Release Date: September 5th, 1942
Series: Looney Tunes
Director: Norm McCabe
Story: Don Christensen
Animation: Vive Risto
Musical Direction: Carl Stalling
Starring: Mel Blanc (Daffy, Announcer, Cuckoo Clock, Dr. Jerkyll, Chloe, Radio)
(You may view the cartoon here or on HBO Max!)
One of the greatest gifts to a cartoonist in the golden age--especially at Warner Bros.--was Robert Louis Stevenson's Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. The gothic horror novel about a mild mannered doctor who developed a serum to help separate his most evil urges into a separate manifestation (which, unfortunately for him, prompts him to become the embodiment of those urges as the nefarious Edward Hyde) received parody after parody after lampoon after burlesque in the animated world--not to mention the countless other adaptations on film, stage, and radio. At Warner's alone, the story has a track record of being parodied at least once a decade, all the way up into the '60s.
At the time of this cartoon's release, the 1941 film adaptation of the story starring Spencer Tracy had come out the previous August and racked up three Oscar nominations. The story was thusly brought back into the public conscience and, with it, the many animated burlesques that dominated the landscape. Thus, a likely participant of this domino effect, The Impatient Patient meets Warners' once-a-decade-minimum Jekyll and Hyde parody quota for the '40s.
The second of McCabe's "Daffy triad", Patient is perhaps one of his moodiest efforts. A clear focus is enforced on the atmosphere and ambience to embrace the gothic tone of the source material--that way, the zany, lighthearted, abrasive antics inherent to any associations with Daffy Duck pack an even greater punch.
Dave Hilberman's streamlined sensibilities may initially feel at odds with such a premise that requires more gothic, archaic sensibilities, but he manages to construct a particularly solid balance. Such moodiness with a streamlined flourish is felt as early as the title credits: fitting with the theme of the title, the credits are written to look like a prescription, each credit supplementing their own doctor's signature seriff. Don Christensen perhaps wins the award for most convincing doctor's script--each credit is hand signed by the credited person. A wonderfully unique title card that feels celebratory in its personalization and collaboration. Just the same, the playfulness in such an artistic decision is potentially at odds with the foreboding, tense, mystical air surrounding the design of the titles and Stalling's music cue: an apt embodiment of this short's tone overall.
That same foreboding, tense, mystical air leeches into the short's opening moments. With a fade in and gradual camera truck-out, McCabe introduces us to an eerie, moody swamp. Interesting is that the camera pushes out rather than in, the overlay of vines and branches clustering in and closing the viewer away. Usually, the very opposite is the case. The audience is being lured away from the swamp rather than invited in--almost a refusal of our presence. Right off the bat, this signals unease and tenseness in the tone through this subtle defiance of convention.
McCabe's directing is rather lush and moody all throughout this opening sequence--something not always a priority with his quirky directing sensibilities. Overlays for a parallax effect to convey depth and dimension are a considerably lush luxury from him, as well as lingering on long, sweeping pans that focus entirely on the atmosphere at hand. No sign gags to dispel the air. No oddball characters popping in to interrupt. Just unmitigated ambience.
These marshland environments are certainly an artistic highlight. Foreground overlays are clustered together, dark in value, animated to slightly outpace the camera to give the illusion of depth--objects closer to the camera move faster than those further away. The difference in painted values (dark foreground objects, hazy backgrounds) is a particularly valuable consideration, and one that can tend to be taken for granted in these black and white shorts. Hilberman would later go on to co-found United Productions of America, which was an operation currently being sown at the time of this cartoon's release; needless to say, he greatly understood sharp, graphic design and was a valuable contribution to McCabe's unit in giving his shorts a streamlined edge and fresh appeal. Often a saving grace and star attraction of some of his cartoons.
Atop this rolling camera pan, atop the mournful musical accompaniment, atop the croaking of frogs and din of crickets comes another din: a dirgelike, almost spectral moan of "Chlooooo-eeeeeee... Chlooooooooo-eeeeeeee..." A reference to the Charles Daniels' song Chlo-e (Song of the Swamp), the song itself would see a revitalization through a treatment by Spike Jones in 1945. Having been recorded in the '20s, the song was already considered a bit of an oldie by the time of this cartoon's release, though it had seen an--albeit unsuccessful--film adaptation in 1934 entitled Chloe, Love Is Calling You. Jones' recording is its best bet in terms of popularity, but the reference here is certainly amusingly ahead of its time by being behind the times.
Vocal tones of our Chloe crooner are light, airy, haunting, and executed with a slight air of ambiguity. Enough for us to be unaware of its source at the start...
...but for hindsight to bludgeon us with the inescapability that of course this would be Daffy Duck's voice, as a harsh, screechy, cacophonous "CHLO--HEY, CHLOE!" so proves seconds later.
McCabe succeeds in his intent to make Daffy's introduction a surprise. Still relatively early on in Daffy's career, the title makes no indication of his presence--no credit or any sort of "Daffy Duck in..." as is typically customary. First time theatergoers are totally blind as to who is the eponymous patient. Being a Daffy cartoon, this is particularly commendable, as Daffy is such a vicarious character who naturally attunes the audience to his every thought, feeling, and impulse. McCabe especially was very precocious in following this. Usually, we know right away that Daffy will be here or what he's doing--pulling these punches makes for a much more intriguing opening that piques the audience's curiosity. Daffy's vicarious nature is important, and this will most certainly be covered extensively in this review, but that little bit of restraint makes his eventual arrival and presence all the more impactful.
For as sharp as this opening is in its idea, there are some nitpicks and tweaks to have made it a bit more effective. The initial reveal of Daffy holding the telegram addressed to this Chloe, thereby justifying his "haunting" [mail] calls, feels much too tame. As it stands now, his hand holding the telegram robotically slides into the screen--too many drawings spaced too evenly apart. A motion that is much too tame for the sheer urgency and even manicness in Blanc's screaming overtop. Then again, the scream itself does a satisfactory job of filling in any sort of gap left by the weak animation (or lack thereof). Again, his introduction largely works and is very clever--there could just be a few more tweaks to make it even stronger.
In any case, the audience is finally introduced to our duck, living up to the title's adjective. The allotted "manic Daffy breakout" occurs intriguingly early in the cartoon, which is a bit of a surprise. Usually, many cartoons of this era spend many minutes building up to the cacophonous catharsis seen here. Whooping, yelling, frantically darting around the screen, defying the very logics of physics as he does so. Shorts like Porky's Duck Hunt spent minute upon minute carefully crafting such an explosive showcase of mania; now, it's become a simple means of exposition.
There does come a difference between then and now: Daffy's HOOHOOing has expanded its "meaning", as evidenced by more recent shorts such as A Coy Decoy and The Henpecked Duck. Once a mindless, guttural utterance, a way to mark his territory, these shrill whoops now have the capacity to bear a startled edge to them. A catharsis out of defense. A propellant of sorts that flings and carries him around the screen. Though Daffy's animation shows him smiling idly, there's a felt undercurrent of anxiety, fear, and just plain adrenaline--a warning call of sorts. It's all still rooted in daffiness and catharsis, but how that daffiness manifests and what that catharsis is responding to continues to expand and grow more depth.
Handling of Daffy's catharsis--happy, scared, whatever this catharsis may be--is very well done. A lot of emphasis is continually placed upon his environments; his parting of the willow tree leaves as he searches for this Chloe immediately renders the environments interactive and tangible. This entire sequence of him parting leaves, lifting up turtle shells, poking his neck through knotholes, skipping through water is built upon showing how he interacts with his backgrounds and is melded into them. Not placed on top as a flat afterthought.
Particular praises are directed towards his skipping and frolicking on the pond. He continually weaves in and out of perspective, getting smaller as he goes further into the background and larger as he skims the foreground, again cementing the above comments about the depth of these backgrounds and their interactivity. Timing and pacing of his threaded jumps and glides and skips is rhythmic, smooth, purposeful, with some particularly attractive arcs carrying him from key pose to key pose as he pauses to bob robotically in place. Fewer drawings spaced further apart and held for fewer frames juxtapose against more restrained cycles with more drawings, less spacing, making a hypnotic touch-and-go pace.
The "touch" aspect may feel almost a bit too mechanical to some. A classic "Stan Laurel hop" very much feels like Daffy obliging to that beloved move rather than it actually being born out of his catharsis, and the same is true for his affectionately stilted bobbing up and down as he makes direct eye contact with the audience. This mechanicality works in its literality and idiosyncrasies, dissonant with the smoothness of his gliding elsewhere in the scene and even the panic of Blanc's deliveries. Daffy is screaming and shouting and tearing up a swamp in a frenzy, but still has the time to interject these "rehearsed" poses in between. That in itself is a rather daffy thing to do in its unpredictability.
"Chloe! Where are ya, ol' kid? Where ya hidin', Chloe? Come up from down 'err, Chloe!"
Praises be to Christensen's dialogue for Daffy. It's rushed, circuitous, filled with frantic interjections--the friendly condescension of "ol' kid" is particularly apt and true to Daffy's overfamiliar nature, calling someone who he's never met a "kid". "Come up from down there" is similarly excellent in its proud nonsensicality. A rhythmic nonsensicality that will continue to make itself a theme with the character (such as his dialogue in Baby Bottleneck: "Yes, madam, your baby's on the way! Yessir!").
Slowly, the camera begins to pan right, following Daffy's manic travels. A tall, looming tree provides a perfect frame for when a hiccup suddenly stops him right in his tracks, obediently filling the negative space left by the roots.
With this hiccup comes a vacant stare towards the audience: the beginnings of this short's Daffy-to-audience connection that McCabe was so punctual in maintaining.
Our prior analysis of Daffy's Southern Exposure explores this same phenomenon, and is a recurring trend found in all three of McCabe's duck cartoons; Daffy has a particularly strong reliance upon the audience's presence and interaction when under McCabe's direction. Daffy's sensitivity to the viewer isn't exclusive to McCabe or even Daffy, but there's a much more assured immediacy and casualness that comes with his demonstrations. Eye contact with the audience is habitual, deferential. There are many instances where he directly invites the viewer into the cartoon, speaking to them directly for even the most minute of details. There's no sense of pretension or much of a performance--except for when it's intended--as he so casually "breaks the fourth wall". It's not breaking the fourth wall at all. To Daffy, it's just having an amiable conversation with some old friends.
Impatient Patient continually broadcasts and embraces this phenomenon to great effect. It makes Daffy more endearing to us, and makes the story more engaging. There's more at stake when Daffy makes his problems our problems. Especially when it's done as an unconscious, habitual gesture of extroversion.
All of these observations prove consistent with a bout of hiccups that soon overtake him. They increase in their amusing violence, eventually launching him out of the swamp--more mileage out of the tree's framing is momentarily utilized as a passing position. When Daffy is thrust onto land, the camera readily trucks forward. We are thusly more close and intimate with him, sharing his general eye level and prepared for him to broadcast his feelings on the matter to us.
"How d'ya like that," is immediately indicative of all of the above. Personal, inviting language with the inclusion of "you". The colloquialisms of his speech giving him a warm, approachable, perhaps even relatable charm. The direct eye contact and claustrophobic staging that forces our undivided attention onto him. "It's them blamed hiccups again!"
Daffy’s Southern Exposure is again worth mentioning for comparison. Both open with a preoccupied Daffy before he speaks directly to the audience—both instances to complain. That same mild aggravation here is the same in Southern’s. Both openings are armed with the intent to directly involve the audience into the cartoon and make them a starring character of sorts, a figure who Daffy can bounce his reactions and thoughts and feelings off of. So much of the writing and staging in all of McCabe’s duck shorts is personally tailored to foster this connection and vicariousness, but never once feels showy or overly conscious in doing so.
That Daffy is inconvenienced by his “blamed” hiccups is also of note; as mentioned previously, it was McCabe who really introduced a more natural, cynical edge to the character. Daffy’s had a greedy streak and an ego since the very beginning—You Ought to Be in Pictures is the oft referenced beginning of such—but he never truly felt passively bitter or disgruntled until McCabe. That isn’t to say his Daffy is bitter or disgruntled, as he’s often charming, friendly, open, playful, self serving, and generally pleasant. His little annoyances and grievances (like being inconvenienced by his hiccups) just feel more instinctual, like another facet of his ever growing dimension and personality. Compare his reactions to something like Wise Quacks, where he doesn’t even seem to be aware of his hiccuping fits.
Of course, like most things with Daffy, his hiccups are just a passing grasp of his attention: something off-screen soon overtakes his focus, and happily so. That vicarious direction that attunes us to Daffy’s every thought and movement momentarily takes a backseat in the name of further intrigue. Daffy reacts to whatever-this-may-be before we do, therefore grabbing the audience’s attention and playing on their curiosities. It’s more interesting and engaging that way than to share this discovery at the same time, losing all sense of suspense.
Compensating for a momentary lack of unanimity, the next shot is seemingly from his perspective: a dilapidated mansion on a hill, neon sign proudly advertising “DR. JERKYL (DOCTOR)”.
This entire scene balances a brilliance discrepancy in tone. Though the mansion and empty marshlands are thick in atmosphere, foreboding, tense, the neon sign is gaudy and striking. Stalling’s musical accompaniment favors the chipper sign with its celebratory, happy stings. The latter two observations seem to be ingested through duck-tinted glasses; the gaudiness of the sign and promises of a doctor immediately nab his attention more than any rightful suspicion or eeriness. Like a moth to a flame, Daffy is drawn to the sign and its promises, the music reflecting his hopes. All a great way to subtly get into his head and share his thinking.
Enter Daffy himself to inspect the damage, breaking this illusion of the shot being from his immediate perspective.
“Hmmm! A doc—hic—a doc—hic—a d—hic—… a physician!”
The “Porky stutter gag” continues to be an easy and beloved way to get laughs—especially when gently subverted as it is here. Blanc’s proficiency in hiccups should be noted; they were a hot commodity, even landing him the role of Gideon in Pinocchio who was a walking hiccup monger. Given his frequency in these sound effects, especially for other studios, it’s rather surprising that it took Warner’s so long to put such an unabashed focus on them for themselves. Maybe because a short about a character with the hiccups doesn’t immediately lend itself to an interesting premise all on its own.
Amidst his little spiel, the camera cuts close on him. There isn't much of a need to do so, at least at the time that it does; cutting as he's talking disrupts the flow just a bit and jolts the audience's attention without reason. The cut may have been better off happening right before his second line, again addressed to the audience: "Myeh... he can't cure the hiccups, though."
Granted, the camera trucks right back out after that line to complete the sequence, so perhaps there were concerns that cutting so "late" would disrupt the flow of shots. It's a minor nitpick, and McCabe's compulsion to cut close is understandable, as it further personalizes Daffy's aside to the audience and makes it feel more intimate, more buddy-buddy, fostering this relationship with the audience as he continues to hold a one-way conversation with us. Doing so is certainly more effective in a close-up than in the wide shot, which emphasizes the mansion and setting over Daffy. Any issues with the cut is due to timing and placement rather than its presence.
Back to the wide shot for the mansion itself to engage in the conversation. The sign's declaration of "OH YES I CAN" is cute, funny in its literality and how it directly answers what Daffy wants to hear. The colloquialization fits Daffy's personality and conversation style--this is all to say that "OH YES I CAN" is funnier than the sign suddenly changing to "DR. JERKYL (DOCTOR): CAN CURE HICCUPS". The former is more personal, casual, relevant to this exhaustive talk of intimacy with Daffy and the audience.
Daffy's reasons for initially avoiding the mansion are similarly charming. He's lured in, but suddenly grows wary not because of this surprise mansion in the middle of nowhere and its nefarious advertisements of a doctor, but because he feels that the doc won't be able to get him what he needs. Anything that can't serve Daffy in some way isn't worth his time. So, that the sign gives him exactly what he wants to hear is a nice touch, in-line with that earlier dissonance mentioned with Daffy's initial eagerness upon seeing the sign and its gaudiness.
Joyous appropriations of the Stan Laurel hop ensue as Daffy's official endorsement. Like his frolicking in the swamp, the motion here is similarly mechanical: evenly spaced drawings, little regard for follow through, squash and stretch, or a larger antic to make the motion seem more kinetic and appealing. But, just like the swamp sequence, one almost gets the sense that this mechanicality is purposeful, especially when a much more natural scramble take demonstrating Daffy's initial joy precedes it. His hops are almost born out of obligation, an amusing objectivity to them.
In a way, it feels like McCabe is delegating all of these screwball behaviors and Daffy-isms we've so come to love to the very beginning, meeting his quota before indulging in the meat of the cartoon. This short is a burlesque on horror, which doesn't really open itself up to many opportunities for Daffy to constantly be bouncing off the wall or spending the entire time sitting on top of a manic breakout. Granted, Southern Exposure demonstrated that that sort of Daffy wasn't exactly McCabe's forte; we've since evolved past the days of Porky & Daffy and The Daffy Doc. Daffy finally has the lucidity and capacity to react and serve a starring role--no longer is he just a flashbang of noise and spectacle for the sake of noise and spectacle.
This subversive handling of Daffy's eccentricities extend even to his hiccups propelling him up the hill and to the mansion. It's more relevant to the plot and more novel than if he were to just bounce and twirl and cartwheel his way along the path, which is usually the default. As he does so, the sign blinks faster and faster as his hiccups become more concentrated, as if furiously reminding Daffy that this is where his cure lies. In all, an extremely charming opening that balances mood and mirth quite well.
Having gotten this "fit" and exposition out of the way, McCabe is more comfortable to focus on mood going forward. At least for the purposes of this scene. The camera cuts to Daffy at the entrance of the mansion--there's some residual bobbing on him, indicating that he's coming down from the convulsions of his hiccups, but reads a bit awkwardly and aimlessly than anything. Showing him stepping or hopping into frame would have been a bit more clear.
Nevertheless, Daffy's prior apathy to the mansion's exterior and convenience extend to here. If anything, he appears nonplussed rather than wary or turned off. There's still a bit of that residual mental vacancy that was so common with his earliest appearances. One gets the idea that he doesn't know what to think of this mansion. A welcome mat does the thinking for him, prompting a smile--any place with a welcome mat must be indicative of hospitality. McCabe's Daffy seems to have an impressionable streak in all of his cartoons.
Another bout of hiccuping takes him directly in front of the door. The dual metaphor and literality behind his hiccups leading him to the doctor is clever--his hiccups prompt him to go seek out this doctor, both on principle and due to the fact that they are literally propelling him to his destination. Said hiccup bouts are communicated more as convulsions rather than actual hiccups; they're strong, forceful, prompting a frantic cycle of antic, overshoot, antic, overshoot with no in-betweens as he crosses the welcome mat. There's an abstraction and caricature behind it all that keeps the action engaging and fun rather than tiresome.
Daffy is notably puny here--that's true throughout the entire cartoon, but this particular staging really emphasizes the dissonance between his small size and the overbearing, towering mansion. The camera is positioned to look down at him, making him feel small in both a physical and metaphorical sense. The door, the welcome mat, the porch all seem to overwhelm him in size.
All of these are warning signs; signs Daffy does not heed. Instead, he approaches this entire opening with a foolishly blind trust. Nonplussed curiosity manifests through vacant smiles and ponderous beats--it isn't dissimilar to his interactions with the wolf and weasel in Southern Exposure, where he obligingly intrudes upon their home and is completely blind to any sense of danger or suspicion.
Danger and suspicion certainly manifest in a pair of furry, grisly hands that slide beneath the door and yank the mat out from beneath Daffy. A successfully abrupt and surprising action, the hands ease in and give plenty of time for the audience to notice them, but completely drop out of the screen upon the first frame of the mat being sucked in--the yanking feels much more forceful that way. Likewise, Daffy's own posing as he's flung into the air suggest abstract discombobulation. His movements aren't exactly located out of realistic physics, but instead are a flurry of differing poses that, all strung together, give the illusion of surprise and force. It's conveying the idea of his being forced upwards. For this reason, the animation may look a bit frenetic, but fittingly so.
That freneticism is kept up to pace, as Daffy has no time to stop any of his movements or jolts before the implied other side of the mat--"UNwelcome"--is slid beneath him. Between the hands coming out, the mat being sucked in, Daffy being thrown up, the mat pushed back out, and Daffy coming to a stop, there are a lot of ideas and visual information all on the screen at once. Thus, this sort of discombobulation and almost incomprehensible blur of action is shared between Daffy and the audience alike.
The "UNwelcome" mat gag is clever for reasons even beyond the obvious. For one, sliding out a replacement mat that largely communicates the same message if the mat were taken away entirely is added work and convolution, which, in turn, is funnier. Likewise, the hands slide the mat beneath the door and push its other side back out rather than showing the hands turning the mat over on-screen. More pencil mileage and drawings are saved that way. Moreover, the staging is focused on Daffy during any mat-less downtime--it likely would have been more difficult to maneuver his placement and stage presence if the mat were flipped on-screen. Maintaining clarity would be a struggle.
Daffy merely scratches his head at this new development. His development and expanding lucidity only continue to grow more pronounced. The "old" Daffy never would have questioned it, much less even noticed the change. While it also doesn't exactly look like Daffy is doing very much thinking here--sparks are attempting to be connected, but naivite and ignorance forbid--having him stop to think about it at all is another indication of his expanding awareness for the world around him. It may seem like a simple stock action to remark upon, and it is, but it is worth the comparison.
All of the above extends to the door slowly creaking behind him, which prompts Daffy to share a slightly restrained, slightly curious, largely nonplussed glance.
If he didn't notice the furry, black hands before, then he certainly would this time when said hands come in to oil the creaking door hinge. A quaint and cute commentary on all the old stock horror tropes. Stalling's music is absence all throughout, with unabashed auditory focus solely on the creaking door--the atmosphere is more tense as a result.
There are a few nitpicks that come with the sequence, but they are exactly that: nitpicks. The preceding shot of Daffy regarding the door could be held for just a half second longer, giving more time for the door to creak open and the audience to ponder its source. McCabe "spoils" the reveal just a bit too early. Likewise, the animation of the door being oiled doesn't adhere very well to the actual hinge. The drops of the oil seem to fall off like a formless sheet rather than careening down the bends and structure of the hinge. Both the animation of the hand and the oil itself are very attractive, the combined solidity in draftsmanship and careful regard for effects animation suggesting the handiwork of John Carey, but somewhere along the line the registry of the door hinge went awry.
Cutting back to Daffy prompts an animator switch to Cal Dalton. Long, wrinkly mouths in tandem with a shorter, stockier build immediately give him away. He animates Daffy with a more visible anxiousness, manifesting in the sweat dripping off of his face as he tepidly creeps inside. Much more mindful and trepidatious than his previous scenes.
Hilberman's shining moment with his layouts arrives when Daffy first sets foot inside the mansion. His graphic influence is certainly felt all throughout, but there's some restraint and more literality in the swamp environments for the sake of atmosphere in realism. If the swamp backgrounds were too abstract, that may detract from the intended ambience and exposition. Here, the mansion has more leeway to be more immediately artsy in a shot that is intended to impress through its style rather than establish vital story information. These stairs to nowhere are not as important of a story point as the drowning swamplands establishing the short's setting.
The immediate takeaway from the layout, beyond its breathtaking streamlined appeal, is the differentiation in values and lighting. Airbrushed shadows juxtapose against the harsh firmness of the stairs, connoting their physical tangibility vs. projections on a wall. Windows filter in light from some unknown space, trapping Daffy in a metaphorical web of light that is overwhelming, eerie, striking. Aside from the stairs and doorway, the background hardly has any detail; the lighting and shadows are our only guide. Who knows what lurks in said shadows.
In doing so, Daffy's presence in the mansion feels more intrusive. So many little details could be lurking in the shadows, preferential to stay out of the way--Daffy is going against this mold, directly traversing these "secretive" environments, giving the impression that he should not be here. His tiny size against the vastness of the layout certainly affirm such alienation. All relevant to prior discussions of his diminutive stature giving him more empathy and powerlessness.
So engulfed in the atmosphere and beauty of Hilberman's layouts, Daffy's hiccups have become an afterthought. To himself, even--a surprise hiccup prompts the door to slam behind him, which sends him running. Albeit difficult to discern from a distance, tall eyes and gentle distortion as he runs past the camera--a nice consideration to give the scene some more depth by having him run in perspective--seem to suggest John Carey's hand.
Daffy is our "vicarious buddy", and we thusly have no choice but to follow: Almost as soon as Daffy is out of frame, the camera immediately pans in pursuit. A seamless pan into momentary darkness, adding a buffer of sorts before the next onslaught of visual information. The pacing of Daffy's running and the camera behind him is very smooth, very spontaneous.
The onslaught of visual information in question.
Keeping a brisk pace, the camera doesn't linger as it passes right by. It extends into further darkness, pauses for a very brief moment, and reverses course. A classic double take, but a fitting one for the cartoon's running theme of interactivity. This anthropomorphization of the camera follows that same philosophy of empathy and vicariousness that Daffy does--it reflects our own desire to seek out Daffy and maintain our connection with him, curious about his whereabouts and wellbeing. The camera movements have personality, a life of their own, which extends into a subtle directorial commentary.
A hiccup within the suit of armor confirms any lingering suspicions of Daffy's whereabouts.
And then another.
And another.
Each successive hiccup reveals more of our hero. Likewise, each hiccup is more forceful in the information it reveals and, conversely, what is lost of the suit. The mask of the armor is raised, and then the helmet is lifted up entirely to reveal Daffy's neck, and then we see him lose his hat, and then his feet are visible and so on. Carey handles the crescendo of action beautifully and swiftly. The build up is believably incremental, and the armor itself has an elasticity that lends itself to the force and abstraction of Daffy's hiccups, but still maintains its overall solidity and form to keep it feeling like a clunky suit of armor.
Details of what is lost from the armor and where are tracked consistently. Some objects are given a slight bit of distortion or smearing to enunciate the weight and speed of their fall. Carey's decorative star and smoke effects, standard for his work, give a playful, graphic appeal that works with the innate mischief of Daffy's hiccups being so troublesome, and also offers an equally frisky antithesis to the suffocating mood of the scene. Treg Brown's ear shattering clanks and metal sounds all layer on top of each other and fill in any gaps that may have been left by Carey's animation, which should be few. Carey combines feeling and logic in his animation; one feels the general idea of Daffy's "breakout", the caricature and abstraction, but there are details kept track of and a visible destruction of the suit rooted in order and logic.
The accidental nature of Daffy's destruction is certainly interesting; this "breakout"--even if simply referring to a sudden cacophony of noise amidst the quiet--feels as though it'd be a natural progression of his hysteria in an earlier short. Here, his awareness to keep quiet and wary is taken away from him without any source of control. A bemused sympathy accompanies such. We've become so acquainted to Daffy being a harbinger of his own destruction, that having any destruction be sourced from out of his complete control brings a new level of sympathy and engagement.
Amidst the commotion, the camera cuts to a cuckoo clock—relevant, given our observations in the Fox Pop analysis and how anthropomorphized cuckoo birds seemed to be an old favorite. The cuckoo here is more conventional in lieu of Pop’s streamlined handling. It may seem especially odd to cut to a tangent involving a cuckoo bird during such a tense moment, at odds with the atmosphere, but it’s a quirkiness that fits McCabe’s style of directing. Harsh shadows projected onto the wall are fetching, abrasive, maintaining some of that mood. The same could even be said for the hiccuping and clanking still imposed atop the scene and making the scenes feel more connected.
Enter the cuckoo: a bird bearing a reasonable resemblance to Napoleon for a literal cuckoo connection. His rotundness and long, wrinkly mouth again indicate Cal Dalton as the animator. Dalton’s own idiosyncratic style works with this equally syncretic beat, embracing its quirkiness.
One inevitably thinks back to Fox Pop’s cuckoo gag and how much more streamlined and coherent it was. Here, the gag is a bit drawn out in pacing and animation--the bird shuffles out of the doors, spends a few moments almost falling off the ledge and having to catch himself, shushes Daffy, shuffles back to his post after a bit of a pause, and so forth. There's just a lot happening in a gently clunky manner that feels a bit at odds with the established tone of this sequence.
All of this is nevertheless for the sake of a gag: after firmly shushing Daffy, the cuckoo bird hiccups himself. Awkwardly humble animation ensues--a giggle, some aimlessly modest acting, before returning back with the same drawn out shuffle walk. The self consciousness of the cuckoo bird seems to accidentally leech into the directing, with all of the action coming to a halt to focus on this odd, floaty bit. Likewise, the Napoleon/cuckoo connection feels as if it could be embraced or utilized just a bit more--on the surface, it appears like a random bird wearing a Napoleon hat for no reason. If anything, this sequence is quirky in a way that is native to McCabe's sensibilities, but isn't utilized in a way that celebrates and embraces said quirkiness. It just ends up feeling odd and disjointed.
In any case, the self contained bit that is perhaps a bit too self contained proves to be exactly that: self contained. A fade to black gives an air of finality that allows us to comfortably move on to the next part of the story.
The next part being, of course, following Daffy as he tepidly makes his way through the mansion. Yet again, his stocky build and long, chewy mouths suggest Dalton's handiwork. Dalton always drew his characters on the heavier side, and while he may not share the same meticulousness in construction as someone like John Carey, that stockiness helps to make Daffy's footsteps feel more leaden. More leaden means more anxious. More anxious means more atmosphere for the viewer.
Another hiccup spurs on some frantic, aimless flailing, synonymous in motion to the cuckoo's near fall off the ledge. This sort of floatiness in Dalton's animation is perhaps at odds with the scene's intent--it feels like a more solid, more frantic, more energetic burst of energy that quickly resolves itself would be more fitting in conveying such urgency. Here, the motion is a bit too drawn out, sluggish; the general idea of Daffy stumbling to silence himself is nevertheless clearly communicated, which is the priority.
That Daffy does attempt to silence himself is rather telling. He's aware of the gravity of the situation, aware of his position as a trespasser and the leeriness of his environments. It may seem redundant to continually harp on this--Daffy has a logical reaction to his circumstances!--but so many shorts prior to this have demonstrated his obliviousness being his undoing. That's still very true of this cartoon as well, but the continual awareness he has for the potential danger and unease of the sequence is a rather new development for his character. His survival instincts are at the strongest they've ever been. Granted, that's a low bar.
His attempts are nevertheless in vain, as a series of hiccups disrupt all illusions of quietude. Dalton's frantic animation works well; it still suffers from some aimless floatiness, but works overall to the intended chaos.
For as tense as the circumstances are, there's a nice mischief and energy in this particular scene, as Daffy's hiccups are practically musical. Stalling's score almost sounds like a dance rhythm of sorts, the low bass notes effectively mimicking Daffy's own hiccups--a flurried string accompaniment that is high and flighty conveys motion, anxiety, and an overall high pitch of acting. This faithful accompaniment and marriage to his hiccups transforms what could be a dreadful idea for a cartoon ("a character gets the hiccups" feels like a short that would have been novel as a 1932 Disney short starring, say, Pluto) into one that is fun to watch through its sense of caricature, exaggeration, and where the hiccups lead the plot.
Thus, Daffy's hiccups continue to guide him beyond his control. A staircase in the left side of the screen isn't just to occupy the background, but to escort Daffy as his convulsions send him upward.
Whereas he goes up, the camera itself goes down, following the other half of the staircase. A clever split-screen layout that makes the mansion seem even more full of twists and turns. This in itself seems to inflate the sense of danger that Daffy is in, enunciating the unprecedented vastness of the mansion's contents--likewise, we've been so affixed to Daffy this entire time that the idea of separating from him innately sparks unease and intrigue. The audience is wrapped up in the same suspense that Daffy is.
The actual camera maneuver down is a bit less than seamless. Instead of directly panning diagonally, the camera zooms in on the center and then glides towards the general vicinity of the stairs, a wobble permeating its maneuvers. Difficulties with the camera department has long been documented on this blog, with practically every short having its shaky pans or double exposures throughout the '30s. Those issues have largely been fixed since then, which is why this little exception is being brought up; it's not a big deal at all, but potentially "humbling" as a reminder that these same issues used to plague all of the cartoons.
It's also worth the focus, given that the camera itself proves to be a rather prominent feature for the next sequence. A series of camera moves takes us into the heart of the mansion: a cross dissolve takes us to a stairwell peeking into a rather sinister lair. Cobwebs are painted on cel overlays in the foreground that push away as the camera trucks in, giving the illusion of depth and dimension--the same exact faux multiplane pan effect seen at the very top of the short. The actual background paintings themselves here are a bit messy and blobular, not as well defined as they could be, but ends up working to the generally grungy atmosphere of the cartoon.
Atmosphere is certainly the name of the game. To harp on previous mention, McCabe's prioritization of mood and ambience is particularly refreshing, as it's not always a focus with his shorts. When it is, however, in cases such as this or The Ducktators, it can hit awfully hard. For the purposes of Patient, McCabe seemed to understand that a big draw of the horror genre is tone, emotion, and the build rather than just the scares and thrills. Some attempts at nailing this are more successful than others, but the attempts are certainly felt.
A long, winding pan following a slew of test tubes are one of the most striking examples of Hilberman's geometric, graphic layouts. Shapes of the beakers and tubes are fantastical, graphically minded, sleek and playful; they're a far cry from the dingy archaicity surrounding much of the mansion's atmosphere. Just the same, the twining, curving, almost balloon-animal construction of the test tubes doesn't undermine the intended moodiness. Sheer volume of test tubes, the slight parallax effect between foreground overlays and the background, the intimacy of the camera angle and vagueness in what these tubes are for or their various liquids all ooze plenty of tense curiosity. Having many of the test tubes be rendered as its own separate layer with semi translucency to connote the feeling of glass is particularly helpful to the mood--much more effective than just simple, opaque cel paint.
McCabe's quirky music direction has been a phenomenon discussed in prior reviews; Carl Stalling is a musical genius, but much of that genius is a product of how the director collaborates and works with him. Each score sounds just a little bit different depending on who is directing. Each director has their own musical identity, and McCabe's is particularly prominent. Stalling's scores in his shorts often follow unorthodox chords and progressions, a sort of dream-like loopiness to them that is exemplified perfectly here in Stalling's musical pursuit of the beaker's contents. There's a sort of phantasmagorical, dreamy peculiarity that works to the favor of the similarly phantasmagorical, peculiar atmosphere of the cartoon. It certainly gives a greater sense of progression to the liquid's path, making it much more interesting to watch for its somewhat elongated runtime.
The trend of antitheses and contradictions continues with a reveal rather incongruous to the sequence's creepy tone: said mysterious contents of the beaker are coffee.
Perhaps the payoff would be greater if the liquid were darker and actually comparable to coffee. Maybe McCabe was concerned about "giving away" the punchline too early in doing so, but the convolution of the test tubes and general atmosphere would have been enough of a safety buffer. The coffee pot and the chained up sugar bowl--one of the short's only wartime jokes, which is rather surprising for McCabe's standards; sugar rations had just begun before the short's release, one of the first foods to be rationed in the war--as well as table setting carry the context clues. In any case, the bait and switch is effective, and the anticlimax of the reveal is more of a priority rather than the actual joke itself. Such sudden domesticity in these eerie environments is quaintly amusing.
An even greater surprise than the punchline is the droning, "normal" tones of Mel Blanc over a speaker: "Calling Doctor Jerkyll: a duck."
A shot of the speaker for context as he speaks. The normalcy of the announcer's voice has that same sort of incongruous normalcy as the coffee gag.
That is soon to be contested through the projected silhouette of the doc in question. Introducing him by way of a shadow is nice, as it enables the audience's imagination to run wild with only the context clues given: a hunched back, a large nose, buck teeth--all often stock tropes of cartoon monsters. Great preservation of mood, which is preserved through the music's sudden transition into a menacing dirge. The projections of the beakers are similarly moody, with some impressive transparency effects that are conscious of how the light interacts in the scene.
Unfortunately, a small snafu occurs in which the beaker placed within the projected shadows doesn't lose its transparent hue and instead seems to glow in the dark, but that too is a very minor nitpick. The geometry of the scene is much more important and impressive. One could also critique the clutter of the layout, with the test tube in the doc's hand tangenting with the background beakers and muddling the clarity, but that is similarly inconsequential.
All the while, Blanc's announcer voice continues to drone on top. When he gets no answer, a loud, shrieking "HEY, JERK!" forces the doc to pay attention--a great compliment to the heavy atmosphere. McCabe's pacing and directing is very balanced all throughout, with a bit of mood followed by a gag, followed by more atmosphere, followed by more mischief.
Enter our jerk: nerdy, diminutive, and positively wimpy, he proves the very antithesis to the hulking shadow on the wall. Not only is it a clever fakeout, but it's an even more clever representation and foreshadowing of the Jekyll and Hyde effect. The background between what is projected on the wall and what is reality (no beakers in sight) is inconsistent, but manages to get a pass under the guise of the same illusion giving way to the appearance of a monster projected on the wall.
"Yeeees?" Blanc's deliveries for the doc are mild-mannered, absentminded, immediately representative of the doc's "nice guy routine" that is begging to be refuted at a later point.
"DUCK!"
The doc obeys orders quite literally. Execution of his exit into the pot next to him is wonderfully frank. There is no wild take, no antic to lead into the jump, no sign of any sort of preparation. He immediately adapts to an arc leading him into the pot, the drawings timed on one's for the most optimally fast impact. Most of the visual information informing the audience of the doc's presence that once graced the air are the swaths of drybrush that linger afterwards. Having the camera pan slightly over hampers some of the comedic objectivity of the presentation, but the scene overall is very amusing. There isn't even a self-conscious follow up of the doc tepidly peeking out from within the pot.
More mysticity in tone and storytelling as the announcer, now satisfied, drawls in Pig Latin: "Ixnay aday an uckday with the iccupshay."
Back to our doc, who appears to be deeper in the pot(s) than initially realized. The little door that opens to reveal his face is rather McCabeian (or Christensenian) in its proud non-sequitur. It doesn't even really fit with the running theme of science or being an invention of his--it's just a piece of business that happens for the sake of business. For this reason it's a bit distracting, but oddly empowering in the same way. McCabe's oddities in his cartoons are certainly odd. Almost endearingly so.
Not unlike Daffy and his hiccups, the doc is subject to his own bait-and-switch stutter gag a la Porky Pig with his nervous "Oh, a customuh-uh... a patient!". The delivery is rather random and unmotivated, the doc hardly stuttering before switching. It seems like an attempt to convey his flighty, awkward, perhaps nervous nature, and is at least successful in doing so.
The "door" thusly slams shut, capturing his nose in a vacant void in the process. Such an odd sequence of beats that could potentially turn off the viewer, though there is a certain charm in its refusal to question itself. After all, the cartoon itself is quirky and odd, so said quirks are rather fitting. It feels like a somewhat failed attempt at McCabe and Christensen to get their own brand of humor across, rather than a complete lapse of ideas. The trouble is that there are too many ideas that are conveyed too vaguely.
Nevertheless, the camera makes a cross dissolve back to our uckday. More tonal juggling ensues—after the doc is revealed to be a nervous, unassuming guy, the music itself matches that quaintness and pleasantry. Daffy is completely unaware of the doc’s presence and his nice guy demeanor, however, so the music and pacing shift back to suspense and anxiety. McCabe has briefly broken the Daffy and audience vicariousness for the sake of exposition; rather than detaching us from the duck, it ironically makes us feel closer to him through the subsequent pity we feel for him as he’s confined to his wariness.
Screen direction of this sequence proves intriguing: instead of creeping in from screen left, Daffy instead comes in from screen right. This isn’t a hardened rule, but a character coming in from screen right often feels unnatural and can typically be indicative of something bad about to happen. Like how a book (at least in western countries) is read from left to right, there’s a feeling of progression in doing so. Reversing that makes it feel like a character is reversing course, going on the wrong way, going against the mold. Characters who enter from screen right are often running away or about to walk into a bit of bad news, as is the case here.
All of this isn’t to say that it was entirely intentional. It very well could be a “the curtains are blue” scenario in that McCabe just wanted Daffy to come in from that way. The doc himself is seen heading screen right before the dissolve, so this may just be an attempt to mimic a parallel (though perhaps Daffy should be coming in from screen left to demonstrate that he’s potentially getting closer to the doc). It’s just a technique nevertheless worth noting, especially given that it proves consistent with what happens on screen: Daffy does indeed walk into trouble.
That trouble in question: a platform that sends Daffy flying. Cal Dalton’s animation doesn’t make much sense physically, mimicking prior observations of his handiwork, but this is another scene where the idea of the action is successfully conveyed. Rapidity of Daffy’s poses and Treg Brown’s sound effects—both the slapping, almost fish-like flopping noises and the metallic twang accompanying the platform shooting up—supplement anything that may be missing in the animation. Animation of the distortion on the platform is refreshingly energetic and playful, again maintaining the McCabe tradition of balancing tone. Tense, creeping atmosphere coupled with an elastic burst of energy.
A switch back to John Carey allows for more nuanced animation, focusing more on how Daffy feels and reacts to these changes. His animation of Daffy catching his balance is more believable in how his weight is transferred--his arms still flail a bit after he puts his feet down, he lurches back to offset some of the wobble as he stumbles backwards, then suddenly lurches forward as he aimlessly ambles around, and so on. Solidity of the draftsmanship and appeal really pull their weight.
Amidst this recovery, Daffy spots his reflection in the mirror. Scenes involving mirrors are deceptively difficult to animate, as they require twice the amount of work and brain power. Ensuring the reflection moves in exact tandem with the real subject, and ensuring the reflection is mirrored correctly, is no easy task. Daffy's reflection is inked in comparatively lighter hues to give the illusion of glass within the mirror.
That this scene looks as nice as it does is a real bonus given the complexity of mirror scenes. Carey doesn't seem to struggle with juggling two different Daffys to animate at once. He certainly doesn't skimp out on the acting, either--upon seeing himself in the mirror, Daffy shows shades of Donald Duck as he immediately puts up his "mitts". Hopping forward and back, his reflection follows as it eases in and out of the mirror to demonstrate the full perspective. Hopping turns to swinging left hooks and right, which segues back to more hopping, which then becomes a spontaneous amalgam of the two actions. A ton of energy and personality, making the most of the space given for his acting. It may not seem like much on the surface, but Carey is juggling a lot and seems to do it effortlessly. It's a beautiful scene.
And that's all just observing the animation--what these behaviors represent is beautiful in its own way. This scene certainly lives up to observations of McCabe's duck being on the scrappier side. Such a sudden transformation from his meek, anxious ways into invoking a fight certainly feels like a farce with how cautious Daffy has been this entire time. All bark and no bite.
Blanc's deliveries of the bark are full of personality and charm, with Daffy spewing off as many cliches and threats he can think of ("Put 'em up! I'll sock yer in the puss, 'at's what I'll do--gah, stick up yer mitts! Stick 'em up--"). The words sound tough, but Blanc's scrambled, chewy deliveries manage to convey the rapidfire freneticism and even helplessness felt by Daffy. Again, a very overwhelming feeling of all bark and no bite, and struggling to think of what people who do bark the bark actually sound like.
This, too, is a rather important development for Daffy. He's certainly had his share of confrontation and tough guy acts before, such as his run-in with the bull in Porky's Last Stand. The difference is that an angered bull charging right at him is a much more dangerous scenario than being scared by one's own reflection. His habitual default to threats and effectively raising his hackles feels like a trait of McCabe's more cynical, scrappy duck rather than an actual response to the situation at hand. Of course, McCabe's duck is still very charming and pleasant, with that cynicism often tangential rather than a main attraction, but scenes like this are a great glimpse at how layered and well-rounded McCabe's duck is. He has a real feeling of dimension, a relatively recent development.
Humble pie is nevertheless served on a silver platter once Daffy allows some of the adrenaline to drop. Carey's handling of this realization warrants all of the same praise as his earlier animation; the sudden transformation to gentility and awed observation is very much felt. His movements are much less abrasive, and there are more drawings spaced closer together that give the movements more softness and graduality. The detail of his hat turning around as Daffy turns to look at himself in the mirror is especially hypnotic--smooth, gentle, obedient to a gliding arc that is a great antithesis to the unpredictable hopping and swinging seen just before.
"Heh heh... it's me!"
Self inflicted face blindness would be an amusingly recurring trait with Daffy. Both Scrap Happy Daffy and The Stupor Salesman feature similar gags with Daffy unknowingly confronting his own reflection; indicative of an assured ego--and proof that said ego isn't a trait exclusive to the Jones or Freleng ducks of the fifties--his default for confrontation is born out of eagerness. A form of roleplaying that has been discussed in prior analyses and will continue to be brought up. Instead of coming off as obnoxious, Daffy is able to charm the audience through such overcompensation because of how deeply he gets into the role and how he was so ready to put up a metaphorical fight with himself.
This particular occurence is much more born out of fear than the other two instances. The other two cartoons have comparatively less at stake in their tone; that may seem amusing to say here, since, unlike the aforementioned instances, we know that it's Daffy's reflection from the start, but that vicariousness and connection to McCabe's duck really pulls its weight. We get swept up into Daffy's theatrics and thinking more effectively here. It feels more intimate and, thusly, more charming.
That Daffy regards the audience with his "It's me" is proof of such. So many casual acknowledgements of and to the viewer, and not once do they feel forced or overt. There's a real charm in Daffy's sheepish omission to the audience, explaining himself to them as if they wouldn't have realized it was his own projection unless he told them--no matter how verecund he may be in doing so.
His aside to the audience prompts his back to be turned, which gives license for the mirror to give way to a guest. The irony of Daffy remaining oblivious to an actual potential threat, given his prior outburst, is duly noted.
Luckily for him, the doc in question is rather far removed from being considered threatening, and a somewhat silted close-up demonstrates as such. The close-up shows the doc blinking his eyes and wiggling his ears, nothing more, nothing less. These little quirks could have likely been kept to the layout either preceding or succeeding it, but is nevertheless harmless; it's more to represent a shift into the next bit of business.
That business being another entry in the ol' mirror routine that has seen many homages and parodies since its popularized birth in the 1933 Marx Bros. film, Duck Soup. Daffy has a slight advantage in scene composition, as he is more visibly in frame. Thus, he receives slightly more directorial sympathy and attention than if the stage were cleanly split in half. It's consistent with McCabe's personalized directing towards Daffy.
Carey is the chosen auteur for this scene as well, and delivers on all the same fronts that warrant prior praises. His poses are appealing, solid, visually interesting--always a bonus in a scene that garners much of its humor from viewer scrutiny of every little movement. The conscientiousness in Carey's hand makes him a great fit for such a task.
Knowing that this mirror routine has been repeated so many times, McCabe does what he can to add his own voice and make it a bit fresh. That includes the doc looking directly at the screen and giving his unsubtle (to us) diagnosis of Daffy right then and there: the twirling index fingers and bemused smirk speak for themselves.
Daffy's own look to the camera is endearing rather than subversive. This habitual attachment to the audience almost feels validation seeking, so comfortably aware of the audience's presence and feeling as if he'll have some of his anxieties curbed or questions answered by sharing a glance with us. Even if that's just to communicate a communal sentiment of "Are you seeing this?" It's born out of anxious defense, a charming "break of the fourth wall" that doesn't really read as such with how innate this gesture comes to McCabe's socially dependent Daffy. Compare to the doc, whose finger twirling, ear wiggling and smirking is much more hammy and coy and does feel like it follows the typical convention of fourth wall breaking through its showiness.
Unable to articulate his uncertainties, Daffy defaults to another scratch of the head. This abides the same observations as his earlier head scratching when deciphering the un-welcome mat--he's at least aware enough to know that there's something to scratch his head about. His sentience grows. Even if he's unable to articulate it.
Timing of this sequence errs more towards the airy side. It isn't detrimental in any way, and works with the continually phantasmagorical, floaty atmosphere--it's moreso a gentility and conscious slowness rather than born out of awkwardness. The care and conscientiousness in Daffy's animation is especially nice for reasons mentioned beforehand regarding Carey's animation: he animates Daffy here with a grace and caution that neither he nor we have been privy to until recently. In the case that he is regarded with these slower, conscious moments--The Henpecked Duck had its moments as well, many of these being Carey scenes--it was out of a predisposed moroseness or demand for the story. Here, the caution in Daffy's movements is more casually ponderous and self motivated. There's nobody telling him to move slowly, to scratch his head, to look at the audience (whereas in Henpecked, he was beaten down by external forces). This, too, all communicates the running theme of his growing sentience and agency.
Comedy often comes in threes, and that is true of this scene: both duck and doc hiccup twice, with the doc sparing a third as Daffy yet again counsels the audience through a vacant stare. Thus, his suspicions grow--there's a bit more of that "bark and no bite" when he first looks at the doc, a scowl on his face as if he's about to get confrontational... only to whip back to the audience, visibly nervous, maintaining that earlier quest for validation as the doc continues to hiccup.
Carey's artistic hallmarks are perhaps at their most visible with Daffy's expression: tall, elastic eyes, equally stretched mouth, solidity in his hand wringing and the long, syrupy sweat drops. Incredibly appealing, incredibly funny, and incredibly telling in Daffy's newfound capacity to feel such unease.
Whereas most subjects of this mirror gag seem anxious at getting caught or breaking the act, the doc doesn't seem to express any such sentiment. It's as though he believes Daffy is imitating him--and doing a rather poor job of it--rather than the other way around, as indicated through his earlier "diagnosis" through pantomime. The shared screwballisms of both characters is charming.
That charm continues when the doc readjusts Daffy's hat. Completely unconcerned with being "caught" or breaking character, he grabs the brim and turns it back to its proper position--a comely act of condescension that almost borders on paternal. If anything, it's a demonstration that he isn't much of a threat if he's willing to do such "favors" for Daffy, but this only freaks him out even more. Telling, as this invasion of personal space and friendly, oblivious condescension is often a textbook Daffyism. Kudos to Carey for understanding the appeal of Daffy's big, oversized hat on his squat, little body and how it gives him a sort of underdog appeal--Baby Bottleneck would take these same observations and run them to the absolute most extreme extent.
With that taken care of, the doc takes his leave. Very prompt and swift, hardly any sort of antic or build-up before he's gone with a few stretched arcs and a puff of smoke. It's a bit of an odd scene, and perhaps one that some could argue deflates the momentum of the cartoon, but it somehow manages to fit with McCabe's quirky directing style. The sheer amount of appeal in Carey's draftsmanship and motion alike is an overwhelming aspect to any successes of the scene--the carefulness of both characters, the palpable anxiety and even sympathy that comes with Daffy's acting, the spry movements during bouts of energy.
A scene starring Daffy that is entirely composed of pantomime is a rather impressive feat. That isn't to imply that this has never been the case before, but had this short been released three or four years prior, the "old" Daffy likely wouldn't have been able to shut up, much less have the lucidity to even know that he was pantomiming anything. Granted, the rapidly maturing duck of the '40s and '50s may have struggled to keep his own beak shut, depending on the director. That much silence for that much time is peculiar in any association with Daffy. Just the same, it aids greatly with his appeal in the scene; communicating with his eyes and glances to the audience is more charming in its reservations. We're sympathetic and endeared to his anxieties, and that's easier to do for some people if he's not gabbing a mile a minute.
Cut to a wide shot, in which Daffy's curiosities trump his anxieties enough for him to peer through the window. Cutting to a new shot is indicative that something is about to happen, something that warrants all of this new space: such a hypothesis is proven when the platform that he's standing on forcibly dives out from beneath him.
Perhaps physics wise, it would be more realistic if the pedestal were to yank out from beneath him, leaving Daffy lagging behind in the air for just a bit. Keeping his feet glued to the podium saves more time and ultimately feels faster, which is the goal of the scene. The feeling of the surprise. Freeze-framing nevertheless shows that his hat trails behind him in the air to supplement that feeling, though timing the drawings on one's doesn't lead this action to be very visible. This is all nitpicking for the sake of nitpicking--the speed and urgency are believably conveyed, and that is the most important objective.
All the familiar Daffyesque theatrics resume. Stalling's score has been furtive and quiet throughout the mirror routine, luring us into the shared unease and even hypnotism of the scene that's felt by Daffy; now, with this sudden adrenaline rush, the music rises in a frantic crescendo, flighty and convulsive to match Daffy's own frenzy.
This fit entails startled HOOHOOing, aimless threats, and a lot of equally aimless thrashing. It certainly feels as though we're getting a raw, undistilled glimpse of the duck--the same principle as earlier observations of his bark and lack of bite. His tough guy act is born out of fear and at odds with himself; his shrieking and whooping, like at the top of the short, is a frantic, urgent, instinctual means for him to get out some sort of catharsis. Not a screwball catharsis to alleviate a stockpile of mania, but out of fear and anxiety. McCabe's duck is approached with a surprisingly dimensional psychology--or, at the very least, invites a lot of psychological discussion.
"Ya can't do this to me, I tell ya" mimic similar protests in Porky's Last Stand during his aforementioned confrontation with the bull. Immediately bringing himself and his rights into matters ("I'M A CITIZEN!", per Last Stand) makes the matter personal. This, too, is a unique, Daffyesque expression of gentle entitlement--"You can't do this to me" versus "What are you doing" or "Stop doing this to me" is more revealing, more intimate, indicative of how he sees himself and perceives threats to specifically be targeted against him and what he stands for. Whatever it is a puny telegram delivering duck finds himself standing for in the first place. Being attacked or caught unawares is an insult to his pride.
It turns out that the doc can do "this" to him, and quite easily--the platform promptly dumps him into a chair, whose restraints are imminent. Staging of this sequence could benefit from some clarity--a lot of negative space remains unused after the podium exits the screen, cramming the audience's focus to the left half of the screen.
A close-up nevertheless resolves this. There's more than enough clarity to see the metal bowl placed over Daffy's head and the hammer that hits it, the close-up focusing on Daffy's dazed reverberations. Treg Brown's echoing bell sound effects are powerfully apt, magnifying the animation.
Cutting close barely moments after the hammer first struck him maintains some of the discombobulated pacing throughout this sequence. Perhaps that's by accident, but it fits the urgency in tone and onslaught of overwhelm from Daffy's point of view. Reverberations of the bowl are gelatinous and frenzied, animated on one's for the intended freneticism. Daffy's neck is incorrectly animated to be moving with the bowl--realistically, only the bowl should be moving--but could just be an attempt to maximize the impact and demonstrate the extent of Daffy's tremors. The bowl gradually rising up as it continues to wobble is nicely handled.
The bowl presents an additional caveat: its reactions to Daffy's hiccups, which still have not faltered. The force of his hiccups prompt him to hit the bowl, only enforcing his daze. Similarities in sound design, both between the bowl vibrating and how it reacts to Daffy hitting it, further connects this parallel. Crossed eyes, half lidded pupils, and a comparative sedation (that is, he's no longer making inane threats) indicate the change. The only way for Daffy to calm down and keep quiet is for him to be incapacitated by force.
More Daffy-to-audience relations ensue as we get a direct POV shot of the doctor approaching. At this point, the viewer is quite literally experiencing the film from his eyes. All sympathy is with him. He's talked with us, confided in us, looked at us for reassurance, and now shares his direct perspective with us. Such a strong sense of companionship and vicariousness. Endearing and amiable, this sort of intimacy with a character is seldom--if ever--mirrored by any other character in the Looney Tunes canon. Certainly not with the same amount of flippancy and approachability.
Part of Bugs Bunny's eternal charm is that separation between himself and the viewer, forever keeping him on a bit of a pedestal of idolatry. Porky Everyman Pig is somewhere in the middle; he is exceptionally endearing to audiences and often able to derive much of his comedy through his relatability, but he's still stubborn and idiosyncratic enough to close himself off and really prevent from anyone getting too close to him. Daffy lacks any of the aforementioned pretenses and, at least during this period, doesn't even seem very preoccupied with how he puts himself on or comes across: that "old friend" appeal he has is too intimate for such. McCabe understood said intimate appeal incredibly well and immediately.
The perspective of the doctor could benefit from being more straight on, consistent with Daffy's shared point of view. Instead, he's at a 3/4 view that's at odds with the camera angle, seconded through an accidental lack of eye contact. In any case, the camera mimicking Daffy's hiccups does the heaviest lifting and to wonderful effect.
Out of convenience, a hiccup sends the bowl over Daffy's head flying out of screen, removing it of liability. His expression remains satiated as the doc gives a rather amicable "examination"--his magnifying glass being a farce is a quaint and cute gag. Nothing entirely gut busting, but nonchalant and unquestioning and quaint in its delivery to benefit his equally reserved demeanor. Hilberman's layouts continue to guide the composition nicely, as the shadows form a geometric frame around both characters and guide the viewer's focus inward.
"Nasty hiccups, nasty, nasty... eh, we'll try the scare cure! That's what we'll do, yes!"
That isn't even the only gag: the doc's hair is sent flying, revealing a chrome dome amidst his own surprised take. The action happens so quickly and focus is so steadfast on Daffy that it becomes rather easy to miss, but is a cute consideration nonetheless.
Having satisfied his petty needs, Daffy smiles contentedly at his handiwork. Had this been a Bugs Bunny cartoon, this would be where the doc is thusly lambasted in his status as a "maroon"--there's almost a sense of petty triumph behind Daffy's behavior that seems more comparable to someone like Bugs than Daffy. Maybe it's a symptom of his comparative reservation here. Maybe it's due to him being "provoked". Whatever is the case, it's a very charming bit.
The doc's "hair" flying off is actually a practicality in disguise: during his take, his doctor's mirror is sent flying, which sets the stage for the coming sequence--enter Mr. Hyde. Strategically placed beakers and test tubes create an attractive frame around the doc that again prove helpful in guiding the audience's eye. Yet again, the streamlining and whimsical geometry of the vessels are indicative of Hilberman's hand. One wonders just how much more literal the layouts would have been for this cartoon without him.
Resuming the focus on mood and tone, we get a comparatively intricate highlight of seeing how the Hyde solution is made. Many of the steps and reactions are differentiated--pouring liquid in the glass having no effect, then a drop from pipette igniting a small plume of smoke that the doc flinches away from--to maintain utmost visual interest. It makes the process feel more tangible and gives more agency to each of these mystery liquids and ingredients, and the stakes thusly feel inflated.
The same is true for the close-up giving more detail and intricacy to the ingredients: ink from a pen, moth balls, insect repellant. Brown's sound effects are again a particular winner, really giving the illusion of tangibility when each item is added. The clinking and clanking of the moth balls as they're poured in the glass is perhaps the strongest example. Likewise for when the solution is eventually mixed together. And, just like the test tubes during the coffee sequence, the glass holding the solution is rendered on a painted overlay to make it feel more glossy, physical, and real, thereby inflating the depth of the doc's actions.
A topper--both comedically and literally--of soda water is a gag taken straight out of Frank Tashlin's The Case of the Stuttering Pig, which was another one of the many Warner parodies of the Jekyll/Hyde conundrum. The dissonance between the drama and this sudden bout of domesticity regarded with the same drama is effective; Stuttering does the same, but the more lugubrious build-up and intimate shot language (close ups, slanted angles for added dynamism) enunciates the comedic contrast. Keeping the soda fountain as a surprise until the last second also works to the scene's favor.
If observing the nefarious preparations of this mixture weren't enough to convince the viewer of its potency, McCabe cuts back to a shot of the doc mixing the contents as a final "test": having the spoon disintegrate into nothing certainly justifies its strength. The doc's satisfied, pleasant smile is yet another indication of the short's directorial equilibrium. Nefarious is balanced out by playful.
All that's left now is for the stuff to take. Hilberman's layouts continue to impress and guide through their geometry. Beakers and test tubes in the foreground offer a frame, their shadows contrasting against the light, milky values of the backgrounds. Beakers and test tubes in the background are sleek, low detail, effectively conveying an atmospheric perspective that gives the staging dimension and depth--all while preserving Hilberman's streamlined aesthetics. Very effective and fetching.
The transformation from man to monster is obscured through smoke effects, both resulting in a way to save some pencil mileage and to engage through the allure of the unknown. Given the meticulousness of the sequence prior, the actual transformation scene may feel a bit overwhelming in comparison. Perhaps the smoke effects just need to be stronger or cover more ground. Perhaps this is a reaction to Stuttering Pig, where the transmogrification of Lawyer Goodwill into the monster is animated right on screen. Whatever is the case, the point is clearly conveyed and effectively so--it just feels like such a pivotal moment demands a bit more attention.
Granted, any lingering feelings of an anticlimax are relatively fitting for our Hyde, who is a walking anticlimax in himself. Dopey and vacant, his buck teeth and hunched back match the traits of the silhouette projected on the wall. His comparatively unassuming demeanor matches the relatively unassuming transformation.
Stalling's music score deserves its own due praises. Loyal to the beast's movements, he is both able to capture his maladroitness with leaden piano chords and the airy domesticity of his shedding the "girdle". Light, flighty, and gently upbeat, he captures the surprising nonchalance of the sequence well.
Contented back scratching accomplishes the same. Very far removed from the rather tragic origins of what the Hyde monster represents in the original and how he is so feared by Jekyll; here, it's merely as though the monster were dormant, waking up from a nap and ambling about to start his day. This sort of informality and leisure, perhaps even warmth, is unique to McCabe's burlesque of the story. Most other Jekyll/Hyde parodies at Warners treat the Hyde monster as a genuine threat right off the bat.
Another difference: most of the characters in said parodies are actively afraid of their Hyde. Daffy remains lost in his own gently conceited world of oblivion, polishing imaginary fingernails and humming inarticulately to himself. Both actions that convey a clear lack of concern. There's a luxury in his leisure, suddenly able to sit back and relax and wait idly; a very far cry from his earlier histrionics. Perhaps this is all still residual from his prior daze, but the purpose in his movements and attitude feel more like complacency and ignorance rather than stuporous.
There's a bit of screen direction trouble where the monster approaches Daffy from behind. It's inconsistent with the staging of the earlier scene using this same layout, showing the doc leaving from screen right and slyly looking behind him at Daffy in the adjacent scene. The intentions for him coming up from behind are understandable here, as Daffy can be caught unaware more feasibly than if the monster walked right up to him. Nevertheless, the inconsistency is gently awkward.
Daffy is indeed caught unaware--so unaware, in fact, that he's oblivious to the presence of the smiling, hulking giant next to him. Whether still an effect of his daze or just his usual friendly complacency, he's bold enough to condescend: "Hey, where'd the little guy go, chum?" Good gag on the hiccup preceding the line, indicating that the sight of the monster hasn't scared him out of his hiccups. A way to rub salt in the wound.
For all of his obliviousness, his chumminess with the beast is almost admirable. Immediately referring to him as "chum" and the doc who made him so anxious before as "the little guy"; part of it is out of accidental condescension, but it really does feel as though he's making friends. An admirable overfamiliarity in calling someone who he's (presumably) never met in his life "chum".
Realization does strike after a few more beats. No belabored antic or build-up leads into his take--it just explodes all at once, believably capturing the spontaneity of a true double take. From the head spinning, the drybrush spiral trails, and tiny, blobular sweat effects, Izzy Ellis appears to be the candidate behind the animation.
As he does his take, the restraints fly off of him with perhaps more convenience that is believable. The action itself is easily lost within the hubbub of Daffy's movements and yelling--actually showing the restraints breaking or adding sound effects would be helpful in adding clarity. But, nevertheless, the general point is clear: Daffy's finally reunited with his sense of urgency. Certainly ironic how anxious he was before encountering the doc, and yet he's calm and colloquial in the face of the beast. Fleetingly.
The camera cuts to a new layout accommodating Daffy, offering more neutral staging for him to directly confront the monster (rather than needlessly remaining confined to the same layout of the chair). Animation if his scrambling into place is a bit floaty, unanchored to the perspective of the ground, but that's perhaps more a reaction to a similar scene coming up that is more solid and coherent in depicting Daffy's frantic movements. This scene functions more as a bit of cinematographic housekeeping in character geography. Note that the camera looks down on him, again rendering him small and powerless much like shots on the porch.
More painted overlays corral the viewer's eye to look directly at Daffy--intriguing to note is how light in value many of the backgrounds are in this laboratory. Sequestered in an old mansion basement, one would assume the environments to be dark and dingy; these cobweb overlays and abandoned, mysterious equipment do communicate the dinginess, but the light hues of the background seem to be a purposeful choice in allowing Daffy's dark values to pop and remain visually clear. This in no way sacrifices the mood, especially since so many shots of Daffy lurking in the dark mansion scratched that same itch. Just an observation of the care put into the art direction to ensure the actions are clear and easy to see.
Narrative sympathy with Daffy is still as strong as ever, as we receive yet another shot from his direct point of view. Whereas the camera looks down at Daffy in the prior scene, the camera entertains the idea of looking up at the monster. He dominates much of the screen space even when he's not directly approaching the viewer, hands outstretched--the power imbalance is clear, and so is the sense of overwhelm as he grows closer and closer. For all of his ridiculousness in appearance, the viewer does feel for Daffy as we get a direct perspective of just how overbearing he is in comparison. A good way to compensate for the scariness that he may lack in demeanor.
"Deh, I'm Chloe." Blanc uses his typical dope dialect for the beast, again contributing to prior observations of McCabe's subversive approach with the Hyde parody. He's "scary" in the same way that the snowman in The Abominable Snow Rabbit is through his not-so-gentle giant Lennie Small appeal, rather than scary in the way that most Hyde parodies are rendered as. "Let's you an' me wraaaa-ssleeee."
Back to John Carey, identifiable through Daffy's tall, oval eyes and structural elasticity. He was an animator who really understood the art of animation--how characters move, how that movement is caricatured, taking little cheats and distortions to convey the feeling or caricature of an action--and all of the above are certainly felt in the surprised takes and running that dominate the scene. From his hat take to struggling the hat back onto his head to running away, all actions convincingly encapsulate his panic. Coherently so. There's only one brief error of his leg overlapping with the frame, but it's for a single frame and the camera is already beginning to match his pace, making it easily missed.
That's the real winner of the sequence: the pacing. Daffy scrambles in place before gaining momentum, with the camera almost immediately joining him--there's a palpable movement and direction that feels convincingly hurried yet appealing. Carey is aware of how Daffy's physics and his running interact; his legs lurch him forward, prompting him to run with his abdomen out with his spindly neck and head flailing behind. His hands gradually ease off of his hat and lurch forward, never coming exactly down to his sides due to the momentum of his running. When he comes to a surprise stop, his hat catches on his head, lurching far forward before wobbling back into place--Daffy's sudden reversal of direction, rearing around in a gorgeous arc of motion, expedites the process with his hat falling back over his face.
Keeping all of these actions in one fell camera pan is a great way to differentiate from prior scenes and keep the directing from becoming too repetitive. Likewise, it makes the mansion feel bigger, more palpable, the environments overwhelming with their depth. A pillar in the foreground briefly covers Daffy for a few moments as he's implied to run past it, giving the illusion that he's really interacting within his environments. In all, such a simple action--getting Daffy from point A to point B--is rendered with such meticulously conscious animation, benefitting from some deft directing and spry camera movements. Audiences feel the same burst of energy and speed that Daffy is feeling.
It's difficult to prevent these analyses from becoming A Celebration of John Carey, but scenes like this one are paramount to his sheer skill and appeal. There is a clear difference between this and the earlier scene of Daffy jumping out of his chair and sliding into the next frame.
“Chloe?”
Praises for Carey's animation and its considerations continue even to an action as menial as Daffy reaching beneath his hat and grabbing the telegram. He even takes the time to grab the brim of the hat and pull it away to give himself an opening, one eye closing as his hand brushes right past it. Such a minute gesture that is rooted in observation and tangibility. Maintaining his wide-eyed stare all the while, as if he's afraid to take his attention off the monster leering over him, is equally brilliant. It makes the actions feel more natural, gestural, second nature; he doesn't need to put every ounce of concentration into grabbing a paper.
"Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you." Daffy takes slow steps backwards as asserts himself as a rather lousy "singing" telegram deliverer. We've been so entangled in his hiccuping fit and the mystery of the mansion that we--and he, himself--almost forgot why he's even here to begin with. It's understood he's to deliver a telegram, but its contents are unknown... until now. Both questions of who would ever send Chloe (not the doc, Chloe in particular) a singing telegram and who allowed Daffy to have this job in the first place are floated and happily unanswered. It's funnier that way.
Daffy's stolid deliveries and the principle of the birthday telegram to begin with are wonderful. Likewise with McCabe and Christensen actually offering an "answer" as to what the telegram is for, rather than keeping its purpose forever locked in exposition purgatory. The comedic dissonance is just wonderful, with the spooky environments and Chloe continually approaching Daffy, Daffy's half-hearted, objective recitation of the song, and Stalling's light, airy music cue that embraces and celebrates this birthday occasion. So many different tones and ideas and information all being juggled at once and resulting in a very funny amalgam.
Chloe comes to a stop, filling in some of the negative space on the right half of the screen and reminding us of the threat he poses. More kudos to Carey's considerations: even when Chloe is standing still, he's animated to be breathing idly--fingers flexing, weight slightly bobbing up and down. A surefire reminder that he is not a static obstacle, but a living, breathing threat.
"Signed Frank N. Stein" perhaps only opens more questions than answers as to the social lives of all the beloved monsters.
Having taken care of his duties, he zips off-screen...
"That'll be 36 cents, please."
A job is a job, and Daffy seeks compensation in life or death. This is yet another harbinger of what's to come with early shades of money grubbing. Granted, he has a relatively positive attitude about it here--the joyful, manic "HOOHOO!" at the end makes it feel more like an impulse, that he had been sitting on this brief little catharsis through all his time in the mansion. He's made a lot of progress in the name of lucidity, but not to the point of completely divorcing himself of his insanity. He's just been able to sustain some more of his most guttural impulses for a longer point in time. The timer that sets off, begging him to explode and release all of his wanton impulses, is able to stretch on for longer periods of time. Just the same, asking one's potential murderer for payment is its own concession of craziness. Daffy's capacity for daffiness is expanding in how he alleviates and expels his insanity.
The obligatory chase then ensues. Hilberman adds a geometry to his layouts that guide the audiences even through light--shadows square off a spotlight towards the center of the staging, guiding the viewer and helping them process the information introduced by the layout with more ease.
That way, audiences can more clearly focus on the "ladder to nowhere" gag--while perhaps polite, unremarkable, the gag itself is well timed with surprisingly few gaffes. Daffy's place on the ladder is kept consistent--his cel doesn't jump, his feet don't lose their registry, the cycle isn't accidentally skipped or repeated. A deceptively finicky visual, especially when timed on ones.
Noticeably, both Daffy and Chloe are small in comparison to the staging. The focus of this scene is its environments (ie. the ladder), so more space is accommodated for utmost clarity and focus. This size discrepancy is most notable when the ladder finally comes to a shot, Chloe having the height advantage over Daffy once more. Daffy's exceptionally diminutive size here gives him further sympathy.
Two surprised takes are shed in regards to Chloe's presence rather than one. One on the ladder, and one while he's scrambling to gain traction in mid-air. It may be redundant, but it could be a way to compensate for the staging--since Daffy is so small, his actions have to be more broad to communicate more clearly. Doing two takes instead of one could be a way to mitigate that. Pacing is seamless, with the takes consecutively confined and without any long pauses--the repleteness is nevertheless curious.
Confined to the same camera pan, the chase leads into the next room. Hilberman's layouts employ some tricky perspective, almost seamlessly transitioning from an objective wide shot to a bit of an abstract up-angle shot. A wooden pillar essentially splits the two rooms, helping to disguise any awkwardness in fully committing to the transition--the floor is indicated as a slanting black shadow that slowly begins to slope upward upon passing said beam. Keeping all of the action on the same camera pan maintains shot flow and prevents the cuts or transitions in directing from feeling too repetitive or unintentionally discombobulated. Likewise, the characters more feasibly interact with their environments, which has been a large point of focus in building the believability of the cartoon's atmosphere.
In fact, interactivity with these environments is the entire focus of this sequence: Daffy is easily able to skirt beneath a cabinet thanks to his small size.
Chloe struggles to do the same.
Having the camera follow Chloe as he falls keeps the pace of the chase. The momentum had already been broken in the prior scene with the ladder running out, so to stop again in focusing on Chloe's crash would prompt the flow to become scattered and exhausting to keep up with. With the camera continually sliding past, the movement innate to the chase is never lost. In fact, it speeds up as Chloe sends the cabinet crashing further into the background.
Brown's shattering sound effects pull a lot of weight in conveying the impact, serving as a buffer in case the audience rightfully can't digest all of the action happening at once. Bottles flying out in perspective and into the foreground again maintains the running theme of dimensional surroundings--potentially to a point of irony, as the bottles never actually fly into the camera. They disappear behind the black sliver representing the floor. This does admittedly flatten the composition, but there's so much happening at once that McCabe is away to get away with it. It's all about the perceived feeling of the impact.
More everyday objects save the day as Daffy conveniently uses a kettle to swing to a higher vantage point. This is another scene that happens rather quickly, and the pacing is somewhat more muddled: after he leaves the screen, the camera spends a few more moments panning up to nothing. It's almost as if the camera was easing in, preparing to suddenly jolt upwards and indicate Daffy's hiding spot in the same layout, but that never occurs: a cut to a new scene shows his landing. A bit awkward, but ultimately harmless.
Daffy's landing comes with some perspective trickery of its own: he swings in an arc, his back grazing the audience before the ropes curve back around and take him to the shelf. McCabe's direction deserves continual praise for its immersion, whether it be through Daffy's constant friendship with the audience, sharing his point of view, or simple flourishes such as having objects interact with and graze the foreground.
And, on the topic of the viewer-to-duck relations, Daffy delivers his next remarks not to Chloe, but us directly: "When you hear th' tone, the time will be eg-zact-ly ten to."
For all of his hamminess, putting on his best impression of a radio announcer giving the time, it doesn't come out of direct condescension as it would with a character like Bugs. Instead, it's just an old chum cracking a joke and showing off--the very same amicable showboating that so charmingly dominated the opening of Daffy's Southern Exposure. Had he directed the line to Chloe, it would perhaps feel more like gloating, a perfectly timed wisecrack at his expense. That pretension is absent here, and instead feels born out of instinct: a desire for Daffy to impress us and endear himself. It's incredibly successful--especially imagining how this would have played in a theater, where these feelings of intimacy between characters is amplified.
Showboating is successful. Brown's resounding gong sound effect once Chloe is hit continues to heighten the impact and perhaps make it seem greater than the information that is given on screen.
McCabe's directing does get a bit "cutty" here, as there are a lot of quick cuts to short scenes that feel a bit tangential when strung together. Almost as soon as Chloe is hit, the camera cuts back to Daffy smiling vacantly for perhaps a moment or two too many. This shot functions as a segue into the next part of Daffy's escape, so the cut is necessary, but the pause beforehand does seem to take some of the impact away. Nevertheless, such a beat further endears the viewer to his victory, showing how he has the time to be satisfied with his work. These victories don't often come easily to him.
Depth and immersion is yet again a focus at the tail-end of this shot and into the next: Daffy jumps into the foreground, practically leaping into the audience in an effect designed for theatrical audiences. The next shot has him zigzagging through the mansion--through doorways, behind walls, making turns, again giving a real tangibility to the environments and how they overwhelm him. These brief separations (that is, allowing the walls and foreground overlays to obscure Daffy) render the action more intriguing and fun to follow. A certain anxiety comes with it with the dubiety of Daffy's whereabouts; we've been attached to his hip for so long that to get separated, even for a few seconds behind a wall, immediately piques the audience's curiosity as to where he's headed.
A dead end coupled with a surprise visitor prevent him from making further ground. Just as Daffy does, the camera itself glides to a gradual stop: another effective maintenance of momentum. Chloe's appearance is never once telegraphed or alluded to--the surprise is more effective that way and continues to keep the audience's understanding and pacing of events on par with Daffy's.
For that same principle of sympathy, a close-up demonstrates Chloe's fingers tensing around Daffy's neck and his clear apprehension. That he seems to know he's a goner is, again, very telling and indicative of his growing lucidity. Compare to Porky's Last Stand, when he openly taunts the bull and waves a red flag, running away in a fit of hysterical shrieks at the last possible second it registers that this isn't a very good idea. His reactions are much more grounded and grasual here. Even as recent as Southern Exposure, Daffy made pauses during the chase to chat with, humiliate, and even kick the villainous wolf when he was down. None of that same freeform screwballism is really felt to the same extent. Running from a wolf in the vast wilderness is much different than being confined to a mansion that the monster is more familiar with than you are.
Attempts are nonetheless made to compensate. Like a flash, Daffy repeatedly attempts to dodge Chloe's grasp, darting in and out and around him as a frantic collection of afterimages. Daffy's anxiety and Stalling's equally tense music wring most of the drama--Chloe just smiles, ambling and grabbing at Daffy as though he believes it to be a game. It's indicative of the aforementioned Lennie Small appeal, though with a bit more murderous intent. Chloe's role is perhaps muddled in its dissonance; that can both be empowering and detrimental to the cartoon, depending on the needs of the scene. It perhaps errs just a bit more on the side of distraction here.
More drama is nevertheless supplemented when Chloe corners Daffy against a radio, revealed through a surprise jolt of the camera not dissimilar to Chloe's own reintroduction. A vase on top is nearly knocked over, wobbling to an unsteady stop whereas Chloe and Daffy remain locked in their positions, indicating the sheer force of the impact. Just the same, it encapsulates the intended gut dropping pause, a moment where everything freezes upon the realization that Daffy is officially cornered. The lack of music is a great contributor to the pause.
Partially out of necessity: the slow, gradual crescendo of dance music ("You Hit My Heart with a Bang") is a very purposeful directorial choice, coming straight from the radio. Its use is at first a bit ambiguous, not entirely clear that Chloe knocking Daffy into the radio is the source of the music. A clicking sound or even the radio lighting up may have been more clear.
Music nevertheless tames the savage beast, and Chloe is no exception. Timing of the scene is a bit floaty, as the drawings are all evenly spaced and prompting a rather weightless effect in showing Chloe's changing demeanor. Maybe having this realization be on the previous scene would have been better--then again, the entire point of the close-up is to bring attention to how this affects Chloe, so it may just be a matter of tweaking the timing and spacing. Nevertheless, the point is clear: Chloe is a simpleton who is rather happy with this development.
That reaches its zenith in the next cut. Chloe and Daffy thusly cut a rug together, the latter not entirely by choice. Before doing so, there's a long, gradual ease in of Chloe preparing to grab Daffy before yanking him onto the floor. It perhaps lasts for a few beats too many and may be too subtle in its intent, feeling like Chloe is moving with awkward idleness rather than warming up for an explosion of dance. Regardless, the intent of the ease is to juxtapose against the flurry of movement that succeeds it. The build-up and crescendo is successfully felt.
Dalton's animation of the two dancing is incredibly charming. Consistent with earlier observations of his work, he excels more at conveying the feeling of the energy and dance rather than stringing together a coherent set of dance moves. Given that this scene is all about the sudden change in energy and demeanor (and how this is a lucky break for Daffy), any "lapses" in functional dance animation are irrelevant. Likewise, his animation does have a structure to it--Chloe kicks his legs, transfers his weight, swings Daffy around. It may not be graceful, but it is dancing; given that it's Chloe doing the dancing, it shouldn't be all that graceful.
It's charming that Chloe is the initiator of the dance rather than Daffy, who instead takes a few moments to catch up with what just happened. Compare this to Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid, in which Bugs and Beaky go into a simultaneous dance routine at the same time (but is nevertheless understood that Bugs is the arbitrator). Daffy taking a moment to catch on is more believable and endearing, perhaps giving more intrigue to the story in who throws the curveballs and where. In fact, Daffy looks positively panicked when Chloe first begins to swing him around. Usually, Daffy would be the screwball that initiates a dance break. That he's on the receiving end (and, daresay, the straightman) is relevant to the exhaustive analyses of his ever growing dimension.
When he does warm-up, however, it makes for a rather endearing reprieve. There's a palpable relief in Daffy's dancing, as if he feels he can finally let his guard down and that he and Chloe are now "friends". This sort of innocence regarding his enemies is a particularly common recurrence. In this particular instance, it almost seems as though Daffy is able to let his guard down enough to revert back to some of his screwball ways--dancing surely must be a great way to burn off some of the residual mania that has been broiling and biding within him all through the cartoon. Again, McCabe expands the capacity for how Daffy alleviates his lunacy.
Unfortunately, another common recurrence of Daffy's perceived chumminess with his enemies is the discovery of that not being so. The music comes to a stop, and so does Chloe. Amusingly, Chloe seems lost rather than enraged--he ogles straight at the audience, as if he's completely unaware that the music came from the radio or as though he believes the viewer may have an answer as to why it stopped. Instead, Daffy is the one who frantically turns his head to check the radio, continuing his role as a psuedo-straightman and being the one who has to put out these fires. Good on McCabe for resisting the urge to pan to the radio and show that the music has ended. The silence and sudden stop of dancing is more than enough to convey the same.
Though Daffy was slow to catch on to the dancing, he is quick this time to know he has to get out. The explosion of energy that comes with this is yet again all about feeling rather than practicality. His anxious, fervent wind-up as he runs aimlessly in circles is much too extravagant, but is also the fun of it: a clear demonstration of how he's fervid little dynamo in contrast to slow, lumbering Chloe. That this exit isn't even accompanied by a single HOOHOO is yet again indicative of growth.
Both characters take their exit just shy of the camera, continuing to engage the audience through the illusion of depth. The effect was likely staggering in theaters, as if they were running right into the audience.
Space and interactivity of the backgrounds is back to being a focus in these next few cuts: the characters enter from the foreground and dash into the background, Hilberman's angled layouts adding even more motion and movement. Curves and turns are traversed, foreground overlays momentarily obscuring characters. Not once has there been a plain horizontal shot of Chloe chasing Daffy. Characters are always weaving in and out of curves, walls, foreground and background, making the directing all the more intriguing.
The chase leads both parties back to the radio. Doing so feels a little too soon, as there's only one quick cut between this scene and the earlier scene with the radio, which wouldn't make much sense geographically. McCabe and Hilberman are able to partially obscure this through a new layout flaunting the excuse of a different angle, but it does feel like a rather generous cheat.
In any case, the radio is important to the gag: the chase sees an abrupt stop by way of an announcer--a livid, screaming Mel Blanc--shrieking "STOP!!!!", disarming both the audience and characters on screen alike. Enunciating the force of the outbreak, the radio is anthropomorphized, lurching forward to tangibly possess the force of the yell.
"...that lazy sluggish feeling."
Both the shift in Blanc's deliveries to a mild mannered announcer and the pensive, loyal listening from Daffy and Chloe evoke a strong domesticity in tone that is powerfully incongruous to the theatrics of the chase thus far. McCabe continues to assert his parallels and antitheses all through the short.
That continues as Daffy turns the radio channel and flees. He spares a few frantic head shakes as he does so, clearly struggling to decipher where he should direct all of his energy--it's as though he feels he could make a grave mistake by not keeping an eye on Chloe as he turns off the radio. The result is convincingly frantic.
Now, the next channel of choice is one covering a horse race--fitting commentary for our own chase. Similar to the earlier ambiguity of Daffy turning on the radio by colliding with it, the change to a horse race feels as if it could benefit from more context. Static fuzz, a light shining on the radio. It almost feels as though there's an omnipresent spectator looking down at Daffy and Chloe rather than a direct result of the radio; some additional sound effects covering the event, such as horse hooves trampling, may help to separate the context.
McCabe tries to remedy this by illustrating an audience: a fish tracking their movements from a beaker. Another non-sequitur of native McCabeian quirkiness, the highlight contributes to the gently disjointed directing. Yet, given the familiarity of these sorts of non-sequiturs in McCabe cartoons, it's largely forgivable. There's a respectable attempt to inject some mysticism back into the environments with the beakers and mysterious liquids and, evidently, goldfish, which has largely been put on the back-burner during the chase.
This is made more clear in the next scene, where Daffy and Chloe pause in front of a swarm of bubbling cauldrons. Animation of their skidding to a stop is admirably smooth--great weight in their wobble and follow-through as they uneasily come to a halt. Nevertheless, there are nitpicks to be had: the scene starts with Daffy already halfway turned around, preparing to grab Chloe and yank him to a halt; it feels just a bit too sudden and could benefit from having Daffy turn around the whole way, especially since the scene starts in the middle of some rather fast paced action.
Earlier comparisons to the star wabbit are nonetheless warranted, as Daffy pauses to give a sly aside: "Nyehhh... hey, doc! What's cookin'?"
History is thusly made. Intriguingly, this wouldn't be the only time Daffy has referenced such a line--he does the same in Along Came Daffy with synonymous complacency. It's of particular importance here, however, as it marks the first time any star character has made reference to Bugs. Irony of it being Daffy is not lost. Yet, given Daffy's established love of pop culture through constant references to the audience--this may be a trait yet to be developed at this point in time--it's rather fitting. One is almost inclined to wonder if this was McCabe's way of trying to sneak Bugs into his cartoon, given that he didn't have enough studio seniority to work with him. Bugs was a very carefully guarded character.
During this line, the camera suddenly cuts closer on them for reasons unknown. It isn’t out of clarity, as there is hardly any difference in staging. Magnifying the impact of the punch Chloe receives to the face may be a reason, but it feels odd to cut before that. Most scenes would truck out further to commodore for the space of the blow. Instead, the staging feels cluttered and claustrophobic, furthered through the cluster of cauldrons in the foreground.
Victorious Stan Laurel hops à la Daffy are muddled by the staging and a bit too quaint, but the following cut rectifies it. (Additional note: what little lip sync he has seem to suggest some HOOHOOs that never came to fruition.)
Daffy’s scrambling in the next cut is believably frantic, excitable; his sliding to a stop warrants all of the same praises and observations as earlier John Carey scenes. A solid anchor of weight, solid construction, understanding of where little details settle and have some follow through for an added boost of appeal. This routine with the radio is beginning to feel just a bit repetitious, but Carey’s animation makes the simple act of changing the channel appealing and full of life.
This is especially true for Daffy’s exit. His scramble cycle doesn’t even seem to be born of anxiety, but just plain excitement. The adrenaline of the chase is finally going to his head, magnified through his previous victory with socking Chloe in the face. This is some of the closest we get to honoring Daffy’s roots with a tried and true breakout during the climax; he may not bounce on his head and shriek, but the sheer alleviation of giddiness that propels his every motion, the way he gets swept up into the breathless momentum of the chase, feels the same.
More dance music from the radio prompts more dancing from Chloe. Hilberman’s layouts impress yet again: looking at this shot with the geometric, design oriented test tubes, the way the values interact and invert with each other, it certainly is easy to see his influence in co-founding UPA. Who knew that such history would partially be made with such comparatively humble surroundings.
Unlike the previous instance, this bout of dancing doesn’t necessarily go anywhere: the music (and Chloe’s dancing) die out just as quickly as they had started. While this indicates that Daffy’s streak of success is on the way out, furthered as Chloe begins to chase him, the scene feels as distracting as much as it is a distraction for Chloe. There’s nothing in this sequence that hasn’t been established, and to greater effect, beforehand. At least the backgrounds are pretty.
Returning to Daffy shows that he has suddenly become armed with an insecticide gun, presumably filling it with an antidote. The cut to Chloe implies that Daffy finding the gun and the antidote all occur off-screen in that time, but that doesn't exactly prevent the harshness of the cut. Even something like showing Daffy grabbing the gun first and then filling it up, instead of already having it in hand, could offer some clarity.
McCabe's depiction of the subsequent "standoff" between both characters is tailored to Daffy's sympathies. A shot of Chloe approaching from Daffy's point of view, followed up by Chloe's point of view and illustrating just how small and visibly anxious Daffy is in comparison. Both cuts alternate, the camera and characters growing closer with each one. The shots of Chloe approaching could be exaggerated just a bit more--perhaps a more drastic up-angle, perhaps a more menacing expression--as they are a bit difficult to take seriously, especially in a high octane moment like this one. His appearance and approaching isn't very much difference from his introduction where he wanted to "wrassle"; the directing ends up feeling a bit same-y as a consequence.
At any rate, the shots from Chloe's point of view help to supplement this, giving an alternative angle that works to the viewer's endearment of Daffy. Seeing him get backed into a corner, Chloe's shadow overtaking more and more of the screen, the viewer is given every possible angle and avenue to feel Daffy's disadvantage. Every shot is suffocating.
Not that it has to be. With a gentle jolt, the camera backs up to give Daffy room as he seamlessly adapts his role as an army guard (which is consistent with a similar gag in Southern Exposure, trumpet backing score and all), insecticide gun proudly flaunted. The transition is serviceably sudden, but could benefit from more abrasive--maybe some drybrush to indicate his zeal, a greater difference between the two poses. The latter seems like the better option, as there is a power to Daffy's sudden transformation with hardly any sort of antic or in-between. A comedic frankness that's upheld through his stiff, robotic gun twirling.
Stalling may accompany the action with a trumpet fanfare to complete the army metaphor, giving Daffy a welcome sense of authority, but that doesn't mean it's strong authority: the last note falters in a rash, out of tune blare as Daffy squirts the antidote into Chloe's open mouth. A tongue in cheek musical commentary that enunciates Daffy's scrappy "little guy" role and captures the feeling of a screw or two being loose. Good ironic commentary that is endearing rather than mean, as Daffy as shown himself throughout the cartoon to not be a great force of nobility.
Daffy's solution is the product of some quick thinking and convenience, possibly more than is believable. Showing that there is an antidote to begin with maybe would have helped in this victory feeling more earned. As it survives now, the resolution seems a bit hasty, going through the motions. That could also be a reaction to Daffy's "bravery", as it's not often he nabs a victory through careful thinking. Both A Coy Decoy and Daffy's Southern Exposure (and even The Henpecked Duck, if considering his marital battles to be a similar triumph) have his wins be the product of combined escapism and dumb luck. Coy Decoy, a bolt of lightning just so happens to strike the wolf while Daffy is running away. Southern Exposure has Daffy fleeing the border entirely to escape his troubles rather than actually solving them. It could just be that this is the first true victory we've seen from Daffy that isn't accidental, and that being a bit disorienting to process.
Keeping consistent with the doc's transformation into Chloe, the same exact effect happens of the reverse: same cloud of smoke, same gunshot sound effect. The feeling of underwhelm with the transformation mentioned before still lingers just a tad, but the parallel between the two sequences is a nice consideration that gives the story some structure.
Likewise, this particular transformation is dependent on the visual information being obscured: how else would the surprise of Chloe being a baby be preserved?
The first sign that something is "up" comes with the camera pushing out rather than in. Chloe is huge in comparison to the doc, so there's no need to back up further. This is perhaps five times as true for the reveal of a baby Chloe in a carriage, but all of the empty space that surrounds him pronounces just how small and alien he is in relation to his surroundings. Having him all dolled up in a carriage is infinitely more funny than if he were just sitting on the floor; there's a convenience to it all and an embrace of his infanthood. All the stops are pulled out for the sake of the gag.
Enter Daffy, who largely takes this development in stride. McCabe is again a bit slap happy with his cutting: we see Daffy begin to enter the frame in the same shot, before the camera cuts--rather arbitrarily on him--as he continues into frame. Cutting in-between the same action is gently disorienting. Waiting entirely before he's in screen or after he's reached his assigned blocking is better.
"Nyehhh, Snookiewookums! Now I guess you'll b'have."
More "friendly" condescension from Daffy. His remarks here are enshrouded with a bitterness that is more potent than his other patronizations, which are largely born out of innocent overfamiliarity and his "everybody's a friend" philosophy earlier on. Granted, given all that Daffy has been through, such pettiness is warranted. Still, it's another bit of characterization that is consistent with the more cynical, bitter McCabe duck--traits that are still largely new to his character. At least broadcasted with such honesty.
"Uh huh!" Channeling the wisdom of Red Skelton's Mean Widdle Kid, a persona that was represented time and time again in countless Warner cartoons (and giving birth to Tweety Bird as a direct consequence), Chloe confides in the audience with a Skelton-ism: "He don't know me vewy well, do he?"
Blanc's baby voice/Mean Widdle Kid voice is directed as though it was intended to be sped up--his deliveries are a bit slow, gradual, drawn out. Unfortunately, they never did get sped up, making for a bit of an awkward an slightly grating end result. Given Chloe's bumbling nature, the decision to keep them unsped could have been a conscious choice, as it does maintain some of the dopey appeal found in his adult form.
Regardless, sped voice or unsped, the scene's function is clear: Chloe clearly hasn't rid himself of his nefarious ways. If he can't overwhelm Daffy with bodily force, then a conveniently available hammer will have to do the trick.
Daffy agrees. The familarism and wink in his voice as he confides to the audience one last time, repeating Chloe's "He don't know me vewy well, do he?", is a wonderful last gasp of the connection that McCabe's duck has fostered with the audience. The wink, the friendly playfulness, the sense of the audience being in on the secret--all very charming and indicative of what makes his duck so appealing. Confidence surrounding the reveal of Daffy's own deadly weapon is very appreciated, as there are no awkward beats or spoon feeding to the audience of his intentions. This sudden reveal of the hammer makes Daffy's wink and "confiding" to the audience feel more intimate and like an in-joke.
We never see the physical act of Daffy using the hammer, but the echoing smack heard off-screen and the sudden fit of screaming from Chloe certainly paints a picture. Keeping the action off-screen not only allows the audience's imagination to run wild, thereby inflating the black humor and cruelty of the act (whereas showing it on screen is a bit of a gamble, depending on the skills of the animator and how convincingly McCabe wants the impact to be felt), but also reaps the benefit of saving some pencil mileage and money.
One last Red Skelton joke takes us out: "[HE] DOOD IT" is another line from Junior of "he don't know me vewy well, do he" fame. Consistency with the cuckoo bird from before is considerate, adding a bit more continuity with the cartoon and making its structure feel more coherent. If only McCabe had remembered the design of the cuckoo bird from before. (It is two different areas of the mansion, in fairness--the Napoleon bird was seen on a higher level, but the cheat to use him again would have been a more logical sacrifice.)
Intriguingly, The Film Daily doesn't seem to list a review for the cartoon. When The Case of the Stuttering Pig was released in 1937, it was used as an example of its villain potentially frightening children in a January 1939 article discussing the Hays Code and its relation to cartoons. One wonders how Impatient Patient would have fared on the scale--could Chloe's dripping goofiness been a partial overcorrection of any pushback that Stuttering Pig may have gotten for being too scary? Who's to say.
What can be said is that Impatient Patient is an incredibly fun cartoon and an absolutely brilliant case study of Daffy Duck. It can be easy to view this short through Daffy-tinted glasses, as has been my personal case for years: seeing all of the little inconsistencies and quirks and slight snafus in direction were genuinely surprising when carving this analysis. That's not to imply that the short is by any means bad. In fact, it's rather strong despite (and, in some areas, because of) its flaws.
Said flaws are nothing new or egregious with McCabe's directing style. He has a very uniquely idiosyncratic tone that can lend itself to odd non-sequiturs and occasionally unconfident or awkward directorial maneuvers, but they can be endearing for that reason. A Napoleon cuckoo bird or a spectacing goldfish suspended in a test tube are both odd and potentially confusing, perhaps even with the power to deflate some of the momentum out of the scenes at hand, but they contribute to the overall quirky, occasionally head-scratching charm of McCabe's cartoons. It wouldn't surprise me if Art Davis' shorts of the later '40s strike similar observations in our eventual analyses of then.
The doc's meekness and Chloe's bumblingness are both fun, but Daffy is the unequivocal winner of the cartoon. McCabe really was able to carve deep into his skin to an extent that was hardly mirrored by his contemporaries at the same time. A lot of work had been done by other directors to get Daffy to the point where he is now, but it really seemed like McCabe was one of the only ones who actively wanted to carve deep into what makes him tick and thinking of him beyond a vessel for gags and a high octane of energy. Daffy isn't just a screwball who fluctuates through varying degrees of mania anymore. In this short, he fluctuates between bitterness, trepidation, complacency, overconfidence, caution, invasive curiosity, amicability, rebellion, fear, braggadocio, and so on and so forth. He's allowed moments that are slow and creeping. He's allowed to be approached with a certain gentility and care that seldom has been present prior--the mirror routine comes to mind with Daffy's anxious, validation seeking glances to the audience, his slow realizations, etcetera.
McCabe's Daffy feels real. Given just how much Daffy has been propped up as a beacon of relatability, no matter the personality nor time period, this is a great means of praise. It really feels as if his Daffy is talking to us, cracking jokes with us, seeking our approval, complaining to us. We literally experience the very events of this cartoon from his eyes. Multiple times, yet! Even if one isn't a mouth frothing duck nut, McCabe's direction makes it so that we are endeared to Daffy by design. This is often subliminal. All of the directors thus far seemed to enjoy having Daffy in their grasp and playing with the infectious energy he so often brings to the table, but perhaps nobody has more effectively carved into the "why" and the source of this energy and appeal like McCabe.
Daffy's "old friend" appeal wouldn't be unique to McCabe, but he was one of the first to pioneer it to the extent that he did. He really deserves more credit for his contributions to expanding the depth and dimension of the duck. Daffy's humanity and vicariousness is easily the driving force of this short. Hilberman's gorgeously stylistic layouts and McCabe's particular devotion to atmosphere are also great highlights that deserve the same praise, but without the considerations made to Daffy's characterization, the short itself would quickly become an instance of all style and no substance. Perhaps that's still true to some degree--there has been more than one observation in this analysis that amounted to "This scene doesn't make much sense, but the backgrounds sure look nice".
At any rate, Daffy lovers should rejoice, as The Impatient Patient is yet another breakthrough in discovering What Makes Daffy Duck. Daffy isn't the sole point of success of the short--the reliance on mood and atmosphere, Hilberman's background layouts, Stalling's moody and attuned music scores, Brown's inventive sound effects, the gorgeous and expression animation by the likes of John Carey or Cal Dalton in particular, the all-too-easy-to-take-for-granted vocal prowess of Mel Blanc, and perhaps even McCabe's directorial eccentricities all play considerate roles. Nevertheless, there is a clear, unequivocal star of the short who wins the viewer through his warmth, parasociality, lack of pretension, and personal quirks, and it ain't Snookiewookums.
