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The MeTV Toons guide to Termite Terrace
Turns out...there really were termites!
In our stories about Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies, we bring up "Termite Terrace" quite a bit. Termite Terrace was the nickname for the tiny clapboard building that housed Leon Schlesinger Productions and later Warner Bros. Animation. The animators who worked there gave the studio building the nickname because it was infested with termites and other insects. While the original building was condemned and demolished, when we talk about Termite Terrace, we are referring to the animators and creatives who worked there to bring us Looney Tunes cartoons. This list is a guide to some of the most notable members of Termite Terrace and their contributions to the early days of the Golden Age of Animation.
Let's look at their lives and work so we can see how their individual contributions helped refine Looney Tunes into the legendary cartoon empire we still love today!
Leon Schlesinger
If you recognize this guy's name, it's because he's on all the title cards of the early Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts. Leon Schlesinger was originally a film title card producer who pitched an animation contract to Warner Bros. While he had no previous experience in animation, Schlesinger assembled the highly talented team that would create Looney Tunes.
Hugh Harman and Rudolph Ising
The guys who started it all! This dynamic duo created Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies and produced the cartoons from 1930 to 1933 before moving on to MGM Cartoons. They first met working for Walt Disney and later mentored Bill Hanna of Hanna-Barbera.
Isidore "Friz" Freleng
After Harman and Ising left, several new animators were brought in, including Friz Freleng. He is widely considered to be the most prolific Looney Tunes director because he created over 300 cartoons. More importantly, when Warner Bros. closed the animation studio in 1963, Freleng co-created a new animation studio, DePatie-Freleng Enterprises, in an effort to save Looney Tunes. He created, or co-created, some of the greatest Looney Tunes stars, including Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig, Tweety, Sylvester, Yosemite Sam, and Granny.
Bob Clampett
Clampett originally worked for Harman and Ising, but when he joined Leon Schlesinger Productions when they left. He started in the Termite Terrace around the same time as Friz Freleng and Tex Avery. He is best remembered for creating Tweety, or Orson as he was originally called. Clampett's cartoons are remembered for their surreal feeling combined with super energetic characters. After 15 years and 84 cartoons with Warner Bros., Clampett ended up in a "You can't fire me, I quit!" situation with Schlesinger's replacement Edward Selzer. Clampett went on to work for Screen Gems and went on to create some of the first children's television shows with his Beany series.
Fred "Tex" Avery
Tex Avery began his animation career at Walter Lantz Productions, working his way up from inker to storyboard artist to director. He was then hired as a director for Leon Schlesinger and was off to the races creating classic characters like Daffy Duck and Elmer Fudd. Avery is largely credited with finessing the Looney Tunes style and using animation to stretch the boundaries of reality. After 60 cartoons and enough of Leon Schlesinger, Avery left Warner Bros. for MGM where he went on to develop his signature characters like the Wolf and Droopy Dog.
Chuck Jones
Chuck Jones joined the team a little later, in 1933, beginning as an assistant animator. He was paired with Tex Avery, but the Avery unit needed more office space. This need for space is what led to Schlesinger renting out the small building that became known as Termite Terrace. Many animators had the goal of creating Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons to emulate Disney cartoons, while Avery and Jones wanted their cartoons to outshine and dominate Disney's cartoons. Jones co-developed Bugs Bunny and created Michigan J. Frog, Marvin the Martian, Pepe Le Pew, Wile E. Coyote, and the Road Runner. He worked at Warner Bros. from 1938 to 1964 and produced hundreds of cartoons, two of which won Academy Awards.
Michael Maltese
Michael Maltese gets a real photo because, like Leon Schlesinger, he appeared in You Ought To Be In Pictures as the angry security guard! His animation career had fairly typical beginnings, starting as a cel painter, then an assistant animator, then an in-betweener. But his career took a turn when he was promoted to "storyman" because everyone at Termite Terrace always laughed at his jokes. Quickly, Maltese became the head writer of Warner Bros. cartoons. and wrote many of the cartoons from 1937 to 1958. Most of Friz Freleng and Chuck Jones' cartoons were written by Maltese. After Warner Bros. he wrote for Hanna-Barbera, writing cartoons like The Yogi Bear Show, The Flintstones, and Wacky Races.
Robert McKimson
Before getting into McKimson's illustrious animation career, how about a fun fact? His first drawing job was illustrating his mother's first children's book, Mouse Tales. Cute! Like other animators, he began his career at Disney and then was hired by Harman and Ising to work on Looney Tunes. Like Bob Clampett, he took Harman and Ising leaving as an opportunity to begin directing his own cartoons. He is credited as the creator of Foghorn Leghorn, the Tasmanian Devil, and Speedy Gonzales.
Mel Blanc
You know Mel! He's an honorary member of Termite Terrace in our book because he was in the trenches with the animators. He joined Leon Schlesinger Productions in 1936 and voiced nearly all the Looney Tunes characters, including Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Tweety, Sylvester, Yosemite Sam, Foghorn Leghorn, the Tasmanian Devil, Porky Pig, and, later, Elmer Fudd. He had an exclusive contract with Warner Bros. from 1946 to 1960, but afterward as the Termite Terrace animators went off in their different directions, many of them would hire Blanc again for their later cartoons like The Flintstones and The Jetsons.
Ben Hardaway and Cal Dalton
Hardaway and Dalton were a directing team, with Hardaway focused mostly on the story and Dalton focused on the animation. In 1937, Friz Freleng briefly left Warner Bros. for MGM, and Hardaway and Dalton used the opportunity to begin directing together to fill the gap Freleng left behind. Out of the seventeen cartoons they directed together, two of their most memorable cartoons were Katnip Kollege and Hare-um Scare-um. After Friz Freleng returned to Warner Bros., Hardaway and Dalton were sent back to their original departments, and both soon left Warner Bros. Hardaway went to Walter Lantz Productions and wrote, and occasionally voiced, Woody Woodpecker cartoons. Dalton worked as an animator on Popeye cartoons and TV movies like Dr. Seuss on the Loose and Journey Back to Oz.
