50 Fun Facts About Classic Cartoons

Bugs Bunny's habit of chewing a carrot while talking was borrowed from which star's scene in a 1934 comedy?

Clark Gable munches carrots while talking with his mouth full in It Happened One Night, and three Looney Tunes directors said that scene gave the rabbit his style.

In The Flintstones' early sponsor commercials, Fred and Barney were shown relaxing with which adult product?

Cigarettes from Winston co-sponsored the first two seasons, until the audience skewed younger and Welch's grape juice took over.

In the Peanuts animated specials, which muted brass instrument supplies the garbled voices of teachers and adults?

Trombone was the suggestion of the specials' composer, Vince Guaraldi, and the makers kept the wah-wah effect because they found it funny.

Which voice actor recorded Barney Rubble's Flintstones lines in a full-body cast after a 1961 car crash?

Mel Blanc had been in a coma after the head-on crash on Sunset Boulevard, so producers set up recording gear in his hospital room and later at his home.

Which fictional band from a Saturday-morning cartoon had America's top single of 1969 with Sugar, Sugar?

The Archies were cartoon teenagers, so session singer Ron Dante supplied the lead vocal on a record that topped the Hot 100 for four weeks.

Scooby-Doo was deliberately drawn with a sloped back and bow legs to flout the kennel standard for which breed?

The Great Dane design came from Iwao Takamoto, who asked a breeder colleague what a prize-winning dog looks like and then drew the opposite.

Tweety, first drawn pink and featherless before being given yellow plumage, is usually portrayed as which kind of bird?

A canary is how Tweety is usually billed, but his yellow feathers were painted on only after censors declared the bare pink chick nude.

Which 1950s sitcom about a blustering bus driver and his sewer-worker pal was the model for The Flintstones?

The Honeymooners star Jackie Gleason later said he had considered suing Hanna-Barbera over the resemblance but decided to let it pass.

Which radio countdown host voiced Shaggy in Scooby-Doo and returned in 2002 only once Shaggy went vegetarian?

Casey Kasem, the voice of American Top 40, had quit the role in the 1990s in a dispute over a Burger King commercial.

Which Smurf was created by an evil wizard as a spy to sow jealousy, then turned into a real Smurf by magic?

Smurfette began with black hair, and the spell Papa Smurf cast turned it blonde as the sign of her transformation.

Which fictional mail-order company sells most of the gadgets that backfire on Wile E. Coyote in the desert?

Acme comes from the Greek for summit or peak, an ironic name for a firm whose products fail catastrophically at the worst possible moment.

Which hamburger-loving friend of Popeye gave his name to a burger chain that spread across Britain from 1954?

Wimpy lent his name to Wimpy Grills, founded in Indiana in 1934, and J. Lyons licensed the brand for the United Kingdom twenty years later.

What is the name of the robot maid, an outdated rental model, who keeps house for the Jetsons?

Rosie was an old demonstrator the family hired from U-Rent a Maid, and the first episode gives her model number as XB-500.

Which little sidekick acts as Yogi Bear's conscience, warning him that Ranger Smith will not like his schemes?

Boo-Boo is Yogi's constant companion and not his son, as viewers sometimes assume.

Which Disney dog made his debut as a nameless bloodhound chasing an escaped Mickey Mouse in The Chain Gang?

Pluto got his name only in his third film, The Moose Hunt, after turning up as Minnie's dog Rover in his second.

Which Disney star made his debut in the 1934 short The Wise Little Hen, faking a stomach ache to dodge work?

Donald Duck danced a sailor's hornpipe in that first outing and was then reworked as Mickey Mouse's temperamental foil in Orphan's Benefit.

Which composer wrote the slinky saxophone theme that introduced the cartoon Pink Panther in a 1963 comedy's titles?

Henry Mancini's jazzy tune went on to accompany every animated short, and its tenor saxophone solo was played by Plas Johnson.

Which Hollywood studio employed William Hanna and Joseph Barbera when they created Tom and Jerry in 1940?

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer got 114 cat-and-mouse shorts from the pair, seven of which won the Oscar for best animated short.

Which blue-skinned sorcerer plots from Snake Mountain to seize Castle Grayskull from He-Man?

Skeletor believes the castle's secrets would let him conquer the planet Eternia, and later stories revealed him as Keldor, half-brother of He-Man's father.

Which Autobot leader in The Transformers, voiced by Peter Cullen in the 1980s cartoon, turns into a semi-truck?

Optimus Prime began life as a transforming truck in the Japanese Diaclone toy line made by Takara.

Which horror film veteran both narrated and voiced the title role in the 1966 TV cartoon How the Grinch Stole Christmas?

Boris Karloff was cast for the warmth and rhythm of his reading, but the special's famous song was sung by an uncredited Thurl Ravenscroft.

Which Looney Tunes villain in a Roman soldier's helmet went unnamed until merchandising demanded a name in 1979?

Marvin the Martian was styled on the god Mars, whose armour gave him the helmet, and he made just five theatrical shorts between 1948 and 1963.

Which Looney Tunes romantic, forever chasing a cat with an accidental white stripe, starred in a 1949 Oscar winner?

Pepé Le Pew's For Scent-imental Reasons was only the second Warner Bros. cartoon to win the animated short Oscar, after Tweetie Pie.

Which Looney Tunes character was shelved as too obnoxious by producer Edward Selzer until Jack Warner asked for more?

The Tasmanian Devil was saved by fan mail: Warner told Selzer he had received boxes of letters from people who wanted to see more of Taz.

Which Warner Bros. director created Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner and later brought the Grinch to television?

Chuck Jones devised the pair in 1948 with writer Michael Maltese, who went on to write the first 16 of their desert chases.

Which cartoon flapper of the Jazz Age was toned down to look more modest once Hollywood's Hays Code took hold?

Betty Boop started out as a French poodle, and her floppy ears turned into hoop earrings when she was redrawn as a woman.

Which silent-era cartoon star appeared as a spinning toy figure in RCA's experimental television broadcasts of 1928?

Felix the Cat was mounted on a revolving phonograph turntable for the tests, yet his cartoons did not reach American television until 1953.

Which Terrytoons superhero debuted in 1942 as a Superman parody and later starred in cartoons sung like operettas?

Mighty Mouse was first billed as Super Mouse, and the whole idea began with an animator's sketches of a superhero fly.

What kind of birds are Heckle and Jeckle, the identical Terrytoons pranksters with New York and British accents?

Magpies of the yellow-billed kind, to be exact: the 1946 Terrytoons short The Talking Magpies tried the idea with a husband-and-wife pair before the identical duo took over.

Which Hanna-Barbera dog is Dick Dastardly's sidekick in Wacky Races, best known for his rasping laugh?

Muttley's wheezy snicker was older than he was: voice actor Don Messick had already used it for several earlier Hanna-Barbera dogs.

Which company, run by a bombastic boss and locked in rivalry with Cogswell Cogs, employs George Jetson?

Spacely Space Sprockets asks little of George, whose work week is an hour a day, two days a week.

Which blue dog with a North Carolina accent fronted the first animated series to win an Emmy, in 1960?

Huckleberry Hound was voiced by Daws Butler, who had already given a similar drawl to a wolf in Tex Avery's Droopy cartoons.

Which Hanna-Barbera sheriff sometimes becomes El Kabong, a masked Zorro spoof who clobbers villains with a guitar?

Quick Draw McGraw rode with a burro deputy called Baba Looey, and his guitar smash later lent its name to a pro-wrestling move.

Which policeman keeps trying to evict Top Cat and his gang from Hoagy's Alley and keep them off his phone?

Officer Dibble is the long-suffering authority figure in a series built as a parody of The Phil Silvers Show and its con man Sergeant Bilko.

Which rhyme-speaking superhero is the alter ego of humble Shoeshine Boy and the rescuer of Sweet Polly Purebred?

Underdog was voiced by Wally Cox and ran on Saturday mornings from 1964 under the sponsorship of cereal maker General Mills.

Rocky the Flying Squirrel and Bullwinkle the moose share a home in which fictional Minnesota town?

Frostbite Falls is purportedly modelled on the real International Falls, and the series grew out of an unsold idea called The Frostbite Falls Revue.

Which actor voiced the nearsighted Mr. Magoo for decades and also played a millionaire castaway on Gilligan's Island?

Jim Backus gave Magoo his voice from the character's 1949 debut at UPA, where the stubborn retiree became the studio's most popular creation.

Which comic actor, already famous as a bumbling TV secret agent, voiced the cyborg detective Inspector Gadget?

Don Adams had played Maxwell Smart in Get Smart, one of the shows that inspired the cartoon in the first place.

Which musician and actor, later Dick Hallorann in The Shining, voiced the kung fu janitor dog Hong Kong Phooey?

Scatman Crothers was a prolific cartoon voice who also played Scat Cat in The Aristocats and the Autobot Jazz in The Transformers.

In the 1987 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon, which mentor is really the ninja Hamato Yoshi, mutated into a rat?

Splinter and Yoshi are one person in that series, whereas the original comics made Splinter the martial artist's pet rat.

In the Oscar-winning Tom and Jerry short The Cat Concerto, Tom performs a Hungarian Rhapsody by which composer?

Franz Liszt's piece also drives the Bugs Bunny cartoon Rhapsody Rabbit, and the likeness set off a plagiarism dispute between the two studios.

Which 1937 pop song by Cliff Friend and Dave Franklin became the long-running theme tune of Looney Tunes?

The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down was a new song when the studio adopted it, and Daffy sang a version on screen a year later in a Merrie Melodies short.

Which Hanna-Barbera composer wrote the theme songs for The Flintstones, The Jetsons, Top Cat and Jonny Quest?

Hoyt Curtin came from advertising jingles, where he said every note had to do something because a spot lasts a minute or less.

Which 1967 superhero cartoon has a theme song later covered by the Ramones, Aerosmith and Michael Bublé?

Spider-Man got his tune from Paul Francis Webster and Bob Harris, and the 1967 recording still closes the credits of the 2002 film.

Which Disney Silly Symphony introduced three-strip Technicolor to cinemas and won the first Oscar given to a cartoon?

Flowers and Trees was already in production in black and white when Walt Disney ordered it redone in colour as an experiment.

Which 1914 film did Winsor McCay present in his vaudeville act, appearing to command its animated star from the stage?

Gertie the Dinosaur performed tricks on cue, and the film pioneered techniques such as keyframes and animation loops.

Which studio chief co-created Woody Woodpecker, supposedly after a noisy bird disturbed his honeymoon?

Walter Lantz told the honeymoon tale himself, though accounts differ on whether the wedding came before or after Woody's debut in Knock Knock.

In Disney's 1987 cartoon about Uncle Scrooge, his giant Money Bin towers over which city in the state of Calisota?

Duckburg was built up in comic books by Carl Barks, decades before DuckTales put its cast on television.

Which fictional terrorist organisation, devised by Marvel Comics for a Hasbro toy line, is the nemesis of G.I. Joe?

Cobra got its name from Marvel editor Archie Goodwin, and Larry Hama wrote the comic that ran alongside the toys and the cartoon.

Which Super Friends headquarters did a Hanna-Barbera background artist model on Cincinnati's Union Terminal station?

The Hall of Justice had a local connection, because Hanna-Barbera was then a division of Cincinnati-based Taft Broadcasting.