Tex Avery

/wiki/Tex Averycreator

Bart Simpson: You invented Itchy? The Itchy & Scratchy Itchy?

Chester Lampwick: Sure. In fact, I invented the whole concept of cartoon violence. Before I came along, all cartoon animals did was play the ukulele. I changed all that.
—The Simpsons, "The Day the Violence Died" (1996)

Tex Avery is widely considered the original cartoon gag-man, famous for wild takes, Breaking the Fourth Wall and medium conventions, and stretching every joke to its comedic limit. Sure, there were gags in cartoons before Tex, if you are particularly tickled by a fox in blackface being smacked on the ass by stuff; but it was Tex's arrival at Warner Bros., and his hand-picked staff of animators and directors, that defined what we now call The Golden Age of Animation.

Tex's attitude was that cartoons could and should do anything: Avery and his crew were among the first in Hollywood to realize cartoons (and movies) were just old enough to have established expectations in its audience, which could be played with, teased out, or simply destroyed.

For this wiki's purposes, his cartoons are the first of their medium to recognize tropes and gleefully subvert them: radioland had probably beaten him to Happily Ever After, but visual tropes like the Spinning Paper, the Idea Bulb, the Rebus Bubble and Chained to a Railway were still alive and well before Avery's boys at Termite Terrace got their hands on them. "I wanted the audience to know I knew they were out there," he later said, referring to some of his earliest gags, like animated hairs in the projector or silhouetted audience members disrupting the action (and occasionally being shot dead).

While Avery's career in theatrical animation began and ended at the Walter Lantz studio, it's his six years at Warners and twelve-year tenure with MGM that made him a revered figure to animation buffs. His filmography produced several milestones: Tex directed the first Daffy Duck short, "Porky's Duck Hunt" (1937) and the first "true" Bugs Bunny cartoon "A Wild Hare" in 1940, creating with them The Karmic Trickster and Screwball character tropes; his MGM variations of these characters, Droopy, Screwy Squirrel and George & Junior respectively, have had similar longevity, as has the risqué "Red Hot Riding Hood" series.

Understudy Bob Clampett in many ways continued his mentor's work (not surprisingly, to a similar undoing). If Tex modernized the cartoon gag, it was Clampett who modernized the old "squash and stretch" animation techniques, shaping and accelerating them to the limits of abstraction. Clampett directed the first Tweety short, "A Tale of Two Kitties" in 1942.

Oh, and did we mention he has his own theme song?

See Tex Avery MGM Cartoons for information on the short subjects he made there.

NOT to be confused with The Wacky World of Tex Avery, which was a "Homage" to the original cartoons. And the less said about it, the better. Too late for that; The Wacky World of Tex Avery has already been said!

Filmography:

Non-MGM Filmography

1930

1933

  • Confidence: Another Oswald Rabbit short where he is credited as an animator.

1934

  • Chris Columbus Jr.: Mentioned working on the lengty cannon scene, possibly directed it.

1935

  • Towne Hall Follies: Directed it, but was uncredited.
  • Quail Hunt: Directed it, but was uncredited.

1936

  • Golddiggers of '49
  • The Blow-Out
  • Plane Dippy
  • I'd Love to Take Orders From You
  • Page Miss Glory
  • I Love to Singa
  • Porky the Rain Maker
  • The Village Smithy
  • Milk and Money
  • Don't Look Now
  • Porky the Wrestler

1937

1938

  • The Penguin Parade
  • The Isle of Pingo Pongo: One of the Censored Eleven.
  • A Feud There Was
  • Johnny Smith and Poker-Huntas
  • Daffy Duck in Hollywood
  • Cinderella Meets Fella
  • Hamatuer Night
  • The Mice Will Play

1939

  • A Day At The Zoo
  • Thugs with Dirty Mugs
  • Believe It Or Else
  • Dangerous Dan Mcfoo
  • Detouring America
  • Land of the Midnight Fun
  • Fresh Fish
  • Screwball Football
  • The Early Worm Gets the Bird

1940

  • Cross Country Detours
  • The Bear's Tale
  • A Gander at Mother Goose
  • Circus Today
  • A Wild Hare
  • Ceiling Hero
  • Wacky Wild Life
  • Of Fox and Hounds
  • Holiday Highlights

1941

  • The Crackpot Quail
  • Haunted Mouse
  • Tortoise Beats Hare
  • Hollywood Steps Out
  • Porky's Preview
  • The Heckling Hare
  • Aviation Vacation
  • All This and Rabbit Stew: One of the Censored Eleven.
  • The Bug Parade
  • The Cagey Canary

1942

  • Aloha Hooey
  • Crazy Cruise

1942 ("Speaking of Animals" series made for Paramount)

  • Speaking of Animals Down on the Farm
  • Speaking of Animals In A Pet Shop
  • Speaking of Animals In The Zoo

1942-1955:

1954

1955

  • Crazy Mixed-Up Pup
  • The Legend of Rockabye Point. Third Chilly Willy short.
  • Sh-H-H-H-H
His cartoons provide examples of:
  • Accordion Man
  • And Call Him George: The line "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?" is used a lot in "Of Fox and Hounds", "Lonesome Lenny" and various George and Junior cartoons.
  • Amusing Injuries
  • Annoying Laugh: Screwy Squirrel
  • Anvil on Head
  • Ash Face
  • Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever
  • Bad Humor Truck: A "Good Rumor" ice cream truck, often getting robbed by the Big Bad of the short, is a frequent Running Gag.
  • Bloodless Carnage
  • Born in the Theatre: Definitely a favorite of Tex's, from characters running off of the film they're printed on, to yelling at members of the movie theater audience, to pulling stray hairs out of the theater projectors, to passing the boundary of the Toon universe where Technicolor ends.

    Tex virtually created this trope and changed cartoon comedy period in the scene of Porky's Duck Hunt where Daffy throws Porky's dog onto the ground (when it was supposed to be the dog fetching Daffy), after which Porky takes out a notepad and stammers "Hey! That wasn't in the script!"
  • The Bully: Screwy Squirrel
  • Butter Face: Several cartoons use this gag.
  • Cartoon Bomb
  • The Cat Came Back: Droopy's Stock and Trade.
  • Catch Phrase:
    • "Silly, isn't it?"
    • "You know what? I'm happy!" - Droopy
    • "You know what? That makes me mad." - Droopy
    • "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?"
    • "You know, if he does that one more time to me in this picture, I'll kill myself."
  • Couldn't Find a Lighter: At the end of "One Droopy Night", Droopy keeps the dragon he defeated to light his cigars.
  • Cranial Eruption
  • Deranged Animation: Particularly in the cartoon "The Cat That Hated People."
  • Dripping Disturbance: Invoked by the rabbit in "Doggone Tired", as one of the tactics to keep the hunting dog awake at night.
  • Executive Meddling: Avery left Warner Bros. for MGM after Leon Schlesinger forced him to cut the ending of the Bugs Bunny short "The Heckling Hare," which contained an Overly Long Gag of Bugs Bunny and Willoughby the dog falling off cliffs.
    • His shorts suffered less Executive Meddling at MGM; however, he was forced to change a lot of scenes from Red Hot Riding Hood as per the Hays Code, who balked at a lot of the gags that were deemed too racy for the general public at the time (The Wolf's sexual reactions to Red were toned down [and one scene of The Wolf having body heat steam escape his collar was considered too risque to be shown in the 1940s] and the end with the horny grandmother forcing the Wolf into marrying her and the Wolf taking his half-human, half-lupine children to the nightclub to see Red were the scenes that gave the censors the most grief and the scenes said to still be around, thanks to a special version that was seen by American soldiers overseas during World War II).
  • Eye Pop: Tex Avery invented this.
  • Fur Is Clothing: Many of his cartoons employ this. One famous example, though it isn't fur, was a cartoon he did at Warner Bros. which was a parody of a nature documentary, in which a lizard shedding its skin gets on its hind legs and does a striptease dance while removing it, rotoscoped off a real stripper.
  • Getting Crap Past the Radar: Avery and his animators would occasionely put some risqué jokes in their cartoons. In order to get this stuff passed the censors they combined it with some outrageously risqué stuff that would never get passed. As they expected the outrageously risqué stuff was never used, but some of the milder stuff now DID get greenlighted, simply because it looked more innocent in comparison.
    • The little duck in "Lucky Ducky" gets out of his egg shell by performing a parody of a striptease act.
      • The lizard in "Cross Country Detours" also sheds her skin like a stripper.
    • In "Red Hot Riding Hood" the Wolf freezes horizontally in the air when seeing Red for the first time. This scene was sometimes cut during airings in cinemas because- Freud Was Right- censors correctly assumed it to be a reference to an erection.
  • Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress
  • Hard Head
  • Hello, Nurse!: Another trope Tex Avery helped codify.
  • Heroes Want Redheads: Wolves do, too.
  • He Went That Way!: "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?"
  • Hollywood Healing
  • Homage: The 1997 syndicated show The Wacky World of Tex Avery, a DIC series which was allegedly patterned after Tex's classic cartoon style. It stars a cowboy named "Tex Avery." It wasn't well-received.
  • I Fell for Hours: Tex pulled this off in the Bugs Bunny short "The Heckling Hare", though the ending he originally wanted to do (having Bugs and his canine foil fall off yet another cliff) was cut short, prompting him to leave Warner Bros. for MGM.
  • I Kiss Your Hand: Almost always led up to some sort of gag.
  • Interactive Narrator: "Red Hot Riding Hood" begins this way, with the Wolf, Red Riding Hood and Granny complaining about doing the same story the same way every time. Tex created this trope in the 1937 WB cartoon The Village Smithy, and conversely, the character talking back at the narrator.

Blacksmith: Listen, chief! Take it easy. We got plenty o' time...this cartoon ain't half over yet!

  • Iron Butt Monkey: Most of the antagonists.
  • Karmic Trickster: A core trope for Bugs Bunny, the most famous example.
  • Land in the Saddle: One cartoon has a cowboy try to jump onto his horse repeatedly, only to miss every time. Eventually he moves the horse to the place where he keeps landing and tries again, only to land where the horse originally was.
  • Literal Ass-Kicking

George: "Junior...bend over."

  • Long Neck: Certain characters have an expandable neck.
  • Love Can Make You Gonk: Men would often bug out and even literally turn into wolves at the sight of an attractive woman.
  • Love Makes You Crazy: In one short even Droopy, who generally is not known to do this sort of thing, begins whistling, slamming his head against the table and taking bites out of a nearby wooden post after receiving a kiss from Red.
  • Medium Awareness: Many times the cartoons characters in Avery's shorts knew they were in a cartoon. This exchange from "The Early Bird Dood It," as the worm and bird pass by a movie billboard with the lobby card of the very cartoon they're in:

Bird: Hey! I hear that's a pretty funny cartoon.
Worm: Well, I sure hope it's funnier than this one!

Narrator: Ladies and gentlemen, your attention please. The next scene is quite gruesome, so for the benefit of the children in the audience, we'll split the screen -- the left side for grown ups, the right for the children. For the grown ups, a hideous Gila monster. For the children, a presentation.

  • Road Runner vs. Coyote
  • Running Gag - Some of these cartoons have running gags that result in a surprising twist at the end. A recurring one is a sign that pops up saying, "[Adjective], isn't it?"
  • Scooby-Dooby Doors
  • Self-Deprecation: Tex had a habit of lampshading his own corny gags as early as his first MGM cartoon, Blitz Wolf.
  • Screwy Squirrel: duh.
  • Sexophone: Whenever an attractive woman struts onto the scene. Always the same riff too.
  • Shout-Out:
    • The Mask had several direct shout outs to Tex Avery's cartoons, including several Wild Takes, the main character morphing into a wolf and howling at a female performer, and early in the movie the main character can even be seen watching "Red Hot Riding Hood."
    • 1939's WB short Thugs With Dirty Mugs: Eddie G. Robbemsome stops counting his money long enough to do an impersonation of radio personality Fred Allen for us.
  • Squashed Flat
  • Take That:
    • In Screwy Squirrel's first cartoon where he beats up a cute little Disney-esque squirrel after asking him what the cartoon the cute squirrel was starring in was going to be about, afterwards breaking the fourth wall to say, "You wouldn't have liked the cartoon anyway." One can assume it's a Take That at the cutesy cartoons coming out in the 1930's by Disney and at MGM's own Happy Harmonies series.
    • "Blitz Wolf" is one large take that at Adolf Hitler.
    • Some of the final theatrical shorts also took shots at competing mediums. In one Droopy cartoon, the villainous cattleman can't get any of the other cowboys in town to help him chase Droopy (a rival sheepherder) because they're all at the saloon watching a western on a TV set, causing the villain to curse, "Lousy Television!" Another short ended with the antagonist declaring that if his latest plan to catch Droopy failed, he'd quit the cartoon and "Go on television!".
    • Tex would zigzag this, doing a Take That to himself in "The Car Of Tomorrow," deliberately putting out an extremely corny visual gag (the "seal-beam headlights" with two seals coming out of the headlight domes) and letting the narrator feel the pain for us--his hand comes in, scribbles the scene out with a pencil and groans "Oh, no!"
  • That Makes Me Feel Angry: The basis for Droopy's Catch Phrase. ("You know what, I'm happy" delivered in complete deadpan.)
  • Unintentional Period Piece: Sometimes you have to know a bit about the 1940s before you can get some of the humor.
  • Wartime Cartoon: Many of his WWII-era cartoons qualify, "The Blitz Wolf" being the one that dealt with WWII directly.
  • Wild Take: Trope Codifier
  • Wolf Whistle: Tex's cartoons are known for this.
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