on a line drive that bounces off each Gorilla with a 'ping' sound as with a pinball game. The scoreboard then blinks a random series of numbers and the word "Tilted", another time-honored WB joke reference.

Jump ahead to the final inning, announced by a radio-style jingle ("What's the score, boys? What did Bugs Bunny do? What's with the Carrot League in baseball today?") with Bugs leading 96-95, the Gorillas having lost a run somewhere along the way. The radio booth has also lost its original play-by-play announcer (an uncredited, somewhat raspy-voiced actor) and Blanc's voice is now heard as the announcer. With two outs in the last of the ninth, a Gorilla is on base and another is up at bat, having just fashioned a bat out of a large tree and swinging it menacingly. (In real baseball, a bat that size is against the rules).Unintimidated, Bugs asks the audience to watch him "paste this pathetic palooka with a powerful, paralyzing, perfect pachydermous percussion pitch". He proceeds with a tremendous wind-up and lets the pitch go, but the ball is crushed and rockets out of the ballfield. The startled Bugs goes chasing after it desperately, clear out of the stadium; is almost led astray by a Gorilla driving a taxi; jumps out and catches a bus (where he spends the trip casually reading a newspaper and checking on the flight of the ball); goes to the top of the "Umpire State Building"; climbs a flagpole; throws his glove in the air (which is actually against the rules); and manages to catch it. The Gorilla batter arrives by stairs just as the umpire (apparently no longer intimidated) climbs over the ledge and yells, "Yerrr OUT!" The Gorilla yells back, "I'm OUT?!" to which the Statue of Liberty (voiced by an uncredited Bea Benaderet) comes to life, saying "That's what the man said, you heard what he said, he said that!" (a popular line from a radio show), with Bugs echoing her words as the iris closes around Bugs.

Instead of Porky Pig and "That's all, folks!", the cartoon ends with one of Bugs' rare closing appearances, popping through a drum, munching a carrot, announcing, "And dat's de end!".

A popular Jump Blues band from New York City, The Gas House Gorillas took their name from the original cartoon.

Billboards

* The outfield wall ad for "Mike Maltese, Ace Detective" refers to writer Michael Maltese.
* The outfield wall ad for "Filboid Studge" refers to a fictional breakfast cereal mentioned in a [http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/FilStu.shtml short story] by Saki.

ee also

*List of Bugs Bunny cartoons
*Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1940-1949)

References

External links

*imdb title|0038333
* [http://ussmariner.com/2006/03/12/bugs-bunny-greatest-banned-player-ever/ A mock-serious and detailed review of the cartoon]