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by Douglas Messerli
Michael Maltese (story), Phil Monroe,
Ben Washam, Lloyd Vaughan, Ken Harris, and Emery Hawkins (animators), Chuck
Jones (director) Rabbit of Seville / 1950
With the death of film animator and director Chuck Jones on February 22,
2002, I decided to revisit several cartoon works by him, a joyful task which
reminded me of my childhood, and gave me the opportunity to really watch these
innovative and, often, abstract works of art.
Jones' long career, spanning work for Warner Brothers from 1933 to 1962,
when his job was terminated for illegally working on the animated cartoon
feature, Gay Purree, saw a complete transformation in the cartoon industry from
realist-like images and cartoon characters to abstract and even surreal-looking
backdrops and absurdist figures. From early characters such as Charlie Dog,
Hubie and Bertie, and The Three Bears, Jones refined and transformed his art,
creating such memorable figures as Claude Cat, Michigan J. Frog, Pepe LePew,
the Road Runner, and Wile E. Coyote. Working with Michael Maltese, he also
transformed the characters of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and Elmer Fudd.
Among the very best of his films was his 1950 work, Rabbit of Seville.
In a huge outdoor amphitheater, similar the Los Angeles’ famed Hollywood Bowl,
where the opera is about to begin, we hear in the nearby woods the gunshots of
Elmer Fudd chasing after Bugs Bunny.
Bugs escapes into the theater door, and
suddenly takes on the role of the famous barber, shaving his enemy Elmer in
various ways, pouring hair tonic over his head, giving him regular massages,
and, in general, remaining as much as he can within the structure of the opera
while attempting to cool down and cleverly manipulate Fudd’s furious attempts
to kill him.
The operatic text represents some of the
cleverest of cartoon lyric-writing of all time: “Welcome to my shop! Let me cut
your mop. Let me shave your cap. Don’t look so perplexed. Why should you be
next? Can’t you see you’re next?” “….There,
you’re nice and clean, although your face looks like it might have gone through
a machine.”
Elmer continues to chase our funny
bunny until, as Bugs often does, he quickly changes gender, flirting with Elmer
while at the same time cutting the buttons off his pants to reveal his
underwear.
Elmer is delighted with the new “senorita”
until he again spots Bugs tale and the war begins all over. Bugs throws him
back into the barber chair, turning his head into a salad and fruit bowl. Soon
after when Elmer is again on the attack, but Bugs brings an electric razor out
of a basket like he were an Indian cobra charmer, the razor chasing after
Elmer.
Finally, the two fight it out by
lifting up their barber chairs to unimaginable heights, until Bugs finally cuts
a chord that slams Elmer back to earth. By this time Fudd is so confused and befuddled
that bugs simply brushes him off, with Elmer providing a tip for his services. Spinning
him off through the doorway, Bugs dances with Elmer, puts him back in the
barber chair once again, gives him a serious pedicure always with his oversized
scissors, provides his with a beard through a hair restorer, pours some Figaro
tonic on his head, and plays out the chordal interludes of the famous “Largo al factotum” on his own fingers.
After another chase ensues with
increasing weapons moving from axes, to guns, and eventually to cannons, until
finally Bugs offers Elmer a box of chocolates, a bunch of flowers, and finally
a ring, upon which Elmer turns into a full-fledged bride dressed now all in
white, marrying him, dragging him up to what appears to be his home, and
dropping him back onto the stage below. Bugs chomps on his carrot in delight.
This 7.30 minute film was voted as one of the 50 great cartoons of all
time, and who’s to argue.
Los Angeles, August 2, 2026
Reprinted from and earlier version
in Reading Film: My International Cinema (Los Angeles: Green Integer, 2012)
and revised in My Queer Cinema blog (August 2026)
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