Easter Yeggs

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Title card: Easter Yeggs.

Easter Yeggs is a Looney Tunes animated short originally released theatrically on June 28, 1947. Story by Warren Foster, with Layouts by Cornett Wood, and Backgrounds by Richard H. Thomas. Animation by Charles McKimson, Dick Bickenbach, and I. Ellis. Directed by Robert McKimson. It is that director's second Bugs Bunny effort (following the previous year's Acrobatty Bunny), and his first Bugs & Elmer cartoon.

1 Plot
- 1.1 Annotations and subreferences
2 Song
3 Quotes
4 See also
5 Availability

[edit] Plot

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Bugs Bunny finds the Easter Bunny sitting on a rock, crying. The Easter Bunny tells Bugs that his feet are sore, so he cannot deliver the Easter eggs. Bugs takes up the job, not knowing that, every year, the Easter Bunny gets some gullible rabbit to do his work for him.

Bugs Bunny confronting the Easter Bunny.

The first house the "joyous bunny" visits bears a name by the door: "Dead End Kid", and the mean little red-haired kid who lives inside throws the egg at Bugs' face, bites him and beats Bugs up. When Bugs rushes back to the Easter Bunny telling him he quits, the Easter Bunny gets him to "try once more".

Unfortunately, the next house is that of Elmer Fudd, the veteran wabbit-hater. Fudd sets up an elaborate welcome and, disguised as a baby, hides his gun in a bassinet and climbs in. Just then Bugs arrives, but this time he's prepared for toddler resistance: he cracks the egg in Elmer's hands. Thus commences the classic chase until Bugs manages to sick the "Dead End Kid" on Elmer. Finally, Bugs paints a bomb painted like an easter egg and leaves it for the Easter Bunny. When he picks it up to finish his job, Bugs lights the fuse, and the bomb explodes on the Easter Bunny, leaving the hapless hen-fruit handler hanging high up in a tree. The stinker's parting shot: "And remember, keep smiling!"

[edit] Annotations and subreferences

A "yegg" is a slang term for a burglar or safecracker.

The main titles are set to the quaint old pop-tune "Some Sunday Morning".

The Easter Rabbit, and his catch phrase, "Keep Smiling!", are a takeoff of a character actually created by Mel Blanc for George Burns and Gracie Allen's radio show during the 1940s; Mel's character was called "The Happy Postman".

The funny little snicker used first by the Easter Rabbit, and then by Bugs at the end of the cartoon, "A-heh-heh!" is borrowed directly from Blanc's other employer, Jack Benny.

Carl Stalling's scoring of this cartoon includes a rendition of "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow" to accompany Fudd's welcome of the "Technicolor hen fruit" courier.

The red-haired little kid, and his complaint, "He bwoke my widdow awm!!", is a takeoff of a character created by Red Skelton for old-time radio. Blanc would use a similar line with Tweety Bird in A Tale of Two Kitties: "Aw, da poor putty tat - he cwushed his widdow head!"

Fudd's "Dick Twacy hat" refers to the popular comic-strip character from mid-20th-century America.

[edit] Song

The song Bugsy sings was a tune previously sung by Happy Rabbit in Hare-um Scare-um. Partial lyrics in Easter Yeggs:

Here's the Easter Rabbit, hooray!

The happy Easter Rabbit, hooray!

I am getting Looney Tuney, touched in the head

This whole thing is gooney, I should-a stood in bed.

etc.

Partial lyrics in Hare-um Scare-um [1]:

I'm going cuckoo, woo-woo!

Here comes the choo-choo, woo-woo!

I'm so gooney Looney Tuney, touched in the head

Please pass the ketchup, I think I'll go to bed

etc.

[edit] Quotes

Dead End Kid: "I want an Easter Egg! I want an Easter Egg! I want an Easter Egg! I want to break it." (as delivered: "Iwannaeastegg-Iwannaeastegg-Iwannaeastegg-Iwannabweakit.")
Bugs: "Cut it out, kid! Someone could get hurt! . . . Probably me!"
Elmer: "Bang! Easter Wabbit Stew!"