BURBANK : Gallery Owner Leaps to Defend Jessica Rabbit

Jessica Rabbit is no floozy.

Or so say her supporters.

Burbank Gallery owner Howard Lowery defended the voluptuous cartoon redhead Tuesday, saying she played a pivotal--and not solely sexual--role in Disney’s 1988 animated/live action film “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?”

Lowery, who owns the Howard Lowery Galley in Burbank, has been buying, selling and auctioning animated art since the early 1970s.

Jessica, he said, is supposed to work with the animated character of Roger Rabbit to persuade a down-on-his-luck live action detective played by Bob Hoskins to investigate a murder.

Surrounded by 9-by-12-inch animated cels of Jessica in various risque positions, Lowery said rumors that the character appears partially nude in the laser-disc version of the movie have been circulating among animated art collectors for months.

Last week, a Hollywood trade publication reported that several frames of the film show Jessica in compromising positions, including appearing without underwear. Disney declined to comment on the allegations.

In one of several controversial scenes, which reportedly involves three to four frames, Jessica’s skirt is hiked up above her waist after a fall off a motorcycle.

The first frame, visible because viewers can freeze a disc frame by frame using a laser disc player, shows Jessica wearing underwear. In the next frame, however, Jessica appears to have nothing on at all.

Someone watching the movie on a VCR or at a theater would be unable to see these cels because there are up to 24 frames per second in an animated picture, Lowery said.

Animators often “get carried away” when they’re creating an animated film peppered with mischievous characters, Lowery said, adding that artists may add X-rated scenes to otherwise wholesome cartoons purely as a joke.