Mother Was a Rooster is a 1962 Merrie Melodies short directed by Robert McKimson.
Plot[]
Late one night, Barnyard Dawg breaks into an ostrich hatchery to steal an egg, the intent being to place it under Foghorn Leghorn and make him believe that he laid the egg, as a prank. Barnyard Dawg justifies this by explaining, "It's been kind of dull around here lately."
Foghorn awakens and taking the bait, discovers the egg underneath him. When the egg doesn't immediately hatch, Barnyard Dawg decides to speed up the process by whacking Foggy over the head with a mallet. The egg hatches an ostrich chick, to which Foggy immediately warms up to as his own son. Foggy proudly shows off his "son" to the Barnyard Dawg as a gesture of goodwill, but the Barnyard Dawg insults the ostrich, making fun of his appearance and voice. The ostrich buries his head in the ground in shame.
After an attempt with a booby-trapped bone to get back at Barnyard Dawg fails, Foggy tries to bond with his son, showing him how to play various sporting activities such as baseball and football. Despite these efforts to build the bird's self-esteem and forget Barnyard Dawg's maliciousness, the dog continually and unmercifully mocks the ostrich. The ostrich buries his head with each insult, agitating Foggy even more. Eventually, Foggy has enough of the bullying and decides to defend his son's honor in a boxing match.
The bout takes place in a makeshift ring, contained beneath the farm's wooden water tower. When Barnyard Dawg decides to cheat, including walking over to Foghorn's corner to throw a cheap-shot sucker punch at him before the match starts, Foggy decides to forget the rules and — using a loose floor plank as a catapult — hurls his canine foe into the bottom of the water tank. Barnyard Dawg returns the favor, and the process repeats several times until the tank becomes dislodged and crashes on top of the ring, leaving both Foggy and Barnyard Dawg with their heads buried in the ground. The ostrich, who had been watching the match, remarks, "They've left me all alone. Where did everybody go?"
Availability[]
Streaming[]
Censorship[]
- On CBS, the part where Barnyard Dawg cheap-shots Foghorn Leghorn as he says, "Okay, son, ring the bell," during the first part of the boxing match was cut.[1]
Notes[]
- This was the last-released cartoon scored by Milt Franklyn; Bill Lava would take over as composer for Warner Bros. cartoons starting with "Good Noose" until the cartoon department's closure in 1969. As Franklyn was deceased since April 1962, this means he completed scoring music for this cartoon before his death.
- This was also one of the seven cartoons (not counting "The Jet Cage", as William Lava also did music for that short) that were released after Milt Franklyn's death, alongside "Mexican Boarders", "Bill of Hare", "Zoom at the Top", "The Slick Chick", "Louvre Come Back to Me!", and "Honey's Money".
- The ostrich from "Plenty of Money and You" and "The Lyin' Mouse" appears once again, but he is shorter, has three hairs on the top of his head, has a light brown head as opposed to a gray one, has smaller pupils, has less eyelashes, has a smaller brown body as opposed to a gray one, has light brown legs as opposed to yellow ones, and has smaller tail feathers.
- This is the only cartoon featuring the ostrich that was not directed by Friz Freleng.
- This cartoon was used in The Bugs Bunny Mother's Day Special.
Gallery[]
| Preceded by The Slick Chick |
Foghorn Leghorn cartoons 1962 |
Succeeded by Banty Raids |
| Foghorn Leghorn Cartoons | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1946 | Walky Talky Hawky | |||
| 1947 | Crowing Pains | |||
| 1948 | The Foghorn Leghorn | |||
| 1949 | Henhouse Henery | |||
| 1950 | The Leghorn Blows at Midnight • A Fractured Leghorn | |||
| 1951 | Leghorn Swoggled • Lovelorn Leghorn | |||
| 1952 | Sock a Doodle Do • The EGGcited Rooster | |||
| 1953 | Plop Goes the Weasel! • Of Rice and Hen | |||
| 1954 | Little Boy Boo | |||
| 1955 | Feather Dusted • All Fowled Up | |||
| 1956 | Weasel Stop • The High and the Flighty • Raw! Raw! Rooster! | |||
| 1957 | Fox-Terror | |||
| 1958 | Feather Bluster • Weasel While You Work | |||
| 1959 | A Broken Leghorn | |||
| 1960 | Crockett-Doodle-Do • The Dixie Fryer | |||
| 1961 | Strangled Eggs | |||
| 1962 | The Slick Chick • Mother Was a Rooster | |||
| 1963 | Banty Raids | |||
| 1964 | False Hare | |||
| 1980 | The Yolks on You | |||
| 1996 | Superior Duck | |||
| 1997 | Pullet Surprise | |||
| 2004 | Cock-a-Doodle Duel | |||