The Extras - Introducing Looney Tunes Collector's Vault Vol. 1

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hi, I'm animation historian Jerry Beck and you're listening to the extras. Hello and welcome to the extras. I'm Tim, a larger host, and I'm very excited because today George Felton scene of the Warner archive and animation historian Jerry Beck are here to talk about the Looney Tunes Collector's Vault Volume 1 cartoons. Hi guys. Hey, hey Tim. Now, George, you were on and announced a while back that this release was coming out, but

Starting point is 00:00:37 this is the first that the fans get to know what the actual cartoon shorts are. So I'm very excited for today's discussion. So how do you want to start? Well, I think it's important to say that we know that any day now, the actual pre-orders will be going up at online retailers. So we wanted to make sure that all the contents, the 50 animated short subjects that are in this collection are clear to all the fans

Starting point is 00:01:12 because not every retailer or online retailer, as you might wanna say, they don't always list the contents even if we ask them to. So that's why I put it on the Facebook page yesterday. That's why we're talking with you today, which is always a pleasure. And there's a lot of fun to talk about here. We're very excited about this new chapter because I think it's appropriate at this point to discuss why we made this migration from Collector's Choice,

Starting point is 00:01:46 which is a single disc, to Collector's Vault. There was a lot of confusion around that. And both Jerry and I lamented the fact that while Collector's Choice was working really well, we weren't getting an opportunity to address the hundreds, literally, hundreds of great cartoons that were remaining in standard definition in home media. And

Starting point is 00:02:13 we wanted to take the opportunity to give those titles the needed quality upgrade while also continuing to mine the deeper depths of the Looney Tunes and Mary Melodies library. So hence two discs for basically just a few more dollars you get twice the amount of cartoons. And I think this is going to be an ongoing series. We are basically planning to start work on volume two as we speak, and it should be very rewarding for fans. And that's what Jerry and I have always aspired to

Starting point is 00:02:57 in all of our animated endeavors. Yeah, George, I think when we spoke and you announced it, one way to kind of help fans understand this evolution from one single disc in the Collector's Choice to this two discs now series is that that first disc is kind of like a continuation of what you were doing on the Collector's Choice. Do I have that right? Exactly.

Starting point is 00:03:25 Disc one of collector's vault is basically collector's choice, volume five. That's what it would be. And I think in retrospect, we really liked the name collector's vault, but people were a little bit put off by the fact that, you know, we use so many different names for these different collections. There's Golden Collection and Platinum Collection, and there's Collector's Choice, now Collector's

Starting point is 00:03:58 Vault, and the Superstars Collector's... How can I keep track of all of it? And that's not an invalid question. It is a very valid question. We made this migration and that's one of the reasons we're delighted to have the opportunity to speak with you today so that people can hear that Collector's Choice Volume 5 is the first disc of this. We couldn't even put an AKA on the label

Starting point is 00:04:28 if we were completely obsessive about it, but I think it's fine the way it is, but we really wanna clarify that we have two missions with this series. The first mission is to continue to mine discs that haven't been available on DVD or Blu-ray in remastered form as part of a Warner Brothers cartoon collection. And then the second disc is all cartoons that have never been part of a Warner Brothers cartoon collection in HD before.

Starting point is 00:05:10 And there's a little caveat to that. I tried to add animated cartoons to our classic film releases and have been doing so for quite some time in order to try to recreate the theatrical movie going experience of the 30s, 40s, and 50s. And there are some of these cartoons that have been used as special features on a Blu-ray release and say, oh, well, that doesn't count. Well, that's not what this is about. And it's almost two different consumers because the animation collector isn't necessarily

Starting point is 00:05:45 the classic film collector. There are people like Jerry and myself who happen to like both, but there are other people that live in other preferences. And we want to try to keep the focus on putting as much of the Warner Brothers animated classic cartoon library in accessible form as possible.

Starting point is 00:06:10 And I will take this opportunity to have a little bit of a bombshell piece of news that will not be courtesy of the Warner Archive, but it will be coming from the greater we of Warner Brothers from entertainment Looney Tunes platinum one and two are going to be back in print at a reasonable price Yeah, and that will be happening in June around the same time this happens So a headline that will send people running to their forums To talk about that, but those discs are going back in print at reasonable prices. So all the scalpers are out of luck and people will finally be able to get, I have been begging my colleagues to put them back in print and finally they are. So digressing a little bit, but that's a

Starting point is 00:06:59 huge piece of news for lots of people that never got their chance to get those. Volume 3 has remained in print all this time. So there's lots of great Warner Brothers cartoon news coming from Warner Brothers today. Well, that's fantastic. I don't know how many posts. I'm sure you see them constantly. Please tell George to reissue these, you know, platinum collection. I'm like, I'm sure that George is doing everything it can,

Starting point is 00:07:27 but there's a whole big company there. It took many years trying to get people to focus. And I said, please, these people are like having to pay outrageous prices for used copies. Please, there's no reason for them not to be in print. And because of how we are reorganized here, there was a time where I could do this all myself, and I had the wherewithal to do it.

Starting point is 00:07:54 Now things are more, more people are involved in the process, so I can't just make these decisions on my own. So I'm very persistent in requesting things. And finally, it has come to pass. And that's what we should look at. And it's such a signal of how popular those were. And I think this, to come back to our conversation today, this new vault series is gonna have

Starting point is 00:08:21 that same kind of popularity. Well, why don't we dive into that first disc and Jerry, maybe you want to dive into the conversation here and tell us something about these shorts that you and George selected for this release. Well, I mean, I want to reiterate what George was saying about the concept of the collector's choice and volume one here on the collector's vault, which is that, and it's perfect that the platinum collection is coming out at the same time. When we do these things, at least in the past, when we do these things, when we're coming out with the first DVDs,

Starting point is 00:09:05 we're coming out with the first Blu-rays, the thing we've got to do is put out the, A, the absolutely most requested, B, absolute classics, acknowledged classic cartoons. tunes. And so we've done that. And so the Collectors series is where we do deep dives. We do the ones that wouldn't be on when we initially go to Blu-ray or something like that. Now we're going really, really deep. And of course, at this point, if you've been collecting, and many people are, these are the ones point, if you've been collecting and many people are, these are the ones you want. You want these ones that we haven't seen otherwise, ones that haven't shown up anywhere else in some cases.

Starting point is 00:09:54 There's definitely a few cartoons on here that are there. In some ways, they're remastered premiere. This is the only place you can get this cartoon you know and restored and looking beautiful so. And so that's sad that's that's the point once we were going along with the collectors choice. We suddenly realized that most if not all of the best you know bugs bunnies and daffy ducks. We put them out i mean there's there's a lot and there's more to do but the real creme de la creme. Are you are clearly are clearly showcased earlier. The.

Starting point is 00:10:47 So these sets, so we definitely had to expand what we were doing with Collector's Choice in the Vault series, the new series that we're doing, so that we could include the Bugsbunnies and Daffy Ducks and major name characters that might have already come out on DVD, but surprisingly were never on Blu-ray. And so we had to figure out that didn't quite fit with what we were doing with Collector's Choice. The Vault series opens it up, opens the Vault more so that we can debut more things at the best possible quality and so that you can watch them anytime you want. So that's my initial statement. How do we begin talking about some of these titles?

Starting point is 00:11:30 What do you want to do? Well, I think we should first talk about Disc 1 and some of the real crown jewels. I mean, you span from the 1930s to 1960s, so it's a nice variety of styles, directors, characters. Yes. Well, I mean, we reviewed the set the other day and I'll be honest, the one that blew me away completely, I mean, really blew me away is the cartoon with the least color in it. And what do I mean by that? Beauty and the Beast, a 1934, I believe it's 1934, yeah, 1934, Mary Melody, one of the first in color. I believe it's Cinecolor.

Starting point is 00:12:14 It is Cinecolor. And it's kind of blue and red shades. And the restoration on this thing is gorgeous. I mean, I've never seen it like this. When you look at it like this, you like you're in nineteen thirty four color cartoons are new. And wow what a unique thing you're looking at on the screen not just the film itself i've seen the film before it usually looks. Pretty funky because throughout the years the prints that went to television have faded.

Starting point is 00:12:46 Things, oh my gosh, restored on this. It almost looks like a director of today cleverly, intentionally just wanted to use two colors. That's how it looks to me. It looks like an artistic statement. And just for your historic background for those who are listening, watching this podcast, Walt Disney had a three-year exclusive deal with Technicolor on the patent for Technicolor starting with flowers and trees in 1932, which prevented anybody else from using Technicolor for their cartoons. So when the decision was made to make Mary Melodies in color, Warner Brothers didn't have the opportunity to use the three-color Technicolor process until 1935.

Starting point is 00:13:39 So you have a bunch of cartoons that are quite good, but that are limited to that two-color process. And I agree with Jerry, when we looked at it yesterday, it was like, wow, I've never seen Cinecolor look this good. Oh, yeah. Coming from the negative makes a big difference. This particular cartoon, I don't have the story behind it. I can only speculate. But it wasn't the first color, Looney Mary Melody cartoon. But for whatever reason, and I'll speculate out why, but for whatever reason, they put a little extra effort in this film in particular, and even in the marketing of it. Now that's the thing I never talk about.

Starting point is 00:14:20 What do you mean the marketing? The marketing of one solo individual cartoon. But if you go online and you look, you'll see that there was two things that are unique that were put out for this cartoon that no other cartoon I can think of has from the Warner Brothers cartoons. And that's they tried to, they marketed the theme song in it, Beauty and the Beast, the song in it, there's sheet music that's out with the characters from the cartoon. There's very rare, very few Warner Brothers cartoons that have sheet music connected to

Starting point is 00:14:56 it. In fact, I don't know of any specific other cartoon other than I think they did, I thought of Puddytat, that Tweety and Sylvester. I mean, that's really it. And the other one was they put out a coloring book. There's a Mary Melodies coloring book, but it's all from this cartoon. All the pictures in it are from Beauty and the Beast, even the cover. So wow, I think what was going on was the Three Little Pigs with such a sensation at disney and the sheet music and merchandising off the car short cartoon that was very rare back then.

Starting point is 00:15:31 I mean i'm talking about if it's not a character like mickey mouse or you know a character from one of the cartoons like later on porky pig so. I think there was a real effort by all the studios to do something like that. This was the Warner Brothers one. I actually know of other examples from the same year from Terry Tunes and other studios where they attempted to market a song that was in the cartoon original to the cartoon. Very rare, very unusual. And now it's been restored and it's a special cartoon. And people wouldn't know that unless they heard what Jerry just had to say. Because that is not the kind of thing that has been extrapolated upon in the few reference

Starting point is 00:16:22 books including Jerry's own, that's an important little factoid. And that's why digging a little deeper into this plethora of thousand plus cartoons is so exciting. Stay with us, we'll be right back. Hi, this is Tim Millard, host of the Extras podcast. And I wanted to let you know that we have a new private Facebook group Stay with us. We'll be right back. Now you have 25 cartoons on disc one and the way you listed them on the Facebook page, George, is that the order alphabetical that they'll also be set up on disc?

Starting point is 00:17:15 We decided to go alphabetical with volume two of Collector's Choice rather than chronological because it also makes for a better viewing experience if you're going to hit that play all button, you don't really know what's coming next. And I think that's part of the fun. And if you don't particularly care for a particular character or a particular director or for whatever reason, if you don't love all of them, you just click and skip to the next cartoon.

Starting point is 00:17:50 But it makes it a lot more fun that way. And we got a lot of really positive response to the Collector's Choice Volume 2 for having done that. So we've carried that forward on the first and second discs of this first volume. And I think it's terrific. I really am very pleased we stumbled upon it because it wasn't calculated. It just seemed like a good idea. Yeah. And in this particular set, is this very interesting because there's a lot of cartoons that without characters that were carried on, one shots I guess we'd say. It's got some unusual cartoons that wouldn't have made the

Starting point is 00:18:36 sets, the previous ones, because they're not the big directors of note or certain other aspects to them. And I mean, it's beautiful actually. It's quite the hodgepodge, but it's beautiful. You know, if you love Warner cartoons, sit back and relax. It's everything is here. You know, I'm looking over the list right now and you know, you tell me when. I mean, I can tell you something interesting, probably, probably about each one. Well, I think you should do that.

Starting point is 00:19:10 Why don't we run down some of them, at least. You already mentioned Beauty and the Beast, and that's the second one on DiscWise and the oldest in this collection, including both discs. So I'm going to be tempted to skip right to it because of what you just said, Jerry, but I won't. I'm going to watch Bars and Stripes Forever from 1939. That's the first one, right? Yeah. That's an interesting miscellaneous cartoon directed by Ben Hardaway. Ben Hardaway, Cal Dalton. They didn't do many cartoons.

Starting point is 00:19:49 They were actually the substitute for Frizz Frieling. That was that period when Frieling went over to MGM for like a year. So, Hardaway and Dalton cobbled their cartoons together. I think Leon noticed the difference. Again, from my point of view, they're really interesting. The character designs are different. They tackle different subjects that they kind of didn't do. This one's all about prison. It's gags about prison life. I don't know if everybody watching back then was familiar with that life.

Starting point is 00:20:25 And by the way, the story goes that Schlesinger, after about a year, basically called Freeling up and was like, is there any way I can get you back? And that was the day that Freeling basically had had it at MGM and was wondering what he was going to say to Leon to get his job back. And that's what happened. And by the way, all of that about leaving and getting your job back, that was reflected in a very famous cartoon that we know, cartoon that we love. Probably the first one Freeling did when he got back to Warner Brothers, you ought to

Starting point is 00:20:57 be in pictures. It's not on his set, but you know that's the live action animation one that supposedly the story idea on that came from from Freeling himself, you know. So the third cartoon on the set is the first of one of the brand new remasters, a great Tex Avery cartoon, A Day at the Zoo. This one is definitely one I have to tell you that people have reached out to me and said, what about this one? And I think that's probably true of most of the Avery's that we haven't put out yet. He did a lot of miscellaneous cartoons in color in the late

Starting point is 00:21:38 30s for Warner Brothers. And, you know, the problem is from another point of view, from the marketing past ways that we've done this, is that a lot of them don't feature Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Bugs Bunny, or any of the famous characters. They're pretty much what we call one-off or one-shot kind of thing. This one is part of his series that he did that were sort of like little documentaries. They were sort of making fun of other shorts that were in the theater at that time, like a Pete Smith short, you know what I mean? A day at the zoo, look at this, look at that. But he takes it even further, as only Avery could.

Starting point is 00:22:26 This was definitely a thing. These cartoons got a lot of notoriety. It's sort of forgotten today, but they got a lot of press because they were unusual. Disney didn't do cartoons with narrators back then. They were doing more character driven stuff. Avery was doing more gag driven stuff. And it was noticed, you know, it was one of those things that made the Warner Brothers cartoons unique.

Starting point is 00:22:55 Last thing I'll say there quickly is just that I was mentioning how it's sort of a take off of some of the other shorts that were that's what that's what Avery did. Avery was doing takeoffs, not only of live action shorts like sports, you know, the little sports one-reelers, and little other things he did where there was spoofs of fairy tales. That was Avery making fun of the other cartoon studios that were doing fairy tale stuff. I always look at Avery's cartoons from that period. He was the Mad Magazine of the 1930s. If somebody was doing something, they did a cartoon around it.

Starting point is 00:23:36 It wasn't just Avery, but Avery was the leader. He's the guy who did it first. I think it ties in very well because Warner Brothers Short Subject Department live action was a massive operation. In the 30s, they had two studios. There was the Brooklyn studio and then there was the home office studio, each having a production unit for all sorts of short subjects and only a fraction of those are viewable today in any fashion. We put very few of them out in home video unfortunately and if you see some of them pop up on tcm, you're looking at a videotape that's at least 35 years old.

Starting point is 00:24:29 It's a whole other portion of our library that needs triage and attention. And happily, I can report that a lot of those are being restored and preserved as Warner Brothers Discovery has increased the budget for preservation and restoration, which is something a lot of people don't know and I'm grateful to the company for doubling down on seeing the importance of preserving our library. So who knows? We may be talking about new short subjects, compilations on future episodes of the extras. But the fact that we get to show these cartoons, that as you say, I mean, Detouring America is another one that I think of as one of the most famous pieces of shorts. And I don't think anybody did it better than Tex, but we could do a whole,

Starting point is 00:25:26 you know, 200 hours talking about Tex. Well, shall we jump to the next one here? The Dixie Friar. That's one of those, I think that's one of those Pappy and Elvis cartoons with, that's two, what animals are they? Are they, I guess they're roosters too. Anyway, I'm sorry, I don't have that in my head right now, but those are McKimson, more rural antics with foghorn and leghorn in that cartoon. And they're fun. Yeah. One of the things that I wanted to talk about, because it's something that I found revelatory and Jerry and I experienced

Starting point is 00:26:06 this yesterday. We just got the first, the test discs yesterday and we watched all of them. This is a tradition that Jerry and I have that goes back to the very first, we were doing things way before this, but the first Golden Collection in 2003, when I got the first Tesc DVDs, Jerry came over to my house and he hadn't seen any of the work. I was much more focused on watching his reaction to the restorations, which now I look at and say, oh my God, they'd look terrible because 20 years ago the technology was what it was But at the time it was revelatory. Oh, yeah

Starting point is 00:26:50 Jerry's reaction level to any of these restorations has always been a personal treat for me To see his reaction when he sees the final product Yesterday we were looking at a cartoon that Jerry doesn't particularly care for, but it changed his opinion now due to the gorgeous restoration. That's Goodnight Elmer, directed by Chuck Jones. Goodnight Elmer.

Starting point is 00:27:18 It's on my list of not interested because it's essentially a live action short, meaning it's all about Elmer Fudd trying to go to sleep, trying to close his window. There's literally nothing in it, I think, that needed to be animated. It could have been an Edgar Kennedy short. And the animation is, well, that's the thing. Of course, I've only seen it, you know, what I call channel five prints, which are 16 millimeter prints faded.

Starting point is 00:27:51 Purple, scratched up, hue marks. When you see it in color, holy mackerel, I didn't realize, I never, I mean, it's just beautiful, beautiful, the lighting, the color to get the effect of middle of the night. It's really, I mean, it's a treat to watch. I understand why I didn't like it before. You know, it's 100% improved being remastered. So you know, good night Elmer. You know, good night Elmer. You know, good morning Elmer.

Starting point is 00:28:29 And you've said that before, George, Jerry, you've said that before on other Looney Tunes, Collector's Choice releases where we talked about them, that when you saw this remaster in HD, it was eye-opening to you to see. I mean, people like George and I and many of my animator friends, we watched growing up on TV, we would watch the same cartoons over and over and over. We studied them. You know, I wrote a book and described every, so we've seen all of these many, many, many, many times. And then one day, one day I'll go back further, George,

Starting point is 00:29:06 one day I remember that George was involved with transferring 35 millimeter prints for laser disc. Right? And just seeing a 35 millimeter transfer, jaw dropping, you know. And now if we look back at that, it doesn't, it won't rock your boat. But at the time it was to me revelatory. And then George now with the Warner Brothers going back to the original negatives where it looks like it was shot yesterday, like it's brand new. I mean, you know, I am so happy. I'm so happy to have lived so long to see this. It's amazing. I mean, we're very fortunate in that I can think of very few.

Starting point is 00:29:59 First of all, all of the Warner Brothers cartoons exist. The commercially released produced cartoons, none of them are lost. Can't say that about certain other characters at certain other studios. They all exist. Almost all of them exist in their original negative as well. There are very few that have source element problems.

Starting point is 00:30:23 There are a couple and some of them we've tackled to the best of our ability. But the fact that, you know, half the library went through four or five owners before it came back home is a 40 year journey from the time that Jack and the Brothers sold the pre-48 cartoons and pre-49 features in 1956. And it wasn't until Time Warner bought Turner in 1996 that finally the Warner Brothers Library was reunited. And the fact that all of these original negatives have survived that huge journey between three or four owners over 40 years and then coming back here for safety, it's really a great

Starting point is 00:31:19 blessing. We're very fortunate and we keep going back to make things better. Technology has improved so much since, I mean, Jerry's right. When we were doing the, when I was working at MGM and we did the laser disc releases, there had been one inch video tape transfers made off of 35 millimeter Technicolor prints. And we went just nuts because we were used to seeing them from 16 millimeter sources. And meanwhile, a 35 millimeter Technicolor print is going to be soft. It's a very poor choice for an element to work from in mastering, unless that's all

Starting point is 00:32:08 you have. But nobody thought you could go back to the original negatives at that point. It's really only until the last few years where we can deal with original negatives with some form of safety because in scanning the film never touches nothing ever touches the sprocket holes and there is such care taken in the scanning process and that's why we are allowed and able to make these scans for preservation as well as having film backup elements, which is, in my opinion, essential,

Starting point is 00:32:49 because to have analog film backup on every cartoon is essential, because you never know what's gonna happen in the world of digital. So having something physically as an asset is terribly important to the protection of the film. But the quality of all of these, I mean, we were watching, we went through both discs for most of the day yesterday, and we were just delighted with how great everything looked and how everything sounded. It's something to be really excited about mostly because we know we are among the fans. We are the fans of these cartoons.

Starting point is 00:33:37 We are part of that group. This is what we do for a living but it just happens to be that we are also the consumers you know i don't just. Can my collection have our library i go out and buy other things made by other companies that are from other studios because i'm passionately dedicated to my love of film and especially classic film. What we know what the consumer wants. And we put these things together and always have, well, what would we wanna see? And this has been kind of what has united our work together for many, many years.

Starting point is 00:34:25 And we met each other going to 16 millimeter film collector conventions in New Jersey, you know, many, many years ago before we were in the industry. Because that's how we got to see cartoons in those days, aside from on television, was by trying to get 16 millimeter used prints. We still collect film, although I haven't put film in a projector in over a decade.

Starting point is 00:34:53 I can't say I'm an active collector anymore, but for years, I would love having people over and putting a cartoon in a projector and having people crazy because there was no other way for people to see the cartoons for a couple of years. And then of course, video cassettes started to be progressive. I know we tried to do that at MGMUA with the Cartoon Movie Star series. Warner Home Video, before I worked here, had the Golden Jubilee cassettes, which were terrific, because they were put together with a little bit of intelligence and curation. And when I got to MGMUA, they had been putting out

Starting point is 00:35:37 some pre-48 cartoons without any intelligence or creation and the most ridiculous titles and marketing them for little children. So we needed to clarify that these are animated motion pictures that were made for adults and perfectly appropriate for the children who also happen to be in the theater. And we've always wanted these films to be respected the same way. I'm quoting Jerry here. You need to respect these films the same way you quote, we respect Gama at the Wind or

Starting point is 00:36:09 Singing in the Rain or Casablanca. It's that important. And people have always been demeaning towards classic animation as, oh, it's cartoons, it's for kids. There are people I encounter in day-to-day life who think I'm a little crazy because I love watching classic animation. I'm not crazy. I see the genius that went into the great works. And that's not saying that every classic cartoon or old cartoon is great. There are some that just aren't.

Starting point is 00:36:46 We happen to be very fortunate in that the emphasis at Warner Brothers on animation was on both artistic quality, animation quality, and most importantly, humor. Warner Brothers cartoons are funny, and they probably are the funniest. And I'd also put Tech Savory, MGM cartoons, and Tom and Jerry Golden Era cartoons in that group as well.

Starting point is 00:37:13 In terms of theatrical animation, I don't think anybody else can touch those in terms of humor. Some other cartoons are really beautiful to look at, but they're not necessarily funny Well, we've gotten through like four cartoons guys We can't talk about all 50 But I mean I can point out some things maybe

Starting point is 00:37:45 Why don't you just look through that list and Jerry or George and pull out a few that you think are worth a couple of minutes mention or background. Boy, oh boy. One I want to at least mention is a real oddity, which is Quackadile Tears from 1962, one of the later ones. But it's oddity because it's the rare return to the director's seat for one cartoon of Arthur Davis, who had directed some great ones in the late 40s, and then became an animator under Fritz Freling. An animator on under fris free link after that the powers that be at one is eliminated that unit that was like a fourth unit and then they you know the rest of the. What about the card is not point on word word mckimson jones and feeling. I'm but in the early sixties when the wonders was doing the bugs bunny, the major directors, McKimson, Jones,

Starting point is 00:38:47 and Freeling were on top of it. They had to direct the interstitials. They had to make it be pre-mode because it was gonna be on TV and everyone was gonna see it. And so during that weird period in the early 60s, a lot of the animators who were not directors got elevated up for one or two cartoons, you know, at that period.

Starting point is 00:39:14 What's interesting is that this one is Arthur Davis. He was a director, not only at Warner's doing some really great hilarious Daffy Duck cartoons and one- And the Goofy Gophers. And the Goofy Gophers, which we have on here. Which is on this set. That's right. And he was also, believe it or not, he was a director, believe it or not, at Columbia

Starting point is 00:39:34 Pictures. You know, like the Little Match Girl, the Color Rhapsodies of that period, he did a lot of those things. That was in his early days. Plus, it's a great little cartoon with, you know, Daffy Duck being the henpecked husband bit in this particular cartoon. And June Farré as his, you know, oh, it's true, that Marjorie Maine voice

Starting point is 00:39:58 that she does for the wife. You know, anyway, it's good stuff. Well, I want to talk about a cartoon that's on disc two that has always been one of my favorites, Hair Condition. And this is Bugs Bunny in the department store going against the great Gilda Sneeze. There's the store manager, sounds very much like the actor Harold Peary who was on the radio as the great Gilda Sleeve.

Starting point is 00:40:31 You know, going so fast, eh, little chum? You know, there are certain lines and catchphrases in these cartoons where people know the line or catchphrase, but they don't know what the cartoon is from. Right. People know the line or catchphrase, but they don't know what the cartoon is from and what line the cartoon is from. And I think that this is a cartoon that everybody knows once they see it, they'll recognize it. The way Warner Brothers was able to make verbal puns over the use of the word hair, the titles

Starting point is 00:41:03 is second to none, I think. And so many of my favorite Buzz Cartoons have hair in the title, you know, water, water, every hair. That's not on this set, but I mean, I can think of so many of them, but that's one that I really, really love. And we also have Birth of a Notion with Daffy,

Starting point is 00:41:23 which has always been one of my favorite cartoons. And the fact that these have not been on Blu-ray before is shocking. Right. What you got on Disc 2 says the story because there are a lot of classics on Disc 2, classics that are either standalone or they feature major characters. And if we were continuing the collector's choice set, we would not be putting these out on Blu-ray, at least not right now. That wouldn't have happened. This format change allows us to get Porky's Duck Hunt, Horton Hatches the Egg, on and on and on.

Starting point is 00:42:07 Great, great classic Looney Tunes on this particular disc. And very happy to have these on Blu-ray. Final. Yes. And it's been a long time coming because if you think about the space between the last release of Platinum, which I believe was over 10 years ago, there was basically 10 years where there were no Warner Brothers cartoons getting remastered and coming out in high definition on Blu-ray. We weren't allowed to touch Looney Tunes or other bigger franchises within Warner Archive. As Warner Archive has grown and we just dipped our toe in the water a little bit with 4K

Starting point is 00:42:59 releases, we'll only be doing three or four a year because they're very expensive, but the ones we do are very notable, I hope will continue to be. So we were also given the opportunity to spread our wings into Looney Tunes. We did a little bit with Porky Pig 101 on DVD, which left much to be desired in terms of picture quality and we had no budget, but it was a test idea that allowed us eventually to convince the powers that be to let us have a crack at going right for the collector, hence collector's choice, and bringing these things to Blu-ray. No bells and whistles, just beautiful masters and great cartoons.

Starting point is 00:43:53 Here we are now with twice the amount of cartoons, 50 cartoons, and tackling both those that have never been part of a Warner Brothers cartoon collection, either on DVD or Blu-ray, they maybe never had a home video release or maybe were released on VHS. But now, they're out on Blu-ray and people can own them and enjoy them, and no one is going to take them away. They're on your shelf. Then the second disk is, as I've said before, they're cartoons that may have been available in other formats, but this

Starting point is 00:44:31 is the first time they're part of a Warner Brothers cartoon compilation in high definition looking and sounding terrific and being oh so entertaining, which is really the most important thing of all. I was going to ask you about this disc too, just a couple of questions that may or may not pertain to others, but I just was curious when you knew that you were going to do this too, and you were looking at it, I'm assuming there's quite a large number that you could choose from, did you kind of put this first compilation together trying to get various different characters? So you had some of Pepe Le Pew and some of Bugs and... The key thing is characters. Clearly on the second disc. In fact, I think the only one shot on there might be Horton and he's a character, the

Starting point is 00:45:26 famous Dr. Seuss character. But most of these, I know for me, I wanted to make sure there was some Speedy and some Peppy in particular, and of course Bugs and of course the other, you know, Daffy and all the, but I wanted to make sure that we still have fans out there who think that there's some oppression to those characters and there isn't, you know. And there never has been. Right. Like, you know, there's all this talk about rumors, but not facts. Right. And so I wanted to make sure that we got some of those on there.

Starting point is 00:46:08 And, you know, anyway, that really was the point was, does this show off? Are these really important cartoons for these characters that haven't been on Blu-ray yet? Yes, is the answer. So, you know, that in a way, disc two is a bit easier. You know, there's so many good ones. You know, I knew that, you know, whatever was on disc one, disc one, we're doing, like I say, deep, deep, deep dives. And, you know, there's people who may not care for some of that. They want Bugs Bunny, and we may not have those on those deep dives. So this is a better package, you know.

Starting point is 00:46:50 And given the kind of business that Warner Archive is, where we're a little bit focused as a niche, you know, there's Warner Brothers Home Entertainment, formerly known as Warner Home Video, which when there were stores that carried disks in store, which is a rarity nowadays, but that's what they were focused on was hundreds of thousands of units. The numbers of units we sold on the Golden Collections initially are mind boggling now as the business has changed and morphed.

Starting point is 00:47:37 But we started Warner Archive as an alternative with this DVD is made on demand. And now we're primarily a Blu-ray label that's even dipped its toe into the 4K water. We're really going for quality over quantity and trying to get deeper into the library because even on the feature film side, it's staggering how many important films that we own that have only been available on DVD and some of them haven't even been released on home video and they're important films. So it's just a matter of me getting my budgets approved and the permission to move forward because I'm always on bended knee asking for this or that. I don't have the authority to just pick exactly what I want to do and release it.

Starting point is 00:48:39 That is not the way we are structured. I have to make a good business case for everything we do. And that's why fan support is so important. It's virtually a guarantee that there will be a volume two of Collector's Vault before the end of the year. If people don't support volume one, they may pull that support. But I'm confident we're giving consumers what they want at a great value proposition and that this will be beneficial

Starting point is 00:49:13 to the people that buy the discs and ultimately beneficial to the shareholders of this company who are looking for profitability. And that is my job, is to do both of those things. Get the films to the people that they want, that want them and get the profits to the company that needs them. End of story. Well, I'm sure that people are going to come out and support this. I'm very,

Starting point is 00:49:38 very confident and looking at the list, I know people are going to are going to have their favorites, of course, that they're very, very happy to see. And there's going to be so many on here that are just, you know, eye-opening new revelations to so many people. So that's a lot of fun. I love the Collector's Choice volumes, and I'm expecting to love the Vault ones even more because the aggregating, right, that you're doing of the ones that were on this film or that film. Now, you know, people were always asking that, where can I find that film? You know, which film is it with? But now it's going to be easier with this fault

Starting point is 00:50:16 to find them on these discs too, they're in HD. So was there anything else we needed to cover guys? Well, I think we want to address an elephant in the room. And that is that in putting this set together, as we're all doing a lot of other things and dealing with one set, planning another and so forth and so on, we goofed. We put a cartoon on Collector's Vault Disk 1 that we actually had the same cartoon, Double or Mutton, on Collector's Choice Volume 4. And by the time we discovered this, whoops, the disks were finalized and done. The menus were done. Everything is done, we can't change it. So folks, we

Starting point is 00:51:06 made a mistake, we apologize, and we're gonna make it up by having 26 cartoons that have never been before part of a Warner Brothers cartoon collection in DVD or Blu-ray in remastered form. So disc one of Collector's Vault, volume two, if it happens, as we believe it will, we'll have 26 cartoons to make up for our programming error, for which we are deeply apologetic. But we are human. So mistakes happen. And we try to correct them. And I was thinking about it, George, you know, we were talking about how this disk one is kind of like disk five, you know, of the choice.

Starting point is 00:51:48 And I could see where on your listing of when you were doing this for this for that sometimes, you know, because it's this five, it just also get put on this. Not to mention the fact that we're working on so many different animation projects right now. Because as a lot of people know, we just released Megilla Gorilla about a month ago. There's a lot more episodic, Hanna Barbera coming. And the detail that goes into some of the things we're working on right now is it's enormous. So it's really important to try to keep everything organized and we just had a little slip there.

Starting point is 00:52:36 I don't think it's the end of the world because we have a way of correcting it in terms of what we're getting out there. And if you have disc one of Collector's Vault in your player and you happen to see a cartoon you've seen before, the world is not coming to an end. No one's taking away anything from you. It happened. It happened. We grouped and, uh, uh, it's an apology and we're going to make it up to the fans by giving them a little more next time. Yeah, there's just such a wealth. Uh, we talked about this before, George. I feel like this has

Starting point is 00:53:19 been animation lovers, uh, paradise for the last two years. Well, the animation lovers have been in the desert for many years because we weren't offering anything as a company, which was very frustrating to me because I knew there was profitability for the company that was out there that we could attain as long as we had management support, which we have. And with all the restoration and remastering going on, it's just a really great time to be an animation fan. Whether your animation preferences are more contemporary or whether they're classic, there are things happening all over the company.

Starting point is 00:54:04 You know, a lot of things that i'm not involved in another happening. And i'm always happy to see people get what they want it's not about what i like it just so happens i love these. When i was cartoons and i have since practically birth but anything that our company brings to the consumer or the collector, whatever their preference is, that makes me happy that people get to own. There's nothing like owning a beautiful disc with wonderful quality and great entertainment, whatever your choice of entertainment is.

Starting point is 00:54:44 Well, this has been another fantastic discussion. Every time you guys come on, I just love hearing you back and forth to talk about your passion for animation. And of course, all the stories you have about the directors and the teams of animators that worked on these. So, so much good stuff here. I have to thank you again, as always, for coming on and sharing these incredible stories with the fans and in today announcing some

Starting point is 00:55:12 of these great, great, great shorts that are going to be on the new Collector's Vault coming out very soon. And I know it's going to be very, very popular. June 17th. Yes, June 17th. Mark your calendars. And I do expect that probably within hours of you putting this podcast up for public viewing and listening, the pre-orders will be available at major online retailers. Wow. Wow. Looking forward to that. Well, thanks again, guys. Thank you, Tim.

Starting point is 00:55:46 Thanks, Tim. Well, hey, that was a great discussion with George and Jerry, but we did not have a chance to run through all of the 50 cartoons included on here. So I'm just gonna read them for you so that if you're listening to this in the car or somewhere, working on your yard or the dishes,

Starting point is 00:56:04 that you do have a listing of all of these cartoons. So disc one, Bars and Stripes Forever 1939, Beauty and the Beast 1934, A Day at the Zoo 1939, The Dixie Friar 1960, Double Or Mutton which we talked about Double Or Mutton, which we talked about, was on volume 4 of the Looney Tunes Collector's Choice. Each Dawn I. Crow 1949. Easy Peckins 1953. Feather Dusted 1955. Fox and a Fix 1951.

Starting point is 00:56:38 Good Night Elmer 1940. The Goofy Gophers 1947. I'd Love to Take Orders from You 1936 A Kitty's Kitty from 1955 Let It Be Me 1936 Of Fox and Hounds 1940 Cockatiel Tears 1962 Ready Woollen and Able 1960 Robin Hood Makes Good 1939 The Squawk and Hawk 1942 Terrier Stricken 1952 Tweet and Lovely 1959

Starting point is 00:57:11 Tweety Circus 1955 Toos the Crowd 1950 Wild About Hurry 1959 Zip and Snort 1961 Now for this two. Ain't She Tweet 1952 Bantee Raids 1963 Birth of a Notion 1947 Bye Bye Bluebeard 1949 Cat Tales for Two 1953 Daffy Dilly 1948 Daffy Duck and Egghead 1938 Gee Whiz 1956.

Starting point is 00:57:46 Gonzalez Tamales 1957. Hair Conditioned 1945. Hair Triggered 1945. Hair Trimmed 1953. Horton Hatches the Egg 1942. Little Boy Woo 1954. Much Ado About Nuttin 1953 Odor Able Kitty 1945 Past Perfumance 1955

Starting point is 00:58:14 Porky's Duck Hunt 1937 Rabbit Punch 1948 Red Riding Hoodwinked, Rhapsody Rabbit 1946, Snow Business 1953, Tom Turk and Daffy 1944, Two Crows from Tacos 1956, Zoom and Board 1957. So that's a total of 25 on disc 1 of which 24 are brand new ones, accidental repeat and 25 on disc 2. So a total of 50. If you'd like to know more about these releases, you can look for a link to our Facebook page in the show notes. I'm also going to list these out in the show notes so that you can have reference for them

Starting point is 00:59:04 there. And as mentioned, the retail should go up very soon. So we'll have that up on our Facebook page as soon as it is made available. So check out our Facebook page, follow our podcast, follow our YouTube channel, wherever you like to watch or listen, and we'll have all the information for you. Well as always thanks for listening to The Extras and stay slightly obsessed about animation. Hey Tim Lard here, host of The Extras podcast and I just saw The Day the Earth Blew Up, a Looney Tunes movie and I want to say that this is a big thumbs up. If you're a Looney Tunes fan it has everything that you want in a Looney Tunes movie. It has the gags, it

Starting point is 00:59:48 has funny, it has silly and it was great to see in the audience there you had people who are very young and of course you had all the 45 and up crowd, those who grew up with Looney Tunes and it was great fun to see both age groups laughing at the appropriate places, at the appropriate gags and I could just tell that those folks that I used to work with, some of them that I knew who worked on this film over at Warner Brothers Animation, they really put their heart and soul into this and they really wanted to stay true to the Looney Tunes ethic that was established back in the 30s and 40s in

Starting point is 01:00:27 the classic days of Looney Tunes. And Looney Tunes means so much to Warner Brothers so it was great to see the work that they did in this film. And Daffy, Porky Pig are the stars of this show. There is no Bugs Bunny. The Toon Your Pig is also in there, but if you enjoy those characters they are very fun and it's a great teaming up. But it's a lot of fun if you've been thinking, I don't know, do I want to deal with the hassle of going to the theater?

Starting point is 01:00:57 You know what? If you're a fan of Looney Tunes, I hope you will because this film does need your support. It doesn't have a big budget. It has not had a big budget. It has not had the marketing budget that typically would go into a Warner Brothers release because it is being distributed by Ketchup Entertainment. So I hope that if you are a Looney Tunes fan that you will go out and support this film.

Starting point is 01:01:20 You'll go to the theaters. And already the film is being released on Blu-ray here in the United States at least. I know it's only in the theaters here in the United States, but go to the theater, support it, and if you enjoy it, then buy the Blu-ray. That pre-order is ready. It's going to be coming out sometime in May, but please get to the theater, support it there. That always helps the downstream release on Blu-ray, but it also will help Ketchup Entertainment know that they can take this to Europe, to the UK, and to the rest of the world where I know there are so many Looney Tunes fans as well. I think you'll really enjoy it and you'll have a good time enjoying seeing some of your favorite Looney Tunes characters on the big screen.

The Extras - Introducing Looney Tunes Collector's Vault Vol. 1

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