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Cartoon Feuds: Chuck Jones vs. Bob Clampett
Drama down at the Termite Terrace!
If you're looking for beef, we've got it hot to go. Imagine having such a tumultuous rivalry with someone that the drama ends up on both of your Wikipedia pages. Imagine how infuriating it is to be in a feud with someone for over 30 years, and then they take credit for your and your friends' work. But also imagine an ex-friend turning many of your friends against you and smearing your name in the press because you allegedly misremembered something. This is the story of how two of the most visionary directors at Looney Tunes couldn't stand each other.
Bob Clampett and Chuck Jones "grew up" together as animators, starting as assistant animators in Tex Avery's unit. Under Avery, they learned and trained until they were ready to direct. Their first few cartoons, like Porky and Gabby and Rover's Rival, Jones and Clampett co-directed as their own unit, but this was only after Jones had worked as an uncredited co-director with Clampett on another animator's two unfinished cartoons. Many animation historians pin this moment for Jones, who found himself confronting his friend to receive credit for his work, as to where the bad blood started. After Porky's Poppa, Jones and Clampett did not direct together again.
Jones and Clampett got along at least cordially until 1946. Both animators had been at Leon Schlesinger Productions for at least 15 years, and suddenly, Schlesinger announced his retirement and that he had sold the studio to Warner Bros. Now there was a new sheriff in town, the no-fun, no-nonsense Eddie Selzer, and he was placed in the studio by Warner Bros. to manage the animation productions. By all accounts, no one was happy about Selzer taking the reins, but most animators continued their work as best they could. Clampett was already on thin ice because many of his cartoons were censored, or very nearly censored. A censored cartoon was like setting money on fire because it couldn't be shown in theaters, which meant no money for Warner Bros. or Schlesinger. Clampett wasn't even trying to abide by the censorship rules but trying (and failing) to find loopholes around them. Selzer fired him. But Clampett also wanted out because he saw a bright new horizon in television, a place where he could own his work and not be held accountable to Schlesinger or Selzer.
While Clampett was starting over, Chuck Jones was stepping into his directorial prowess: he was creating characters like Wile E. Coyote and Marvin the Martian, collaborating with Michael Maltese for classic hits like Duck Amuck and What's Opera, Doc?, and, most importantly, delivering hit after hit with no censored cartoons. Jones was, for Warner Bros., a money-printing machine and an indispensable cartoonist.
Chuck Jones' star was rising, and Clampett's was too, but not as meteorically as it had in his Looney Tunes days. After his television shows wrapped, Clampett became an animation professor and went on speaking tours about animation history. He interviewed frequently and was happy to reminisce on his memories of Termite Terrace and the wonderful cartoons he created there. Clampett was then tapped to narrate and appear in a 1976 documentary, Bugs Bunny: Superstar. If you watch the documentary, Clampett's enthusiasm and love for cartoons are undeniable, but he also takes credit for many of the cartoon characters that were either group-effort creations or created by other animators entirely. This documentary was the straw that broke decades of tension and made Chuck Jones snap.
Clampett had made many of the claims in the documentary on speaking tours, talk shows, and radio interviews, but repeating these claims in an official documentary made Jones decide that enough was enough. Jones wrote a 5 page letter outlining Clampett's claims and debunked them one by one, citing each claim's true creator. Jones had receipts for everything, but it was easy to have receipts when some of Clampett's claims were so outrageous, like taking credit for cartoons from after he had been fired by Warner Bros. Before sending the letter out to the press, Jones sent the letter to Tex Avery and asked for his thoughts. Avery went through the letter and cosigned Jones' statements, even adding in "For thirty years I have been sickened by 'Super' Clampett's false claims to characters and cartoons that you, Friz (Freleng), and myself created. Your true exposure of these facts is very gratifying and comforting to me - now I can rest in peace!".
Jones and Avery forwarded the letter to Michael Barrier, an animation historian whose interviews with Clampett contained many of these claims. Avery also suggested sending the letters to universities and organizations that featured Clampett as a speaker. According to Clampett's friends and supporters, Jones and Avery gave copies of this letter to anyone who would listen, but we will never know for sure who received copies of the letter outside of Michael Barrier. By the way, Chuck Jones and Tex Avery weren't the only one who had issues with Clampett. In his memoir, That's Not All, Folks!, Mel Blanc also dunked on Clampett while describing his relationships with all the other directors as positive, "The only one I had any trouble with was Clampett. He was an egotist who took credit for everything, yet in the studio he could be irritatingly indecisive."
Clampett was obviously crushed by Jones' meltdown. Animation historian and Clampett's friend denied the counterclaims in the letter and said Clampett was a "kind, generous man who was deeply hurt and saddened by Jones' accusations." Gray also called the letter "a deliberate and vicious smear campaign by one of Bob's rivals in the cartoon business." While the takedown letter may have occasionally felt meanspirited, Chuck Jones stuck to his guns, even refusing to credit Clampett as a co-creator of Bugs Bunny in his 1979 film The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie.
