View source for Bosko

{{short description|Warner Bros. theatrical cartoon character}}
{{distinguish|text=[[Bosco Chocolate Syrup|Bosco]], a brand of chocolate syrup, or [[Bosco (TV series)|Bosco]], an Irish children's puppet character}}
{{About|the Warner Bros. cartoon character||Bosko (disambiguation)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=January 2022}}
{{Infobox character
| name              = Bosko
| series            = [[Looney Tunes]]
| image             = Bosko, 1928.jpg
| caption           = Bosko, as drawn by Hugh Harman in 1928.
| first             = ''[[Bosko, the Talk-Ink Kid]] '' (1929)
| last              = ''Fields of Honey'' (Tiny Toon Adventures, 1990)
| creator           = [[Hugh Harman]]<br>[[Rudolf Ising]]
| nationality       = American
| species           = [[Human]]<br>[[Dog]]-like character ([[Tiny Toon Adventures]])
| voice             = [[Carman Maxwell]] (1929–1930)<br>[[Bernard B. Brown]] (1930–1932)<ref name="CartoonVoices">{{cite book |last1=Scott |first1=Keith |title=Cartoon Voices of the Golden Age, Vol. 2 |date=3 October 2022 |publisher=BearManor Media |language=en}}</ref><br>[[Johnny Murray (voice actor)|Johnny Murray]] (1931–1935)<br>[[Philip Hurlic]] (1936–1938)<ref name="CartoonVoices" /><br>[[Eugene Jackson]] (1937)<ref name="CartoonVoices" /><br>[[Don Messick]] (1990)
| franchise         = 
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| home              = 
| significant_other = Honey
}}
'''Bosko''' is an [[animation|animated]] [[cartoon]] character created by [[animator]]s [[Harman and Ising|Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising]]. Bosko was the first recurring character in [[Leon Schlesinger]]'s [[cartoon]] series and was the star of 39 ''[[Looney Tunes]]'' [[short film|shorts]] released by [[Warner Bros.]]<ref>{{cite book |last1=Lenburg |first1=Jeff |title=The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons |date=1999 |publisher=Checkmark Books bosko |isbn=0-8160-3831-7 |access-date=June 6, 2020 |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780816038312/page/56/mode/2up |pages=57–58}}</ref> He was voiced by [[Carman Maxwell]], [[Bernard B. Brown]], [[Johnny Murray (voice actor)|Johnny Murray]], and [[Philip Hurlic]] during the 1920s and 1930s and once by [[Don Messick]] during the 1990s.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0723942/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_25|title=Fields of Honey|website=[[IMDb]]|date=November 2, 1990}}</ref>

== Creation and the first film ==
In 1927, Harman and Ising worked for the [[List of assets owned by Disney#Studio Entertainment|Walt Disney Studios]] on a series of live-action/animated short subjects known as the [[Alice Comedies]]. The two animators created Bosko in 1928 to capitalize on the recent success of [[talkie]]s in the [[film|motion picture]] industry. They began thinking about making a sound cartoon with Bosko in 1928 even prior to their departure from [[Walt Disney Animation Studios|Walt Disney]].<ref name="Michael Barrier 1999, p. 155">Michael Barrier ''Hollywood Cartoons: American Animation in its Golden Age'', Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, p. 155.</ref> Hugh Harman made drawings of the new character and registered it with the [[United States Copyright Office|U.S. Copyright Office]] on January 3, 1928.<ref name="Michael Barrier 1999, p. 155" /> The character was registered as a "[[Negro]] boy" under the name of Bosko.<ref name="Michael Barrier 1999, p. 155" />

After leaving Walt Disney in early 1928, Harman and Ising went to work for [[Charles Mintz]] on [[Universal Pictures|Universal]]'s second-season [[Oswald the Lucky Rabbit]] cartoons. In April 1929 they left Universal to market their new cartoon character. In May 1929, they produced a short pilot cartoon, similar to Max Fleischer's [[Out of the Inkwell]] cartoons, titled ''[[Bosko, the Talk-Ink Kid]]'' that showcased their ability to animate [[soundtrack]]-synchronized speech and dancing. The short, plotless cartoon opens with [[live action]] footage of Ising at a drafting table. After he draws Bosko on the page, the character springs to life, talks, sings, dances, and plays the piano. Ising returns Bosko to the inkwell, and the short ends. ''Bosko, the Talk-Ink Kid'' was a landmark in animation history for being the first cartoon to predominantly feature synchronized speech, though Fleischer Studios' [[My Old Kentucky Home (1926 film)|Song Car-Tune "My Old Kentucky Home"]] was the first cartoon to contain animated dialogue a few years earlier. This cartoon set Harman and Ising "apart from early Disney sound cartoons because it emphasized not music but dialogue."<ref name="Michael Barrier 1999, p. 155" /> The short was marketed to various people by Harman and Ising until Leon Schlesinger offered them a contract to produce a series of cartoons for Warner Bros. It would not be seen by a wide audience until seventy years later, in 2000, as part of [[Cartoon Network]]'s special ''Toonheads: The Lost Cartoons'', a compilation special of rare material from the WB/Turner archives.

In his book, ''Of Mice and Magic'', [[Leonard Maltin]] states that this early version of Bosko
{{blockquote|was in fact a cartoonized version of a young black boy... he spoke in a Southern Negro dialect... in subsequent films this characterization was eschewed, or perhaps forgotten. This could be called sloppiness on the part of Harman and Ising, but it also indicates the uncertain nature of the character itself.<ref>Maltin, Leonard. ''Of Mice and Magic'', p. 225.</ref>}}

== Bosko and ''Looney Tunes'' ==
{{tone|section|date=September 2017}}
[[File:Bosko - The Film Daily, Jul-Dec 1932 (page 886 crop).jpg|thumb|287x287px|Bosko ad in 1932|left]]
Schlesinger saw the Harman-Ising test film and signed the animators to produce cartoons at their studio for him to sell to [[Warner Bros.]] Bosko became the star vehicle for the studio's new ''[[Looney Tunes]]'' cartoon series. Bosko wore long pants and a derby hat, and he had a girlfriend named Honey and a dog named Bruno. He was also sometimes accompanied by Honey's humanized cat ward named Wilbur and an often antagonistic goat, particularly in early cartoons.

The role of Bosko was to serve as a cartoony version of [[Al Jolson]] in ''[[The Jazz Singer (1927 film)|The Jazz Singer]]'' (1927). According to Ising, he was initially supposed to be an "inkspot sort of thing". He was not conceived as either a human or an animal, though behaving like a little boy.<ref name="Lindvall">Lindvall, Fraser (1998), p. 125-126</ref> According to [[Leonard Maltin]], Bosko was a cartoonized version of a young black boy who spoke a Southern dialect of [[African American Vernacular English]]. He cites as an example a phrase from ''[[Bosko's Holiday]]'', said with an intermittent drawl: "I sho'done likes picnics."<ref name="Lindvall"/>

Whether admiring a dress worn by Honey or eating a sandwich (with exaggerated chewing) Bosko had a stock exclamatory reaction indicating his pleasure "Mmmm! Dat sho' is fine!" which became something of a catch phrase.<ref>Toon Zone – LT & MM: The Early Years – Bosko the Lumberjack (1932)</ref>

According to Terry Lindvall and Ben Fraser, Bosko and Honey "were the most balanced portrayals of blacks in cartoons to that point". They had the same type of formulaic coy adventures as [[Mickey Mouse|Mickey]] and [[Minnie Mouse]]. They point to ''Bosko in Person'' (1933) where Honey gives a [[Billie Holiday]]-style performance as an example of nonracist racial tribute to a real person.<ref name="Lindvall"/> According to [[Tom Bertino]], Harman and Ising never called attention to Bosko's racial status, and stayed clear of negative stereotypes involving dice and watermelon.<ref name="Lindvall"/> Bosko instead received positive portrayals as a spunky and resourceful boy.<ref name="Lindvall"/> An exception to this was a demeaning representation in ''[[Congo Jazz]]'' (1930). Bosko in a jungle setting is depicted standing between a small monkey and a gorilla. All three are depicted with virtually identical faces. The only things identifying him as human is his relative size and his clothes.<ref name="Lindvall"/>

Following his first ''Looney Tunes'' outing, ''[[Sinkin' in the Bathtub]]'', Bosko would go on to star in 39 musical films (one of which was not released). His cartoons are notable for their generally weak plots and their abundance of music, singing, and dancing (though there were exceptions, such as ''[[Bosko the Doughboy]]'', in 1931). These were the early days of sound cartoons, and audiences were enthralled simply to see characters talking and moving in step with the music. In terms of animation, the shorts are on-par with Disney's shorts of the same period. Harman and Ising were allowed production costs of up to $6000 per cartoon.<ref>Michael Barrier ''Hollywood Cartoons: American Animation in its Golden Age'', Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, p. 157.</ref> During the same period, Disney was spending around $10,000 per cartoon.<ref name="Michael Barrier 1999, p. 158">Michael Barrier ''Hollywood Cartoons: American Animation in its Golden Age'', Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, p. 158.</ref> The smaller budgets forced Harman and Ising to recycle footage much more often than Disney did.

However, Harman and Ising had an advantage in terms of music and sound recording, as Warner Bros. provided access to a large musical library with all the popular tunes of the day, lavish orchestras (like [[Abe Lyman]]'s), and sound recording equipment and staff free of charge.<ref name="Michael Barrier 1999, p. 158" /> Disney, on the other hand, had no access to a music library and was forced to rely, for the most part, on public domain music.<ref name="Michael Barrier 1999, p. 158" />

Vaudeville was the major entertainment of the time, and the cartoons of the era are better understood when compared to it rather than to animation of later decades. Though rudimentary by today's standards, Bosko's films were quite popular in their day and rivaled films featuring Mickey Mouse in popularity in the early 1930s, although Disney cartoons would eventually surge ahead in popularity on the basis of stronger plot and character development.<ref>{{cite news|title=DEPRESSION WEATHERED NICELY: Bosco's Animated Nightmares in Celluloid, Where Plausible Plots Shorn of All Semblance of Sanity, Prove Unwavering Ability to Please|author=John Scott|work=Los Angeles Times|date=December 7, 1930|page=B11}};<br>{{cite news|title=CARTOON GANG GETS PAINTED PLAYMATE|work=Los Angeles Times|date=July 19, 1931|page=B11}};<br>{{cite news|title=A FEW OF THE INTRICACIES INVOLVED IN A LOONEY TUNE|newspaper=The Washington Post|date=April 5, 1931|page=A4}}<br>{{cite news|title=The LEE SIDE O'L-A|author=Lee Shippey|work=Los Angeles Times|date=January 26, 1932|page=A4}}</ref>

In the later ''Looney Tunes'' shorts in which Bosko appeared, his accent was gone, instead using a [[falsetto]] voice. Consequently, his race became more ambiguous.<ref name="Cohen">Cohen (2004), p. 56</ref>

== Bosko at MGM ==
[[File:Bosko in MGM.jpg|thumb|Bosko and Honey as they appear in their original designs in the opening for ''Hey-Hey Fever'' (left), and Bosko and Honey as identifiable black children in ''Bosko's Easter Eggs'' (right)]]
In 1933, Harman and Ising broke with Warner Bros. over budget disputes with Schlesinger. Having learned from Walt Disney's experiences with [[Oswald the Lucky Rabbit]], they carefully kept all rights to the Bosko character and took him with them at the time of their departure. The two found work with [[Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer]] where they launched the ''[[Happy Harmonies]]'' series. At first, Bosko appeared in his original design in two-strip [[Technicolor]] and some of the old animation from the ''Looney Tunes'' series was even reused in the ''Happy Harmonies'' that featured Bosko. However, after only two cartoons, the character was redesigned into an identifiable black boy, similar in appearance to [[Inki]] and [[Lil' Eightball]], with an overactive imagination. This redesigned Bosko, whom many consider to be a different character altogether despite the shared name, only starred in seven negatively-received three-strip Technicolor cartoons before Harman and Ising discontinued the character.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://bosko.toonzone.net/characters/bosko/ |title=Toon Zone - LT & MM: The Early Years - Bosko & Honey |access-date=August 27, 2005 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051122175000/http://bosko.toonzone.net/characters/bosko/ |archive-date=November 22, 2005 }}</ref> The career of the character ended for good when MGM fired Harman and Ising due to [[cost overrun]]s in the films they produced. They were replaced by [[Fred Quimby]], who later hired Harman and Ising back, though Bosko did not make any appearances in subsequent MGM subjects they produced.<ref name="Cohen">Cohen (2004), p. 56</ref>

== Bosko on television ==
Bosko cartoons were packaged with other Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies, to be broadcast in various television markets in the 1950s. For instance, "Skipper Frank" (Frank Herman), showed Bosko, along with [[Buddy (Looney Tunes)|Buddy]], on "Cartoon Carousel" his hour-long afterschool cartoon program on [[KTLA-TV]] (Channel 5) in Los Angeles.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.newsfromme.com/2010/08/21/from-the-e-mailbag-23-2/ |title=From the E-Mailbag… |date=2010-08-21 |access-date=2022-04-15 |last= Evainer| first= Mark}}</ref> Bosko cartoons were also later aired on [[Nickelodeon]] as part of the network's Looney Tunes program beginning in 1988 and ending in 1992, when the network pulled all black-and-white shorts out of rotation to make room for more recent color cartoons featuring more popular Looney Tunes characters.

Bosko appeared in a 1990 episode of the television series ''[[Tiny Toon Adventures]]'' titled "[[List of Tiny Toon Adventures episodes|Fields of Honey]]". In a parody of the then-current film ''[[Field of Dreams]]'', a mysterious voice leads [[Babs Bunny]] to build a theater that shows nothing but cartoons of Bosko's girlfriend Honey, after being told about Honey (voiced by [[B. J. Ward (actress)|B. J. Ward]]) by the Acme Looniversity's mysterious vaultkeeper (voiced by [[Don Messick]]). Babs does so, and the resulting audience laughter rejuvenates the aged and ailing Honey. The laughter also rejuvenates the vaultkeeper, who is revealed to be none other than Bosko himself as well as the source of the voice. The cartoon depicts Bosko and Honey as dog-like [[talking animals in fiction|talking animal]]s similar to the lead characters of the later television series ''[[Animaniacs]]'', presumably so as not to offend viewers with the original black-face characterizations.

The character is also seen in a portrait in the 1996 film ''[[Space Jam]]'', this time in his original form. He also appears in his original form in the ''[[Animaniacs]]'' cartoon "The Girl with the Googily Goop", in which he is seen parking his car. Five episodes of ''[[Futurama]]'' featured scenes from three ''Looney Tunes'' (pre-1934) Bosko cartoons in the opening sequence: ''[[Bosko Shipwrecked!]]'', ''[[Box Car Blues]]'', and ''[[Congo Jazz]]''. The opening to the ''Futurama'' episode "[[Bendless Love]]" featured a scene from the ''Happy Harmonies'' cartoon ''Little Ol' Bosko in Bagdad'' in black-and-white.

The majority of the cartoons are available on [[VHS]] and [[DVD]] in the ''Uncensored Bosko'' series from Bosko Video. In 2003, Warner Home Video officially released the initial pilot film ''Bosko, the Talk-Ink Kid'', as an extra on the ''[[Looney Tunes Golden Collection]] Volume 1'' DVD box set. ''[[Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 3]]'' (released in 2005) also includes the first ''Looney Tunes'' short, ''[[Sinkin' in the Bathtub]]'' (which originally introduced Bosko and Honey to audiences in 1930) as an extra. ''[[Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 6]]'' (released in 2008) includes several Bosko films, most of which are on a disc officially devoted to Bosko and other early 1930s characters. The ''[[Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 2]]'' [[Blu-ray Disc|Blu-ray]] (released in 2012) includes the aforementioned ''Bosko, the Talk-Ink Kid'' and ''Sinkin' in the Bathtub'' as extras on a disc of bonus material.

All the Bosko cartoons subject to copyright remain owned by Warner Bros., but the majority of Bosko cartoons have fallen into the [[public domain]]. Warner Bros. also owns the ''Happy Harmonies'' cartoons starring Bosko through [[Turner Entertainment Co.]], as [[Ted Turner]] bought the pre-May 1986 MGM library.<ref>{{Cite news|title=A Look Back At Show Biz '86|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1314&dat=19861229&id=iIBRAAAAIBAJ&sjid=eggEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6518,7901301|last=Beck|first=Marilyn|date=December 30, 1986|page=11|access-date=December 27, 2021|work=[[The Spokesman-Review]]}}</ref>

== Filmography ==
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Year !! Title !! Notes
|-
| 1929 || ''[[Bosko, the Talk-Ink Kid]]'' || The first Bosko film.
|-
| rowspan="5" | 1930 || ''[[Sinkin' in the Bathtub]]'' || The first Bosko film released.
|-
| ''[[Congo Jazz]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Hold Anything]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[The Booze Hangs High]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Box Car Blues]]'' ||
|-
| rowspan=11 | 1931 || ''[[Big Man from the North]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Ain't Nature Grand!]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Ups 'n Downs]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Dumb Patrol (1931 film)|Dumb Patrol]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Yodeling Yokels]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko's Holiday]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[The Tree's Knees]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko Shipwrecked!]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko the Doughboy]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko's Soda Fountain]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko's Fox Hunt]]'' ||
|-
| rowspan="13" | 1932 || ''[[Bosko at the Zoo]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Battling Bosko]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Big-Hearted Bosko]]'' ||
|-
| ''Bosko's Party'' ||
|-
| ''Bosko and Bruno'' ||
|-
| ''Bosko's Dog Race'' ||
|-
| ''Bosko at the Beach'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko's Store]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko the Lumberjack]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Ride Him, Bosko!]]'' ||
|-
| ''Bosko the Drawback'' ||
|-
| ''Bosko's Dizzy Date'' || Alternately titled ''Bosko and Honey''.
|-
| ''Bosko's Woodland Daze'' ||
|-
| rowspan="9" | 1933 || ''Bosko in Dutch'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko in Person]]'' ||
|-
| ''Bosko the Speed King'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko's Knight-Mare]]'' ||
|-
| ''Bosko the Sheep-Herder'' ||
|-
| ''Beau Bosko'' ||
|-
| ''Bosko's Mechanical Man'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko the Musketeer]]'' ||
|-
| ''[[Bosko's Picture Show]]'' || Final appearance of Bosko in a WB cartoon.
|-
| 1934 || ''[[Bosko's Parlor Pranks]]''|| First appearance of Bosko in an MGM cartoon.
|-
| rowspan="2" | 1935 || ''Hey-Hey Fever'' || Final cartoon featuring original Bosko.
|-
| ''Run, Sheep, Run'' || First cartoon featuring Bosko in later design.
|-
| 1936 || ''The Old House'' ||
|-
| rowspan="4" | 1937 || ''Circus Daze'' ||
|-
| ''Bosko's Easter Eggs'' ||
|-
| ''Little Ol' Bosko and the Pirates'' ||
|-
| ''Little Ol' Bosko and the Cannibals'' ||
|-
| 1938 || ''Little Ol' Bosko in Bagdad'' || The last Bosko film.
|-
| 1990 || ''Fields of Honey'' || Episode of ''[[Tiny Toon Adventures]]''.
|-
| 1992 || ''Two-Tone Town'' || Episode of ''[[Tiny Toon Adventures]]''; cameo appearance in a picture.
|-
| rowspan="2" | 1996 || ''The Girl with the Googily Goop'' || Episode of ''[[Animaniacs]]''; cameo appearance.
|-
| ''[[Space Jam]]'' || Cameo appearance in a picture.
|}

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

== Sources ==
* {{citation | last1=Cohen | first1= Karl F. | title=''Forbidden Animation: Censored Cartoons and Blacklisted Animators in America'' | chapter= Racism and Resistance: Stereotypes in Animation| year=2004 | publisher=McFarland & Company| isbn=978-0786420322| chapter-url =https://books.google.com/books?id=gIyH_DLYhoIC&pg=PA36 }}
* {{citation | last1=Lindvall | first1=Terry| last2=Fraser | first2=Ben| editor1-last=Sandler| editor1-first=Kevin S.| title=Reading the Rabbit: Explorations in Warner Bros. Animation | chapter =Darker Shades of Animation: African-American Images in the Warner Bros. Cartoon| year=1998 | publisher=Rutgers University Press| isbn=978-0813525389| chapter-url =https://books.google.com/books?id=zd_WTZZjvqkC&pg=PA121 }}

== Further reading ==
* Barrier, Michael (1999): ''Hollywood Cartoons''. Oxford University Press.
* Maltin, Leonard (1987): ''Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated Cartoons''. Penguin Books.
* Schneider, Steve (1999): ''That's All Folks!: The Art of Warner Bros. Animation''. Barnes and Noble Books.
* Beck, Jerry and Friedwald, Will (1989): ''Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies: A Complete Illustrated Guide to the Warner Bros. Cartoons''. Henry Holt and Company.

== External links ==
{{commons}}
{{wikiquote}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20051122175000/http://bosko.toonzone.net/characters/bosko/ Bosko] at Toonzone.net
* [https://www.toonopedia.com/bosko.htm Bosko] at [[Don Markstein's Toonopedia]]. [https://archive.today/20240528073932/https://www.webcitation.org/6xQnZRnII?url=http://www.toonopedia.com/bosko.htm Archived] from the original on February 22, 2018.

{{Looney Tunes & Merrie Melodies}}

[[Category:Looney Tunes characters]]
[[Category:MGM cartoon characters]]
[[Category:Fictional musicians]]
[[Category:African-American characters in films]]
[[Category:Male characters in animation]]
[[Category:Film characters introduced in 1929]]
[[Category:Warner Bros. cartoon characters]]
[[Category:Bosko films| ]]
[[Category:Animated characters introduced in 1929]]
[[Category:Characters created by Rudolf Ising]]