A Creator of Cartoons

When considering the legendary cartoon characters of our day, it takes a mind shift to accept the human hands at work behind the mythology.

Somehow, the world occupied by Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig and Sylvester has a vivid reality all its own. We don’t tend to think about the creative process of a salaried, flesh-and-blood artist sitting down at a drawing board in the San Fernando Valley, bringing the critters’ antics to life.

In that respect, the show of Friz Freleng’s works, personal artifacts and other bric-a-brac now at the Skirball Cultural Center can be a pleasantly jolting experience.

Included in the show are cels of cherished characters, story layouts, backgrounds and statuettes of characters such as the Pink Panther.

But we also find evidence of Freleng’s personal life, including customized greeting cards for his relatives.

Black-and-white photos depict him literally at his drawing board, and a copy of his employment record shows he made $275 a week at Warner Bros. in 1933, and $235 a week in 1941.

A display case holds an Oscar, an Emmy and a medal from Cannes on the occasion of Bugs Bunny’s 50th anniversary.

Freleng, born in Kansas City, Mo., in 1905 as Isadore Freleng, was one of the hardest-working men in the business, from its earliest days.

He started work for Walt Disney in 1927 but moved to Warner Bros. in 1930 and was a faithful employee there for 33 years during the Looney Tunes glory days. He formed his own company, DePatie-Freleng, in the 1960s and created the Pink Panther cartoons, among others.

We also get hints in the show of Freleng’s own philosophical attitudes.

Private Snafu was a character he developed during WWII, appearing in the Army-Navy Screen Magazine to lighten the task of military training.

In a surprisingly hawkish drawing 50 years later, Yosemite Sam appears as a Desert Storm Trooper, sputtering a xenophobic line: “I’m a-joinin’ them storm troopers ‘cause they don’t take no guff from no flea-bitten critter varmints.”

Violence, of course, is threaded throughout the Looney Tunes world, but tempered with humor and resiliency.

It takes only seconds to recover from a gunshot wound or an explosive blast. A careful balancing act was going on, in which the energy and violence of the chase--the basis of many cartoons--was countered by wisecracks and pratfalls and the cartoonist’s own taste.

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In one sketch for a hunting scene (“Be vewy, vewy quiet, I’m hunting wabbits”), a note in blue pencil reads “guns are too realistic.”

In a limited-edition cel from 1990, five years before Freleng’s death, we see a chorus line of the Looney Tunes crew, shaking their various legs in a cancan, like aging vaudeville stars gathered one last time for a reunion.

But, of course, the difference is that age is a rubbery, changeable thing when you’re a cartoon. Freleng has moved on, but Porky Pig is, in his own way, immortal.

BE THERE

“That’s Not All Folks,” the Art of Friz Freleng, through Sunday at the Skirball Cultural Center, 2701 Sepulveda Blvd. in Los Angeles. Gallery hours: Tuesday-Saturday, noon-5 p.m.; Sunday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m.; (310) 440-4500.