A German shepherd (the traditional “Police Dog”) arrives in the elevator, and a miniature Paddy Wagon full of “Fleastone Kops” rolls down his tail. As Flora phones for the police (standing in the circle of a rotary-dial phone in the “0″ position and rotating the dial), Flea-Wee delivers a telling blow to the half-stuned villain. But Flea-Wee yanks into position on the wall an electrical socket, into which the sword-point falls, delivering a shocking result to the villain. Finally pinning Flea-Wee against a wall, the villain prepares to plunge in the blade point for the kill. The villain slashes at Flea-Wee’s blade, cutting his sword down to just a handle.
(Michael Maltese would remember this bit years later for a Hanna-Barbera Augie Doggie episode titled “Swat’s the Matter”, featuring the “Three Mosquitoteers” battling Doggie Daddy.) Flea0Wee falls off a shelf, the point of his sword landing stuck in the carpet. Flea-Wee obtains the other sword, and they engage in a furious duel of nearly invisible dots propelling seemingly self-animated swords. He takes a swipe at Flea-Wee with one of them, carving Flea-Wee’s hat in two. Now the villain spies a weapon – one of two crossed human swords on another mounting. The villain merely hops down the barrel of the pistol, producing the bullet out of the loading chamber, and drops the bullet on Flea-Wee for a brief stunning explosion. Flea Wee spots a human-sized pistol mounted on the wall, and with great effort lifts and points the gun at the villan. In another lift from Avery’s “The Hick Chick”, the villain lays a punch on Flea-Wee’s jaw with hardly the effort of a wrist movement – knocking Flea-Wee backwards into the wall. He charges into the building, knocking down a human doorman, and rides an elevator to the top, where he breaks down the villain’s front door with a flying leap. Miraculously, he hears Flora’s calls for help from the apartment above. Meanwhile, Flea-Wee is asking around town for the whereabouts of Flora, encountering fleas of various nationalities (Scotch fleas in the “highlands” of a Scotch Terrier’s fur, German fleas in a Biergarten on a Dachshund, and Eskimo fleas on a Malamute). Unable to climb out, she is pursued round and round inside the glass by the villain. Flora falls into her glass, and has to be saved from drowning by the villain slurping up her drink too, leaving her inside the sloping crystalware. In a penthouse apartment, the villain entertains Flora with a book of “etchings” (prompting several girlish giggles from Flora), while he brings in a pair of full champagne glasses (human sized). A passing Greyhound bus provides Flea-Wee with transportation to the city (he merely hops on the painted dog logo on the side of the bus), and we are off to the bright lights.
They hop onto the poodle, and the limousine departs. Spotting the girl inside, the villain enters the dance, cuts in, and tangos Flea Wee’s girl (rather willingly, I might add) right out the door. This villain arrives on the eyelash of a French poodle traveling in a passing limousine. Mike Maltese is channeling the rival Tex Avery product in two directions at once – not only lifting ideas for character design out of “The Flea Circus”, but also stealing the basic melodrama script from Avery’s earlier MGM production, “The Hick Chick” (1946), by having appear outside the barn dance a moustached city-slicker with oily hair and ways to match. This time, our starting focus is on a country barn dance – taking place on the backside of a dog in a barn, where a hick country flea (Flea Wee) celebrates his anticipated wedding day to follow in a night of frivolity with his girl (Flora). His name – legendary Michael Maltese.įlea For Two (Lantz/Universal, 8/29/55 – Don Patterson, dir., Michael Maltese, story), follows directly in the tiny footsteps of Avery’s outings of the preceding year, again using the concept of depicting fleas as tiny big-headed humanoids.
His legacy (which was already prolific in many directions for Chuck Jones’ unit at Warner Brothers) would span the studios of Warner, Walter Lantz, and a flock of titles for Hanna-Barbera.
#CARL BRIGHT BUGZ SERIES#
One writer had obviously taken note of these trends, and was about to launch a series of scripts which would appear in productions of various studios, building off the precedents set by Tex Avery at MGM. Anything goes was now the rule of the day in dealing with the miniature mites, who could carry a picture on their own when called for. As noted in last week’s installments, character design had now run the gamut from mere black dots to miniature sensual humanized chorus girls. Today, we continue our survey of toons focusing on the almost camera-invisible target of the common flea.
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