A couple of weeks ago, we
reported that the DVD releases of both
Looney Tunes Super Stars' Bugs Bunny: Hare Extraordinaire and
Looney Tunes Super Stars' Daffy Duck: Frustrated Fowl had been delayed until
August 10th. We updated that story later in the day, mentioning that animation expert Jerry Beck, who consults with Warner Home Video about various of their DVD releases (including
Looney Tunes), would be interviewed on Shokus Internet Radio's
Stu's Show this past Wednesday, with more info about the delay, and other plans.
Beck did make his date with Stu, and had a lot to say about all sorts of subjects. For the full interview, including answers to call-in questions, we recommend that you visit the
Shokus website and catch the final two reruns, today (29th) and tomorrow (30th) at 4PM Pacific Time Zone (5PM Mountain, 6PM Central, and 7PM Eastern). Last week Beck also held a separate interview with Scott Katz at USTownHall.com, and you can
catch a recording of that entire interview, at your convenience (the material we focus on below starts around the 66-minute mark, so you may want to jump to that point to hear the below info in Beck's own words).
In these interviews, a number of pieces of
Looney Tunes news comes to light, thanks to Beck. Here are some highlights:
- The delay for the April releases to August was due to Beck's insistence that the cartoons not be released "off the shelf," but instead get restored as the previous shorts have been when released on DVD. Our thanks to Jerry for convincing Warner to take that important extra step!
- The other two "Looney Tunes Super Stars" single-DVD releases planned for this year are being looked at for release in November
- While it could still be subject to possible change, one of these other two releases was guessed at by Stuart Shostak, host of Stu's Show: Foghorn Leghorn!
- In the US Town Hall interview, Beck explains that the other release was going to focus on Porky Pig, but there were far fewer than 15 available color shorts left for curly-tailed fellow, and that Warner was resistant to filling in the rest of the disc with black-and-white shorts (frankly, the appeal isn't as broad, and so the sales - mostly among collectors - are far less than with color productions). They are looking for ways around this, but may have to focus on another character for the second title. In the US Town Hall interview, Beck strongly emphasizes that plans for Foghorn and Porky can certainly change, so don't trust this as being written in stone.
- Also in the US Town Hall interview, just before the 73-minute mark, he has a scoop for Katz: an unannounced, untitled-as-yet 2-DVD (possibly 3 discs, before all is said and done; it's not finalized yet) collection of Bugs Bunny shorts will be released, planned for arrival before year's end. While the single-disc "Super Stars" releases mentioned above will stick to the "no duplicates" policy that the "Golden Collection" four-disc sets had, this special collection of Bugs Bunny cartoons will have material previously seen on DVD (one short mentioned was 1957's "What's Opera, Doc?," already out on Golden Collection Volume 2). What's up with that? Beck explains that this is supposed to be a great item to buy (or get as a gift) for a fan of Bugs, who hasn't bought all the collections that are already out. He says (in part), "The contents are going to be pretty much the classic Bugs Bunny cartoons that YOU SHOULD HAVE...If you're going to have a Bugs Bunny collection...the bona fide Bugs Bunny cartoons." So this is intended to be the best of the best, of Bugs, all gathered in one DVD release for the first time. Beck does hope to include unreleased material on this set, especially on the second disc (tentatively themed as "Bugs Bunny Through the Decades"), but things are still being tweaked and ironed out. And he says that if this goes well, Warner might do similar releases with other characters, too. This is just a tease of the info he provides; please listen to the interview for all the available info, directly from Jerry Beck!
Again, all of this should be considered "early and highly subject to change," so stay tuned for further developments, as they occur. Our sincere thanks to Jerry Beck, Stuart Shostak and Scott Katz for their help with this story!
