165. Porky’s Building (1937)

Release date: June 19th, 1937

Series: Looney Tunes

Director: Frank Tashlin

Starring: Mel Blanc (Porky, Dog), Billy Bletcher (Dirty Digg), Dorothy Hill (Rabbit), Tedd Pierce (Sandy C. Ment)

This cartoon opens with an amusing disclaimer.

Somewhat of a strange anomaly is Mel Blanc voicing “fat Porky”. This is the first Frank Tashlin cartoon since Porky’s Romance, the last cartoon to feature Porky’s original voice actor, Joe Dougherty. Fat Porky wouldn’t survive past 1937—Frank Tashlin was the sole person who kept him going, after Tashlin’s Porky’s Double Trouble he got a diet. This is more of a personal anecdote than a concrete observation, but I always found this so-called “transitional period” amusing. 

Nevertheless—it’s up to Porky you beat his rival, Dirty Digg, to see who can build the best town hall the fastest.

Preliminary lobby card.

Frank Tashlin, ever the cinematographer, introduces the cartoon with a silhouette behind a closed door, the door identifying the silhouette as Sandy C. Ment, city building commissioner. Tedd Pierce provides the voice for Sandy, discussing the plans for the new city hall about to be built. We see Porky and a particularly grizzly brute as the gentlemen sandy is referring to, the only two contractors in the city. They’re both tasked with building the city hall–whoever can come up with the cheapest bid wins. There’s ome particularly funny animation of Porky waving to his rival, only to receive a steely glare in return, much to the rejection of Porky. I’m certain Frank Tashlin’s feelings towards Porky were projected into that glare.

Sandy displays the city hall plans, revealing a poster of an Art Deco feat of modern architecture. Tashlin’s cartoons in the ‘30s are particularly rife with the streamlined, Art Deco feel, supported by his tendency to use jazzy underscores as we see here as well. 

At last, Porky and his rival get the papers they need to sort out the bids. Lovely animation as any sense of camaraderie between the two is gone in a snap, both nose to nose (or nose to snout?) as they stalk over to their desks to crunch the numbers, not once breaking physical contact or eye contact until absolutely necessary. Mel Blanc’s and Billy Bletcher’s voices collide as the two crunch the numbers aloud, the Billy Bletcher brute deliberately copying Porky’s numbers. The two finish, the staring contest resumes, and they do the same furious tango back to Sandy.

As fate has it, the two reach a tie with their bids at $3,000,000.02 each, with a hilarious detail of Dirty Digg’s paper including scribbles of a stickman and a self serving game of tic tac toe, indicating just how dedicated he is to his craft. 

The tie stumps sandy Sandy how to determine who gets to build the city hall, until he reaches a conclusion—both get to build the city hall. Whoever finishes first, wins. A lack of sound effects hides the detail, but there’s some rather amusing animation as Sandy jabs a finger in Porky’s face and honks Dirty Digg’s nose Daffy Duck style.

Transition to the two now at their respective construction sites, waiting to take off like runners in a race, accompanied by a crowd no less. Sandy fires a starting pistol, and the two take off to build. Digg hops into his backhoe, clearing the land for his building. Can’t go wrong with the backhoe scooping up a giant boulder and crunching it up with an anthropomorphic mouth, spitting the chunks into a cart. Porky’s dinky little contraption is just as whimsical, with a mechanical boot slamming itself against an actual shovel suspended by a pulley to clear the way. Frank Tashlin does a wonderful job juxtaposing the personalities, through mannerisms and extraneous details such as their equipment. 

The rubbery animation associated with Digg is only furthered as he struggles to pull his backhoe out of the deep hole he dug for himself–we see that the street lamps in the city are caught in the machine, bobbing up and down in their respective “posts”. Finally, Digg prevails, pulling out a tangled mess of rubbery street lamps. Points for creativity. 

Elsewhere, the cartoon takes a rather morbid yet wonderfully hilarious turn: a dog construction worker loads crates of dynamites into a hole, chuffing halfheartedly on a pipe as he waddles back to the dynamite lever, hands in pockets, marching along to a whimsical rendition of “Boulevardier from the Bronx”. Rolling up his sleeves, he prepares to pull the lever, when a crowd of spectators approach, leaning in as the dog prepares to fire. 

The dog opens one eye and grunts “Step back folks, ya bother me,” VERY well timed to a nice little oboe underscore with each syllable. The crowd gives him his space… until the dog prepares to fire again. Another “Step back folks, ya bother me.” they oblige, until they don’t. The charade continues, until finally the dog waddles back to the hole where the crates are stashed, rendition of “Boulevardier from the Bronx” and all. 

The dog pokes an eye open as the lemmings inevitably wander to the hole of dynamite (a fitting underscore of “Let’s Put Our Heads Together” to boot.) The dog squeezes his way through the crowd, heads to the lever… and BOOM! Cold blooded murder dismissed with a mere dusting off of the hands. A WONDERFUL gag timed succinctly and purposefully prolonged–the same dog would reappear a year later in Porky the Fireman, another Tashlin piece, doing the same prolonged waddle and same musical accompaniment.

A collection of some whimsical animal gags, gags that feel like something out of a Harman and Ising cartoon, albeit more polished. Two beavers load cement and sand into a cocktail shaker strapped to the side of a camel, a pelican dumping water from its beak into the makeshift cocktail. The camel shakes the shaker, all of the animals swaying along. Perhaps slightly outdated, yet still fun nonetheless. Turtles flip their shells open (wheels attached to the top–or in this case, bottom–of the shells) and tow away the mixture created by the animals. 

Meanwhile, a dog carrying a load of cement, the hod carrier, marches up a support beams thanks to suction cups tied on his shoes, complete with some jaunty music and animation. The animation would be repurposed in Friz Freleng’s Jungle Jitters a year later. Elsewhere, Dirty Digg lives up to his namesake by playing dirty, hurling a brick at the dog. The dog falls, his suction cups continuing to ascend up the scaffolding, underscore and all. 

We meet camera shy Porky for the first time in a few minutes, a reflection of Frank Tashlin’s distaste and uncertainty regarding the character, who encourages his team to “get in there and fight!” They’re all lined up along a bench, a sign above labeling them as “HOD CARRIER SUBSTITUTES”. 

Thus sparks the running gag of the cartoon: as the substitutes dash off do to their duty for Porky, a diminutive rabbit (voiced by Berneice Hansell, of course) zooms up to Porky, donning a sweater that reads “HOD CARRIER” as she squeaks “How ‘bout me, Porky?” Porky isn’t at all convinced by her diminutive stature, snapping “No!”

On Porky’s team, a few pelicans pull the appropriate levers to mix water, cement, and sand in their bills, flying off and twirling their heads and bills around to create the mixture. One pelican successfully discards his load down a long chute to the construction site. The next, however, isn’t so lucky. Ever the conniving weasel (or dog), Digg attaches a dead fish to a balloon for the oncoming pelican to feast on. The pelican, eager for the snack, spits out its mixture in favor of the fish, the mixture pouring from the sky and landing right on Porky. 

None too deterred, Porky encourages his cement mixer substitutes, a line of pelicans, to, once again, get out there and fight. As they fly off, the eager rabbit from before, now donning a sweater labeling her as a cement mixer, squeaks “How ‘bout me, Porky?” The same routine as Porky once more yells “No!” 

Digg’s construction site is going swimmingly, as to be expected. A wonderful slanted layout as we spot the builders hard at work. Despite the success of the building, Digg barks “Okay boys, c’mon down. I don’t need you anymore.” Digg marches into his office, a makeshift shack on the site, and we’re left to ponder what it is he’s scheming as a rolling pan of the exterior shields us from Digg’s view, the Billy Bletcher laugh the only thing cluing us in to nefarious acts. Tashlin loved to do the concealing pans, and they work out well in his favor, adding a sense of suspense and anticipation. Out on the other side comes digg in a fancy new machine–DIRTY DIGG’S BRICK BRICK LAYING MACHINE.

Porky, who’s dutifully laying his bricks the old fashioned way, spots Digg’s new trick, and is hardly pleased. Mel’s stuttering is particularly heavy, still attempting to emulate Joe Dougherty as Porky complains “Say! You can’t do that!” Digg takes no offense. “Well, I’m doing it, ain’t it?” 

Settings on Digg’s machine include start, full speed, super speed, super colossal speed, gosh darn fast, and reverse. Digg pulls the lever to start, increasing the speeds as bricks inevitably hurtle out of the chute and land right into place on the site of his building. Wonderful (and tedious!) complex animation as the bricks pile on, one after the other, even Porky taking a moment to admire the handiwork. Tashlin’s cartoons always seem to entail bits of animation that seem so tedious and complex to animate. Tashlin’s eye for detail is keen.

A score board gloatingly displays Digg’s lead over Porky: Digg has 22 stories, Porky 2. 

Porky mourns his loss (”Woe is me… woe is me!”) but no matter–the eager bunny from before is there to cheer him up, donning a “brick layer” sweater with the same “How ‘bout me, Porky?” Porky declines. A quick zoom in and out, and the rabbit asks the same question, now donning a “colossal brick layer” sweater. Porky once more declines. With the third and final “super colossal brick layer”, Porky finally yells “No!”, to which the rabbit sulks off. Thankfully, Porky has a change of heart. “Ok-ok-o-oka-ok-ok-oka–alright, eh-geh-geh-go in there and eh-feh-fi-feh-fight!” The little rabbit is ecstatic.

The power of Popeye compels the rabbit as she flexes her muscles, even flexing her ears to make a pair of makeshift muscles. One ear scoops the mortar, the other tosses a brick on top, and we very quickly realize she is MORE than capable for the job, laying bricks three times as fast as Digg’a machine. The scoreboard hurries to adjust Porky’s “score”, both of them now tied at 77 stories each. Even better is the little “whew!” the rabbit sighs after pausing to rest, a lovely bit of comedic timing both underscoring and highlighting her work.

Now, Digg rushes to beat Porly’s building, realizing he has a worthy competitor on his hands. The two are neck and neck… until the poor mechanical design of Digg’s brick layer lands him in hot water. He mistakes the reverse setting for the highest speed setting, and with a hearty kick to the lever, the lever breaks and is now stuck in reverse. Mel Blanc seems to provide Digg’s exclamation of “Gosh! It’s stuck in reverse!” instead of Bletcher, perhaps added in at last minute. 

Just as quickly as he had laid the bricks, the bricks of Digg’s building come hurtling back into the machine, the machine swelling bigger and bigger as it threatens to burst from the congestion. Digg’s entire building is now without a brick, and to make matters worse (or better), the machine finally explodes.

Porky’s dinky little backhoe from before comes to life, digging a plot of land the perfect size for digg to fit in. Digg flops to the ground from the impact of the explosion, receiving a swift kick to the ass with the machine’s shoe and a konk on the head via shovel for good measure.

Elsewhere, Porky triumphs, his city hall now complete. The cartoon’s motif of “Fifty-second Street” triumphantly underscores Porky’s victory as he shakes his fist in the glory, perched on top of his architectural feat as his adoring fans shout from below. Suddenly, we’re visited by a familiar friend: the little rabbit from before zips to Porky’s side. “How ‘bout me, Porky?” 

Instead of shooing her away, Porky is more than happy to lift her up and have her pose on his outstretched hand. A wholesome iris out as the little rabbit clasps her ears together like fists, reveling in the glory.

Truthfully, this is probably the one Porky cartoon I forget about the most. Not that it’s bad by any means, but out of his hearty filmography of 153 cartoons, this one isn’t the most notable. With that said, this is a fine cartoon. The animation is certainly the highlight: whether it’s Porky and Dirty Digg doing their furious nose-to-snout tango, the dog lumbering around the site of the dynamite hole, the animals mixing cement together, or the entire brick laying montage, there is a lot to admire, the climax of the cartoon especially. The “how ‘bout me, Porky?” gag is especially amusing, albeit taxing (as it was intended to be), and the dynamite gag with the dog is wonderfully morbid. 

Porky still has a very transparent personality, yet Mel’s deliveries are fun to listen to, especially at this stage when he’s still figuring out the speech patterns. The cartoon’s music score is absolutely WONDERFUL, very jazzy, very upbeat, a fitting score to match the streamlined look of the cartoon.

While this isn’t my go-to recommendation for Porky cartoons, it makes for an amusing watch. I wouldn’t urge you to drop everything and see it, and if you don’t watch it you’ll be just as well off, but this is a fine cartoon with a lot to admire. 

Link!