154. Porky's Road Race (1937)

Release date: February 6th, 1937

Series: Looney Tunes

Director: Frank Tashlin

Starring: Joe Dougherty (Porky), Billy Bletcher (Borax Karoff), Tedd Pierce (W.C. Fields, Edna May Oliver, Announcer, George Arliss, Leslie Howard, Starter), Mel Blanc (Hiccups), Berneice Hansell (Girl), Berneice Kamiat (Greta Garbo)

This is the first of many cartoons that begins with a fake disclaimer (often used exclusively for facetious purposes):

And so, of course, the cartoon deals with an amalgamation of celebrity caricatures, all competing in a road race, with plucky little Porky reduced to a mere shadow in the competition... Or so we think.

Frank Tashlin provides a clever segue into the cartoon as the title card fades into a banner that still advertises PORKY’S ROAD RACE — 

First prize....$2,000,000.00 

Less tax.......$1,999,998.37 

Net..............$1.63 

A very clever gag that would be used time and time again in many a Looney Tunes cartoon.

Pan down from the banner to an extended garage of cars. “In My Merry Oldsmobile” underscores the scene (and a hearty chunk of the short), Stalling’s music transforming into whistling as we hone in on Porky hammering away at a behemoth of an engine. Another “I would NOT want to animate that” moment from a Tashlin cartoon—there’s so many little movements happening at once! To top the gag off, the behemoth engine slides out of view, and we see Porky hammering on his OWN engine, a dinky, pathetic excuse of a machine. Wonderful setup as always.

And, because Frank warned us, we now see caricatures of Totally Fictitious Celebrities who in fact do not exist. Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy start us off, both seesawing on a sawhorse. Laurel scratches his hatless head (which spins around in circles behind him on the board) while Hardy glares at him. Both make their contributions to the preparations for the race—Laurel pumps up a tire, while Hardy raises the car jack, both contraptions connected to the seesaw. A lot of meticulous details and animation, lots too look at.

Next victim is Charlie Chaplin, who’s going to town with a spanner wrench in the engine. The music is wonderfully hilarious—still an underscore of “In My Merry Oldsmobile”, but Chaplin’s frantic movements are accompanied by the quick chuffs of a calliope, syncopated with the music. Chaplin moves from one car to the next, wobbling along with the same frantic movements. He heads over to another car, emblazoned with three stars on the side. Chaplin prepare to twist a bulb poking out of the car, when in reality, the bulb is just the bulbous nose of W.C. Fields (not in pig form this time!), who chews him out. “Heeeey, whaddaya think you’re doing here, my good man? Keep your wrenches out of my proboscis, yeeeaaaah.” Tedd Pierce’s drawl is lovely as always.

Next is elderly actress Edna May Oliver (who really wasn’t all that old, she was only 54 in 1937, and would die on her 59th birthday in 1942), sitting in her jalopy. She pegs W.C. Fields for assistance, who lumbers out of his car, droning in terms of endearment (“My little demitasse, my little chickadee, my little bonnie lassie...”) Tashlin does a great job of stretching out Fields’ actions, purposefully making him take forever to put on his hat and coat and get to the point, but almost to the point where it grows tedious and the joke dies off. 

Nevertheless, Tashlin compensates with the product of the build up: fields pours a bottle of alcohol into the engine, and the car launches into a hiccupping frenzy, faster than the eye can see. A faithful gag we’ve been seeing since 1931 with You Don’t Know What You’re Doin’!. Mel Blanc provides the vocals for the hiccups. 

Elsewhere, an unseen Greta Garbo works beneath her car, and all we see is her giant shoes (a reoccurring Garbo gag), providing her catchphrase of “I want to be alone” as “at last, I am alone.” The next car is no car at all, but a full bathtub, an engine with a propeller sputtering in the water. A zoom out reveals the driver as Charles Laughton, donning a captain’s hat and tipping it wordlessly to the audience. Laughton played Captain Bligh in MGM’s Mutiny on the Bounty (1935), which even inspired such shorts like jack king’s Shangahied Shipmates.

The next caricature is probably my favorite, or at least pun wise. Billy Bletcher’s villainous bellow thunders as we hone in on a shed. If the skull and crossbones mounted to the wooden doors wasn’t enough of a turnoff, the giant sign shouting BORAX KAROFF — KEEP OUT! certainly is. Borax Karoff is a take on actor Boris Karloff, who played Frankenstein’s monster in Frankenstein. While Billy Bletcher supplies his voice, Karloff WOULD work with a rather notable Looney Tunes alumnus, voicing the Grinch on Chuck Jones’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas! Borax is a compound of boron, used to help clean cars as well as a number of other uses. I’m a sucker for puns. Borax Karoff is depicted as Frankenstein’s monster, lubing up his giant of an engine. And, for good measure, his car number is 13. What else would it be? Karoff crawls into his limo of a car and revs the engine, the skull hood ornament chattering like crazy.

Tashlin’s distaste for Porky is certainly starting to become more noticeable, because only now does he say his first lines of the short approximately halfway through the cartoon. An announcer calls “Calling all stars! Calling all stars!” (as opposed to calling all cars), signaling the start of the race. Porky, still whistling “In My Merry Oldsmobile”, obeys the cue and gives a few happy “Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy!"s. The animation is exceptionally smooth, flouncy, and weighted as he bounces out of his car, out of frame, and then bouncing ON his car into the seat that awaits him, now donning his racing gear. The car sputters and jerks to life, an unpromising start, but manages to transport Porky to the starting line where the rest of the competition awaits.

The flagger gives the telltale “On your mark, get set, SCRAM!”, which was reused earlier in Hugh Harman's Bosko the Speed King in 1933, albeit with a stuttering dog. No stuttering dog flagger here, but we do have a stuttering pig, does that count? The cars all zip off, a few stragglers speeding by, whooshing along to “Shave and a Haircut”. 

On a much less lighthearted note, we get a dose of racism as a stereotypical blackface caricature of Stepin Fetchit (at least in voice) straggles much further behind. “I don't know why everybody's in such a big rush, I’m in no rush.” Product of its time, but c’mon Frank, you’re better than that! If anything though, the slightly tilted camera angle makes for an interesting layout, and the Shave and a Haircut gag was nice.

Another parallel to Bosko the Speed King as we receive a ground shot of the cars barreling towards the camera, swallowing up the viewer. Tashlin uses his quick cuts again, perhaps not to the extent of Porky in the North Woods or later Porky’s Romance, but they’re certainly quick enough as the cars whirl around the track, skidding on walls and flying around sideways. Three celebrities are all packed in one giant car: the Cheerio Special, toting George Arliss, Leslie Howard, and child actor Freddie Bartholomew, all from the UK. W.C. Fields passes the trio, honking his nose like a horn. Freddie asks Leslie what the time is—4:00. George does a take. “4:00? Then it’s time for tea.” With that, all three pull out their teacups from the Great Unknown, taking a sip and staring into the audience, giving a “Pip pip, cheerio!” in frightening unison.

Big bold letters advertise the CALIBAN, a zoom out revealing the car belonging to John Barrymore, who starred in a film adaptation of Shakespeare’s The Tempest from which the character Caliban comes from. “Caliban” suddenly speeds away from a shrill woman’s voice calling for his name. We see the perpetrator—a woman with a lasso, calling for Caliban, the word ARIEL emblazoned on her own vehicle. Barrymore’s “Ariel” turns out to be his wife, Elaine Barrie. In real life, Barrymore and Barrie (confusing, ain’t it?) would call each other Caliban and Ariel. Strangely sweet! 

Tashlin plays around with dynamic angles as we view the front of Borax Karoff’s threatening limo. He pokes his head out of the window, spotting the competition behind him. To further his lead, Karoff laughs as he showers tacks on the road behind him (wacky races is taking notes), with the next shot being a lovely view of the racks thrown into the track from the audience’s perspective. Charles Laughton attempts to remedy the situation by wielding a fishing rod, a magnet tied to the line and thus collecting all the tacks.

Karoff’s next line of action is a “torpedo” (which is really just a toy plane), tossing the torpedo at Laughton. The torpedo sinks into Laughton’s bathtub on wheels, striking the engine and causing the engine to drown in the water. Living up to his role as captain, Laughton cries “It’s mutiny! That’s what it is, it’s mutiny!” 

Meanwhile, Edna May Oliver putters along in her jalopy, but her “success”, so to speak, is hindered by each passerby. One car whirls past, stripping her car of its windshield, retractable roof, horn, etcetera. Another zooms by, reducing the car to a soapbox, and then another, reducing the car to a mere frame with wheels as Oliver ogles at the audience in disbelief, “woo!”ing with each passerby.

It’s no cartoon without a Clark Gable caricature! Gable hitchhikes on the side of the road, but the racers aren’t too willing. He’s spun like a top (Tex Avery style) as the cars whirl by. Once the dust settles, gable has been considerably dug into the dirt, his lone thumb still jerking out of the hole in hopes for a ride. A reference to It Happened One Night, perhaps?

Some wonderfully malleable animation as Karoff displays his next trick: squirting glue onto the course. The racers get lodged into the glue and fly up into the air thanks to the resistance, slingshotting back into a cluster in the middle. Accompanied by the famous electric guitar zooming twang, of course. The animation reminds me a lot of the rubbery, malleable animation in Ub Iwerks’ cartoons. Karoff skids around in the glue, animation smooth as ever, circling around and stretching into the air. The glue strand manages to snap, and he’s propelled into a pile of bricks near a construction site (a sign reading W.P.A. DETOUR PROJECT). The combination of bricks and glue on the wheels makes for army tank wheels on Porky’s car.

A lovely sense of urgency and speed as Karoff speeds into view, halting in front of the camera and spreading grease on the track next. All of the other competitors zip off of the track like nothing, but thanks to the traction provided by Porky’s makeshift army wheels, he’s able to crawl up the hill with ease. As both he and Karoff race down the hill, the glue begins to wear on Porky’s wheels, and a shower of bricks knock on Karoff’s head in succession. 

There’s a great, quick camera angle as Karoff turns the corner on the track, with Porky close behind. They weave in and out, porky attempting to pass, but with little luck. The weaving gets faster and faster, Carl Stalling’s score enhancing the gag as each weave brings forth a higher note in succession. Finally, Porky outsmarts Karoff (which is rare), extending a car horn to the other side and honking. As Karoff zips back to where the source of the sound was in hopes of blocking Porky, the pig zooms straight past him.

Another one of Tashlin’s famous “concealed action” scenes as Porky and Karoff head into a tunnel. There’s the sound of crashing and an explosion. Tashlin cleverly extends the surprise just a little longer as an unidentified blur rushes out of the tunnel, presumably Porky. However, a look at Karoff’s long limo reveals Porky in the driver’s seat, with a hunched over Karoff crammed into Porky’s little car. Juxtaposition is comedy’s best friends, and it works! 

Karoff veers off course in favor of a draw bridge, where he reaches into the control room and pulls the lever. The draw bridge starts its incline, and Porky in Karoff’s elongated limo flies over the bridge like a ramp. Just as Karoff’s about to make it across the finish line, Porky dives ahead of him in a photo finish, screeching to a half with Karoff just a second behind.

If losing wasn’t bad enough, crashing into the rear end of Porky‘s new car definitely is. Karoff flops to the ground, his car landing next to him. A classic gag that never fails to amuse me as an ambulance screeches up next to Karoff, the assistants loading the car into the stretcher leaving Karoff by his lonesome, the assistants heading off to tend to the “injured” car. An oldie but goodie.

While the race is clinched, the others still haven’t finished. Edna May Oliver has completely refurbished her frame car into a sailboat, her dress the makeshift sail as she pumps air via tire pump and funnel into the sail, propelling the car along. A pompous Porky awaits his coronation as speed king, when Oliver zooms right past. Everyone ogles in befuddlement as we iris out on Oliver pumping along her makeshift car, the crown placed promptly on top of her butt.

This isn’t my favorite Porky cartoon, nor is it my favorite Tashlin cartoon, but I certainly think it has its share of good qualities. Tashlin uses some beautiful and unconventional camera angles, such as cars zooming at the audience, tacks being thrown FROM the audience’s point of view, and so on. The caricature designs are hilarious—we’ve seen many of these from The Coo-Coo Nut Grove, but they still have their charm. A dated cartoon for sure, but as I mentioned in my review of The Coo-Coo Nut Grove, looking up who the celebrities are and learning about them is half the fun. With these shorts, at least, you get to learn something new. 

However, nothing in this cartoon particularly wowed me. Not bad, but not as exhilarating as Tashlin’s other cartoons. Though, for 1937, the wacky races trope would be much fresher and newer than it is now, so as clichéd as it may be, this isn’t necessarily the fault of the cartoon itself, but just how played out the cliché came to be in other cartoons. And plus, the Stepin Fetchit caricature was... not great. A minor role, but still enough to be considered uncomfortable. I’d recommend this cartoon to check out the caricature drawings in action, but essentially that’s about it. You can go either way with this one.

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