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High Diving Hare is a 1949 Looney Tunes short directed by Friz Freleng.

Plot[]

Bugs Bunny is drumming up business for a vaudeville show in a remote western town. One of the main attractions is "Fearless Freep" and his high-dive act. As soon as Yosemite Sam hears the name "Fearless Freep", he goes into a frenzy, buying as many tickets as he can. "I'm a-splurgin'!"

During the show, as Bugs is about to introduce Freep, he gets a telegram informing him that Freep is delayed by a storm and won't be able to appear until the next day. An angered Sam insists on seeing the high-diving act and forces Bugs at gunpoint to the top of a high-dive platform. But Bugs manages to pull out all his tricks and stops, and it is Sam who does all the diving, in a different comical setting nine separate times.

1: Sam pushes Bugs to the edge of the platform, and Bugs bares his claws to secure himself to the edge of the board. Bugs dupes Sam into covering his eyes while he puts on his bathing suit, and then proceeds to spin the board around so that Sam is at the diving edge. Bugs makes it look like he's taken the dive, accompanied with an audible "SPLASH!!", but Sam turns around and starts to walk off, right off the edge and into the tank, which falls apart with the water still intact!

2: Bugs springs on the board so hard (reciting "One for the Money") that he sends Sam up, over and down, separating Sam from his pistols in the process. Bugs then realizes that he forgot to fill the tank with water, so he grabs a bucket of water from off-camera and throws it down from the diving board past Sam. The water makes it into the tank, but Sam misses the tank altogether, smashing through the stage into the basement.

3: Sam walks to the end of the board and finds Bugs standing under the board upside-down. "Great horny toads! What are ya doin' down there upside-downy?" But it is Sam who is upside-down. "I'm not upside down, doc. You are!" Sam looks "up", sees the tank, and falls "up" into it.

4: Having been verbally hit with "fightin' words", Bugs dares Sam to "step over this line", and Sam agrees to. Sam steps over it, sending him down for the splash again, but not before springing back up briefly to declare: "I hate you!"

5: Sam is stopped by a door, and yells "Open up that door!" then asides, "You notice I didn't say Richard?" He backs up and charges towards the door, which Bugs opens at the last microsecond, leading Sam to another splash, this time assisted by an anvil which Bugs gives him.

6: Bugs, dressed as an Indian, points Sam to a "short-cut" in a desert-like setting. "Quick! Him go that way! You take-em short cut! Head him off at pass!" Sam thanks the "Indian" and takes the route leading to yet another dive.

After two more dives in which the setups are unseen, Sam finally has Bugs tied up and standing on the edge of the platform, with Sam sawing away at the board, gloating, "Now, you smarty-pants, let's see you get out of this one! Ha-ha-ha-ha! This time, you're a-diving!" However, as soon as Sam cuts through the board, it's the ladder and platform that falls, leaving the cut plank suspended in mid-air. Bugs cracks, "I know this defies the law of gravity, but, you see, I never studied law!"

Availability[]

Streaming[]

Notes[]

  • This is last cartoon where Bugs is sitting on the WB shield until "(Blooper) Bunny" in 1991. Shorts following this one have his face appear much like the 1944-45 cartoon openings.
  • The short is an expansion of a gag from "Stage Door Cartoon", also directed by Freleng.
  • One of the posters in the background is for "Frizby the Magician", a reference to director Friz Freleng.
  • This cartoon, though edited for time, was used in Friz Freleng's Looney Looney Looney Bugs Bunny Movie.
  • This was the first cartoon to be broadcast in the first episode of Merrie Melodies Starring Bugs Bunny & Friends.
  • Bugs claims to have acrophobia, the fear of heights.
  • Sam's aside "You notice I didn't say Richard?" was inspired by the 1947 hit record "Open the Door, Richard!" by Jack McVea.[3]

Censorship[]

ABC has aired two edited versions of this cartoon--one for The Bugs Bunny Show and another for The Bugs & Tweety Show[4]

  • The version that aired on the original version of The Bugs Bunny Show shortened Bugs Bunny's carnival barking and cut Yosemite Sam's line as he enters the platform "Ya notice I didn't say a-Richard?"
  • The version that aired on The Bugs Bunny and Tweety Show left in the scenes that were cut on The Bugs Bunny Show, but cut the scene where Bugs (while on the high-dive) disguises himself as an Indian and tells Sam "Him go that-a-way! You take-um shortcut! Head him off at past! Ugh!" (this scene was also cut from Nickelodeon's version of this cartoon, though, surprisingly not Cartoon Network, Boomerang, or MeTV, since those channels have a history of editing and banning cartoons with American Indian stereotypes), along with the scene where Sam strangles Bugs, and then Bugs tells Sam that he doesn't want to do it because he gets "goosebumps on his goosebumps", and Sam forces him to do so by shooting at his feet.
    • For unknown reasons (possibly due to time constraints or a technical gaffe) the September 11, 1993 airing of this short also cut out the entire opening, including the TV title card.[5]

Gallery[]

References[]

External Links[]

High Diving Hare on the SFX Resource

Preceded by
Rebel Rabbit
Bugs Bunny Cartoons
1949
Succeeded by
Bowery Bugs
Bugs Bunny Shorts
1938 Porky's Hare Hunt
1939 Prest-O Change-OHare-um Scare-um
1940 Elmer's Candid CameraA Wild Hare
1941 Elmer's Pet RabbitTortoise Beats HareHiawatha's Rabbit HuntThe Heckling HareAll This and Rabbit StewWabbit Twouble
1942 The Wabbit Who Came to SupperAny Bonds Today?The Wacky WabbitHold the Lion, PleaseBugs Bunny Gets the BoidFresh HareThe Hare-Brained HypnotistCase of the Missing Hare
1943 Tortoise Wins by a HareSuper-RabbitJack-Wabbit and the BeanstalkWackiki WabbitFalling Hare
1944 Little Red Riding RabbitWhat's Cookin' Doc?Bugs Bunny and the Three BearsBugs Bunny Nips the NipsHare Ribbin'Hare ForceBuckaroo BugsThe Old Grey HareStage Door Cartoon
1945 Herr Meets HareThe Unruly HareHare TriggerHare ConditionedHare Tonic
1946 Baseball BugsHare RemoverHair-Raising HareAcrobatty BunnyRacketeer RabbitThe Big SnoozeRhapsody Rabbit
1947 Rabbit TransitA Hare Grows in ManhattanEaster YeggsSlick Hare
1948 Gorilla My DreamsA Feather in His HareRabbit PunchBuccaneer BunnyBugs Bunny Rides AgainHaredevil HareHot Cross BunnyHare SplitterA-Lad-In His LampMy Bunny Lies over the Sea
1949 Hare DoMississippi HareRebel RabbitHigh Diving HareBowery BugsLong-Haired HareKnights Must FallThe Grey Hounded HareThe Windblown HareFrigid HareWhich Is WitchRabbit Hood
1950 Hurdy-Gurdy HareMutiny on the BunnyHomeless HareBig House BunnyWhat's Up Doc?8 Ball BunnyHillbilly HareBunker Hill BunnyBushy HareRabbit of Seville
1951 Hare We GoRabbit Every MondayBunny HuggedThe Fair Haired HareRabbit FireFrench RarebitHis Hare Raising TaleBallot Box BunnyBig Top Bunny
1952 Operation: RabbitFoxy by Proxy14 Carrot RabbitWater, Water Every HareThe Hasty HareOily HareRabbit SeasoningRabbit's KinHare Lift
1953 Forward March HareUpswept HareSouthern Fried RabbitHare TrimmedBully for BugsLumber Jack-RabbitDuck! Rabbit, Duck!Robot Rabbit
1954 Captain HareblowerBugs and ThugsNo Parking HareDevil May HareBewitched BunnyYankee Doodle BugsBaby Buggy Bunny
1955 Beanstalk BunnySahara HareHare BrushRabbit RampageThis Is a Life?Hyde and HareKnight-Mare HareRoman Legion-Hare
1956 Bugs' BonnetsBroom-Stick BunnyRabbitson CrusoeNapoleon Bunny-PartBarbary-Coast BunnyHalf-Fare HareA Star Is BoredWideo WabbitTo Hare Is Human
1957 Ali Baba BunnyBedevilled RabbitPiker's PeakWhat's Opera, Doc?Bugsy and MugsyShow Biz BugsRabbit Romeo
1958 Hare-Less WolfHare-Way to the StarsNow, Hare ThisKnighty Knight BugsPre-Hysterical Hare
1959 Baton BunnyHare-abian NightsApes of WrathBackwoods BunnyWild and Woolly HareBonanza BunnyA Witch's Tangled HarePeople Are Bunny
1960 Horse HarePerson to BunnyRabbit's FeatFrom Hare to HeirLighter Than Hare
1961 The Abominable Snow RabbitCompressed HarePrince Violent
1962 Wet HareBill of HareShishkabugs
1963 Devil's Feud CakeThe Million HareHare-Breadth HurryThe UnmentionablesMad as a Mars HareTransylvania 6-5000
1964 Dumb PatrolDr. Devil and Mr. HareThe Iceman DuckethFalse Hare
1979 Bugs Bunny's Christmas CarolFright Before Christmas
1980 Portrait of the Artist as a Young BunnySpaced Out Bunny
1990 Box Office Bunny
1991 (Blooper) Bunny
1992 Invasion of the Bunny Snatchers
1995 Carrotblanca
1997 From Hare to Eternity
2004 Hare and Loathing in Las VegasDaffy Duck for President

See also List of Bugs Bunny cartoons



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