A Brief History of Bugs Bunny

Bugs Bunny first appeared in the 1938 Warner Brothers short, Porky's Hare Hunt. In this short, Porky Pig plays a hunter. While detouring through a field he comes upon a group of feeding rabbits. He frightens all away except for one screwball white bunny. The rabbit, later known to the world as Bugs Bunny, decides to take revenge on the bumbling Porky and his mutt-hunting dog. What follows are endless slapstick comedy routines that end with Porky getting blown up with his own stick of dynamite? This classic was directed by Ben Hardaway, (after whom Bugs Bunny was named) and animated by Volney White. Although the plot of Porky's Hare Hunt is nearly identical to that of Porky's Duck Hunt, (which came out the previous year,) the short was a hit. It's important to note that although Bugs' resourceful, and witty character remained throughout the years, initially he was visually quite different from the Bugs Bunny we are all familiar with today. Instead of being tall, skinny and gray, Bugs was white, much smaller and generally more rabbit-like.

Warner Brothers developed Bugs Bunny's characte such that in 1940, the Warner short, A Wild Hare, was nominated for an Oscar. In this landmark classic, Bugs Bunny first uttered his trademark line, "Eh, what's up, Doc?" while munching on a carrot. Although Bugs had been referred to from the beginning by the animators as Bugs Bunny, he had never been officially called that in any of his shorts. It was in 1942, in Elmer's Pet Rabbit, that the character was actually referred to by his name on screen.

Aside from being anointed with a name in 1942, the film Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt, staring Bugs received an Oscar nomination. In 1958 Friz Freleng's Knighty-Knight Bugs was not just nominated for an Oscar, but won it. What followed was a continuous sequence of memorable Bugs Bunny animation shorts, directed by such talent as Tex Avery, Robert Clampett, Robert Mc Kimson and Chuck Jones.

The last Bugs Bunny cartoon to be released by Warner Brothers was in 1964, titled False Hare and directed by Robert McKimson. Despite this, Bugs Bunny cartoons never left the screen, continuing to appear on television, and representing a number of commercial products. In the 1970's ad 80's, Bugs Bunny also made appearances in various feature films that chose to incorporate original clips from the old Warner Brothers cartoons. In 1996, with the feature film Space Jam, staring Michael Jordan and a number of the Looney Tunes characters, Bugs and his cohorts were brought back into the limelight. Aside from guest staring on a number of Tiny Toon Adventures, in 1998 Bugs Bunny made his way onto a U.S. postage stamp.