The Fox and the Crow

The Fox and the Crow are a pair of anthropomorphic cartoon characters created by Frank Tashlin for the Screen Gems studio.[1]

This article is about the cartoon series. For the Aesop fable, see The Fox and the Crow (Aesop).
Fox and Crow
First appearanceThe Fox and the Grapes, December 5, 1941
Last appearancePunchy de Leon, January 12, 1950
Created byFrank Tashlin
Voiced byMel Blanc (1941, Both)
Frank Graham (1942–1949, Fauntleroy and Crawford)
John T. Smith (1948–1949, Fauntleroy and Crawford)
Daws Butler (1950, Both)
In-universe information
GenderMale

The characters, the refined but gullible Fauntleroy Fox and the streetwise Crawford Crow, appeared in a series of animated short subjects released by Screen Gems through its parent company, Columbia Pictures.[2][3]

Columbia cartoons

Tashlin directed the first film in the series, the 1941 Color Rhapsody short The Fox and the Grapes, based on the Aesop fable of that name. Warner Bros. animation director Chuck Jones later acknowledged this short, which features a series of blackout gags as the Fox repeatedly tries and fails to obtain a bunch of grapes in the possession of the Crow, as one of the inspirations for his popular Road Runner cartoons.[4]

Although Tashlin directed no more films in the series, Screen Gems continued producing Fox and the Crow shorts, many of them directed by Bob Wickersham, until the studio closed in 1946.[5] Screen Gems had acquired enough of a backlog of completed films that the "Fox and Crow" series continued through 1949.

Sometime in 1944, plans for a Fox & Crow movie were announced, but it ultimately never happened.

By this time, Columbia had signed a distribution deal with a new animation studio, United Productions of America (UPA), to produce three "Fox and the Crow" shorts, Robin Hoodlum (1948), The Magic Fluke (1949), and Punchy DeLeon (1950). All three UPA Fox and the Crow cartoons were directed by John Hubley. The first two each received an Academy Award nomination for Animated Short Subject.

An unrelated, six-minute, silent animated short titled The Fox and the Crow, produced by Fables Studio, was released in 1921.[6]

List of shorts

Screen Gems
  • The Fox and the Grapes (1941)
  • Woodman Spare That Tree (1942)
  • Toll-Bridge Troubles (1942)
  • Slay It With Flowers (1943)
  • Plenty Below Zero (1943)
  • Tree for Two (1943)
  • A-Hunting We Won't Go (1943)
  • Room and Bored (1943)
  • Way Down Yonder in the Corn (1943)
  • The Dream Kids (1944)
  • Mr. Moocher (1944)
  • Be Patient, Patient (1944)
  • The Egg-Yegg (1944)
  • Ku-Ku Nuts (1945)
  • Treasure Jest (1945)
  • Phoney Baloney (1945)
  • Foxy Flatfoots (1946)
  • Unsure Runts (1946)
  • Mysto-Fox (1946)
  • Tooth or Consequences (1947)
  • Grape Nutty (1949)

UPA
  • Robin Hoodlum (1948)
  • The Magic Fluke (1949)
  • Punchy de Leon (1950)

In other media

Comic books
The Fox and the Crow
The Fox and the Crow #1 (Jan. 1952). Cover artist unknown.
Publication information
PublisherDC Comics
Publication dateDec. 1951/Jan. 1952 - February–March 1968
No. of issues108
Main character(s)The Fox and the Crow
Stanley and His Monster
Creative team
Written byCecil Beard and Alpine Harper
Artist(s)Jim Davis

The Fox and the Crow starred in several funny animal comic books published by DC Comics, from the 1940s well into the 1960s. They starred with other characters in DC's Columbia-licensed funny animal anthology Real Screen Comics (first issue titled Real Screen Funnies) beginning in 1945,[7] then did likewise when DC converted the superhero title Comic Cavalcade to a funny-animal series in 1948.

The duo received its own title, The Fox and the Crow, which ran 108 issues (Jan. 1952 - March 1968). Until the 1954 demise of Comic Cavalcade, Fox and Crow were cover-featured on three DC titles. They continued on the cover of Real Screen Comics through its title change to TV Screen Cartoons from #129-138 (Aug. 1959 - Feb. 1961), the final issue.

The Fox and the Crow itself was renamed Stanley and His Monster beginning with #109 (May 1968), after the back-up feature, begun in #95 (Jan. 1966), that had taken over in popularity. For the last ten years of its existence, The Fox and the Crow was written by Cecil Beard, assisted by his wife, Alpine Harper. The illustrator was Jim Davis (b. 1915), although it was generally unsigned.[8]

Feature films

Around 1944, plans for a Fox and Crow movie were in development. It is unsure what the plot would have been about, but it was scrapped sometime in the late 40's, possibly due to WWII, the failure of Disney's films at the time, or the fact Screen Gems shut down in 1946.

The Fox and the Crow were going to have a cameo in Who Framed Roger Rabbit but were dropped for unknown reasons.[9]

See also

Footnotes
  1. Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. pp. 82–83. ISBN 0-8160-3831-7. Retrieved 6 June 2020.
  2. "The Comic Book Price Guide For Great Britain - FOX AND THE CROW". www.comicpriceguide.co.uk.
  3. "1940s Columbia Screen Gems Posters |". cartoonresearch.com.
  4. Maltin, Leonard (1980). "Columbia: Charles Mintz and Screen Gems". Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated Cartoons. New American Library. p. 214. ISBN 9780452259935.
  5. Markstein, Don. "The Fox and the Crow". Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Retrieved 2 April 2020.
  6. DataBase, The Big Cartoon. "The Fox And The Crow (Fables Studios, Keith-Albee Theatres)". Big Cartoon DataBase (BCDB).
  7. Wallace, Daniel; Dolan, Hannah, ed. (2010). "1940s". DC Comics Year By Year A Visual Chronicle. Dorling Kindersley. p. 49. ISBN 978-0-7566-6742-9. Animated cartoons were big business on movie screens, and lots of publishers hoped that success could translate onto the pages of comic books.... DC editor Whitney Ellsworth licensed the characters of Charles Mintz' Screen Gems Studio from their distributor, Columbia. The resulting funny animal anthology, Real Screen Comics, starred the Fox and the Crow.CS1 maint: extra text: authors list (link)
  8. The Fox and The Crow #97, April–May 1966 letters column
  9. "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, by Jeffrey Price and Peter S. Seaman". www.dailyscript.com.
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