Billboard Frolics (Shokus All Night Long)

 

Director: Isadore "Friz" Freleng (credited as "I. Freleng")

Summary: It is a "things come to life and put on a show" cartoon, but instead of a grocery store or a bookstore, it's an alley filled with billboards on or around buildings. There is a story of a baby chick from one of the ads getting chased by an alley cat after getting owned by a worm in an apple, but that's buried beneath all the other gags. Probably the only noteworthy thing about this short is that this is the first appearance of "Merrily We Roll Along," which is one of two theme songs associated with the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons. While it doesn't really matter now since both are used interchangably, I'd like to remind casual fans of classic cartoons that the Merrie Melodies' theme is "Merrily, We Roll Along" while Looney Tunes' theme is "The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down," which was heard on the 1937 short "Sweet Sioux," but wasn't used as the Looney Tunes theme until "Rover's Rival".

The Channel: Home media release (Shokus Video's Cartoon Collection, third volume)

Part(s) Edited: Curiously, the scene of the baby chick getting inflated with a tire pump while chasing the worm from the apple was cut. A scene of mild slapstick like this normally wouldn't be cut on television, much less home media release, so I'm as lost as you are when it comes to explaining why it would be edited. I'm just going to assume that this is either a time/pacing cut brought on by either the cartoon going on for too long or, since Shokus Video is one of those gray-market public domain video companies that probably took some cartoon shorts that were still under copyright, some parts had to be trimmed for legal reasons (though if that were the case, why was the beginning with Eddie Camphor and Rub-Em-Off singing "Merrily, We Roll Along" not cut? Seems like the easy target).

Looney Tunes Wiki also claims that there may be a cut between the woman's underclothes dancing and the scene of the chick in the billboard ad chasing after the worm, but I'm going to cover that on my blog page about cartoon shorts that may have been edited, but there currently is little to no evidence of the deleted scenes existing.

What Wasn't Cut, But Should Have Been: The cigarette-smoking penguins doing the same dance as the wooden ducks on "Beauty and the Beast," only now the snow is abrasive, powdered cleanser for sinks and bathroom fixtures rather than soda crackers being put through an electric fan. I could see some unnamed syndicated versions doing it, but mostly, I see Cartoon Network and Boomerang temporarily editing this because one of their taboos is showing characters smoking cigarettes. I say "temporarily" because I can see this being shown edited initially, then shown uncut before getting phased out.

How It Plays Edited/Video Comparison: Going by how I edited it (based on what Looney Tunes wiki states), it looks obvious that something's missing. This is evident in the audio side of things rather than the visual, but I will let you, the viewer, judge for yourself.

Availability Uncut: Besides the Shokus Video's Cartoon Collection print, there are versions of this short that are available uncut and uncensored. The version I used for the compare/contrast video is from MeTV (an over-the-air channel that airs classic cartoon shorts, as well as older live-action TV shows) and that version is uncut (barring the alleged edit I mentioned above). The Golden Age of Looney Tunes laserdisc (volume 4, side 10) had this uncut, as well as the 2005 DVD release of the film Captain Blood, starring Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland. It used to be on Max (formerly known as "HBO Max") when the streaming service was first released in 2020, but it has since been pulled. Why? I don't know. There's nothing problematic about it (unless you count the Rub-Em-Off, the Russian violin [or "wioleen"] player, but most don't. I feel this might have been dropped because no one was streaming it, which is a shame, because it does look good restored). As of this writing, it hasn't been released anywhere else besides those places, but things could change.

Lost Episode: You're Too Careless With Your Kisses! (I'm Too Careless in Keeping Track)

Sometimes, when it comes to keeping a blog or researching, there will be omissions, mistakes, and new additions that weren't caught the first time around. The following is a "lost episode" of Drawn and Quartered showing the rundown of edits done to the 1932 Merrie Melodie, "You're Too Careless With Your Kisses!". In the Warner Bros. cartoon filmography, this short was released after "Bosko the Lumberjack" (which was covered as an installment of Drawn and Quartered) and "Ride Him, Bosko!" (which wasn't edited for anything in syndication or on any known television channel, domestic or international).

Director: Rudolf Ising

Summary: The drunken antics of her husband drives a female honeybee to go out and collect honey for herself...until a spider traps her in his home.

The Channel: WKBD in Detroit, Michigan (now CW Detroit 50)

Part(s) Edited: Back in the 1980s, WKBD cut the beginning of the cartoon where the female honeybee's husband drunkenly stumbles home from a night out and tries to slip in without her knowing, but fails (some things never change). While the Looney Tunes wiki says the cut was done for time (which I partially believe, since the scene did eat more clock than it should have, but the early cartoons weren't shining paragons of pacing), I personally think this was done to de-emphasize the fact that the male honeybee is a drunk.

How It Plays Edited: It's pretty obvious that something's edited from a story perspective. That drunken stumble home establishes the character and his flaw. They're lucky they didn't cut how the flaw affects his love interest.

Video Comparison:

Availability Uncut: The good news: this is a public domain cartoon, so you can watch it on YouTube (or any other video site) without worrying over copyright claims. The bad news is that it was available on two media releases (the Golden Age of Looney Tunes laserdisc [volume 5, side 1: "Black and White Classics"] and streaming on WarnerMedia RIDE), but the Golden Age of Looney Tunes laserdisc has long been out of print and WarnerMedia RIDE (which became Warner Bros. Discovery RIDE) shut down in October of 2023.

Golddiggers of '49 (Of Mice and Laundrymen/Shot-Tub Party)

Director: Fred Avery (you probably know him better under the name "Tex Avery")

Summary: Yay! We're finally into the fast-paced, gag-packed, irreverent side of Looney Tunes cartoons (a.k.a, the kind everyone remembers and can quote better than most classic episodes of The Simpsons). It's not a perfect start, but it's still a start. We still have a ways to go, but it's not an anodyne musical or a Buddy cartoon. Anyway, this cartoon is a Beans the Cat cartoon (but really features Porky Pig more) where it's the Gold Rush and Beans finds the mother lode, which means everyone in town (including some Chinese laundrymen) want a piece of the action.

The Channel: Nickelodeon (both the Nick@Nite black and white version and the computer-colorized daytime/weekend version of Looney Tunes on Nickelodeon).

Part(s) Edited: Today, we have two titles for two cuts that were done. Let's start with "Of Mice and Laundrymen": Both the Nick@Nite and the daytime versions of Looney Tunes on Nickelodeon cut all scenes featuring the Chinese laundrymen digging for gold just like everyone else, including one scene where the laundrymen riding on a rickshaw -- because, why not? -- are trailing behind Porky's junker of a car and get covered in a cloud of exhaust where they turn into (who else?) Amos 'n Andy from the radio show of the same name, complete with blackface and ethnically iffy voices.

On to "Shot-Tub Party": Nickelodeon's daytime version (which was computer-colorized in the 1990s, as opposed to the horrid 1960s redrawns that managed to suck all the fun out of the animation, especially in the black and white Bob Clampett shorts) not only edited the scenes with the Chinese laundrymen looking for gold, but also cut the part where Beans shoots at the villain with his rifle, the bullets hit the villain's backside into a drop-seat onesie-type opening, which reveals that the villain didn't get hurt because his butt was protected by a metal tub. I'm...guessing this was cut because it looked too inviting to impressionable viewers to imitate? Yeah, I know Nickelodeon cut gun violence and dangerous behavior just like any other American TV channel at the time, but this only makes partial sense to me. Did they really think most kids back then had metal tubs just randomly lying around, looking to make for an ineffective shield for bullets?

How It Plays Edited: Considering the fast pace of the cartoon, the edits do come off as seamless and they were more joke scenes than plot scenes. However, the jump in audio should tip you off that there's something missing (on all three edits). As always, here's a video comparison.

Availability Uncut: You have three choices: you can enjoy it as a special feature on the DVD release of the film Gold Diggers of 1935, or on the fourth disc of the fifth volume of the Looney Tunes Golden Collection DVD, or as part of the first disc of the Porky Pig 101 DVD.

Into Your Dance (Not Into Your Stereotypes)

 

Director: Friz Freleng

Summary: Captain Benny's Showboat is in town, featuring a Porky Pig-looking conductor who gets booed off the stage (until he dons a flimsy disguise) and an amateur hour featuring the cow teacher Miss Cud from "I Haven't Got a Hat," a tough-guy boxer reciting sweetheart poetry, and a stuttering anthropomorphic dog reciting the titular song and driving away the audience.

The Channel: Cartoon Network (don't know the exact show this would have been on. Judging by the fact that it's a mid-1930s musical short with none of the well-known characters, I'm going to assume it ran on The Acme Hour, since a lot of obscure WB cartoons aired there, particularly on the weekday 6:00 in the morning version that actually ran for an hour with commercials, not the two-hour, Saturday version where the cartoons were a bit more on the mainstream, "I remember seeing that as a kid on [insert channel/home media release here]" side).

Part(s) Edited: A little light in the edit department today. All that was edited when this aired on Cartoon Network (which didn't last very long) was the scene of the four-man minstrel show singing the title song as people pour in to Captain Benny's Showboat.

How It Plays Edited/Video Comparison: I think the video comparison says it all. While the black-out here isn't as quick as what Cartoon Network usually does with its scene transition edits, I feel like I did capture the spirit of the edit:

Availability Uncut: On physical media, it's available on the Golden Age of Looney Tunes laserdisc set (volume 5, side 4) and as a special feature on the DVD version of the movie, Annie Oakley, starring Barbara Stanwyck, Preston Foster, and Melvyn Douglas. Over on streaming and digital media, it's surprisingly available uncut, uncensored, and restored/remastered on HBO Max (now known as "Max"), despite "Those Beautiful Dames" also being available on the same platform, but with cuts to outdated black caricatures. And believe me: minstrel show men (whether they're actual black men or white men in blackface, since that's what a minstrel show is/was) are just as stereotypical to show in the modern day as a black girl in pickaninny braids. What makes one more acceptable to show than the other?

Buddy's Theatre (Banned From Re-Release)

Director: Ben Hardaway

Summary: In essence, this is a toned-down version of "Bosko's Picture Show." We have Buddy as the projectionist at a movie theater (Bosko, in the former cartoon, was the organist back when movie theaters actually had sing-along segments as part of the coming attractions and B-level entertainment [the cartoons, the live-action shorts, the second-run movies, etc] before the feature presentation), a lot of newsreel gags (also from "Bosko's Picture Show," the hero's girlfriend starring in a movie, and the hero trying to save her by messing with the film (and pissing off anyone who paid top nickel to see it). There are no jokes about Hitler trying to kill Jimmy Durante because he has that long nose stereotypically associated with Jewish people, Buddy doesn't call the villain (who is an escaped gorilla rather than the mustache-twirling, Snidely Whiplash type associated with the romantic melodramas of the time) a "dirty fawk," and there's no running gag involving the original four Marx Brothers chasing after dogs and singing "Daisy" while riding a four-man tandem bike.

The Channel: Nickelodeon (Nick@Nite version of Looney Tunes on Nickelodeon)

Part(s) Edited: According to the Looney Tunes Fandom wiki, there's supposed to be a scene featuring African natives running towards the audience (I'm assuming as part of the "Coming Attractions" string of gags), which was recycled from "Buddy of the Apes", which was on Nickelodeon's list of Warner Bros. cartoons they weren't allowed to show on Looney Tunes on Nickelodeon. It makes sense why Nickelodeon would cut that part.

How It Plays Edited: To be honest, the edit is seamlessly done. If there's something obviously missing, then I haven't picked up on it, because I currently can't find the uncut version. If anyone out there has it or knows where I can find it, then I will be forever grateful. To get the search started, I'm going to upload the edited version of this short (actual edited version. I didn't alter this in any way) on the blog so anyone out there has a good starting point in their search:

Availability Uncut: As of this writing (in 2024), there's no release of an uncut, uncensored, remastered, and restored version (and, if Buddy truly is one of the least-loved Warner Bros. characters due to being bland and boring and not because of outdated racial/ethnic stereotypes or, in the case of Pepe Le Pew, making fun of sexual harassment, why would there be demand for it, outside of the need for completion?), but I do have faith that an uncut version will resurface. My guess? It'll probably happen when this short enters the public domain.

EDIT: Thanks to Anthony's Animation Talk review for this cartoon, I found out where exactly the African native scene was supposed to be in the fabled uncut version (which isn't a fable, but adding "fabled" to it does give it a bit of mystery). After the joke about Mausoleum (Mussolini) drafting literal toddlers as soldiers for his fascist army (with one asking him in gibberish to either leave the army or go to the bathroom, I don't know), there's a newsreel story about Liverpill (Liverpool), England seeing economic recovery as shoppers are flocking to early dollar day sales in the city's stores, then we cut to the recycled scene from "Buddy of the Apes" (and later, a colorized version shown on Frank Tashlin's "Speaking of the Weather") of the angry natives running towards the camera. Like I said: Nickelodeon did a fine job of seamlessly cutting it, but since the scene was part of a string of gags that had no bearing in the plot, there wasn't much the audience was missing, especially since the joke does feel kind of dated to start with. 

Click here to see the version shown (in clips) on Anthony's Animation Talk.

Those Beautiful Dames (A Shamn Dame)

 

Director: Friz Freleng (credited as “Isadore Freleng”)
Summary: This is more-or-less "The Shanty Where Santy Claus Lives," only it's about an orphan girl who wishes to have toys, but is too poor to buy one. Instead of Santa coming to give her toys, the toys come to her run-down shack to cheer her up by giving her a home makeover (a modest one for the 1930s) and throwing her a party with cake and ice cream. Cute kids' fantasy stuff.
The Channel: unnamed syndication, Cartoon Network, and streaming (HBO Max [a.k.a Max])
Part(s) Edited/Video Evidence: Today, we have a two-fer (or three-fer, rather, but I only have evidence of two channels editing this short). Rather than explain it by writing it down (and because I recently installed DaVinci Resolve and gotten the hang of editing on non-linear video software, which is easier than what I used to do back when I was in film school), you can click here to see the video (if anything happens to the video, I will re-edit this blog).

How It Plays Edited: The Cartoon Network version where the Jazz Bow band scene was replaced with the scene of the toys gathered around the girl and the girl looking amazed that the toys she had seen in the store window are here and made over her broken-down shack has the most obvious "replace problematic scene with more benign footage" edit I've seen...so far (I'm not at the later cartoons yet). The edit done to the scene of the pickaninny girls next to the chocolate cake is similar (and looks and sounds obvious that something's missing) on both the Cartoon Network and (HBO) Max/streaming version, with the only notable differences being that the streaming version has more vibrant colors, the sound is clearer (the better to pick up on audio jumps, my dear), and there's no station identification bug at the bottom right of the screen.

Availability Uncut: Until a restored, remastered version that's uncut and uncensored resurfaces, your best bets to seeing this uncut are on the Golden Age of Looney Tunes laserdisc (volume 5, side 6) or as a special feature on the 2006 DVD release of the film Dames, starring Ruby Keeler and Dick Powell.

Buddy's Circus (Ubangi The Drum Slowly)

 

Director: Jack King

Summary: Buddy owns a circus filled with funny animals, non-white natives who can do strange things with their bodies, and a white baby who wandered in on the acts.

The Channel: Nickelodeon (Nick@Nite version of Looney Tunes on Nickelodeon)

Part(s) Edited: Every scene involving the Ubangi circus performers (including a scene where one of the aerial acrobats falls and catapults a baby off a seesaw), Elastiko the Indian Rubber Man, and Asbesto the Human Stove (the last one is not only an edit to get rid of outdated African/otherwise non-white native caricatures, but also an edit for dangerous behavior involving swallowing fire. This is going by my observations, since this was not mentioned on the old Censored Cartoons Page or the Looney Tunes wiki) was cut.

How It Plays Edited/Video Comparison: The first part with the Ubangi Brothers (though the one with oranges for breasts and a skirt is very much a woman. Not a particularly flattering depiction of an African native woman, but what do you expect from 1934?), Elastiko the Indian Rubber Man, and Asbesto the Human stove being cut is no big loss, since it's just a compilation of gags with no real bearing on the story. The second part with the baby getting catapulted...the only criticism I can give is that there's a minor continuity error that not even a diagonal wipe effect that looks like it was part of the cartoon can save:

Availability Uncut: Surprisingly, this is available on home media, uncut, uncensored, and remastered. Your choices are either the Looney Tunes Golden Collection (volume six) DVD set or the Blu-ray version of the Wheeler and Woosley film, Kentucky Kernels. It's probably not going to be on streaming or digital download any time soon, so get it while it's hot on disc.