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Beany and Cecil and Stan and Daws and Bob
Feb. 23rd, 2009 12:52 pmOne thing about Google's Life magazine photo archive, which is both annoying and intriguing, is that the captions and tags don't always reflect a picture's subject very accurately. I keep returning to this collection to find novelties among its millions of images.
I was looking for photos by Allan Grant, who did lots of Hollywood work for Life, and I came across over 200 images labeled cryptically "Beane Tv Act."
I recognized them as portraying the popular (but now-obscure) puppet show Time for Beany, created by Bob Clampett. Clampett was a former Warner Brothers animator and director who seized upon the new medium of television and dragooned two voice actors, Daws Butler and Stan Freberg, into serving as his puppeteers. The program ran from 1949 to 1955.
You will know Daws Butler as the voice of Yogi Bear and about a million other Hanna-Barbera cartoon characters. You will know Stan Freberg as the creator of a long string of hit comedy records, and a longer string of immensely funny TV and radio commercials.
But you can search the archive for Freberg, Butler, and Clampett without turning up any of these pictures. Perhaps Google will eventually incorporate a way of crowdsourcing tags or captions for these images.
Freberg has said that the show was physically demanding because the diminutive Daws was stretched on tippy-toe reaching his puppets above the level of the stage, while Stan hunched his tall frame over to avoid being seen by the camera.
The show also gave rise to a vogue for propeller beanies among Fifties children.
In the following decade, Clampett produced a cel-animated Saturday morning show using the same characters, and recycling many of the same puns.
Daws Butler and Stan Freberg, puppeteers on Time for Beany. Left to right: Beany, Daws Butler, Captain Huffenpuff, Dishonest John ("NYAH-ha-ha!"), Stan Freberg, Cecil.
Cecil gets soaked in the face, and Stan and Daws try to avoid getting caught in the crossfire, as unidentified man operates seltzer bottle.
I was looking for photos by Allan Grant, who did lots of Hollywood work for Life, and I came across over 200 images labeled cryptically "Beane Tv Act."
I recognized them as portraying the popular (but now-obscure) puppet show Time for Beany, created by Bob Clampett. Clampett was a former Warner Brothers animator and director who seized upon the new medium of television and dragooned two voice actors, Daws Butler and Stan Freberg, into serving as his puppeteers. The program ran from 1949 to 1955.
You will know Daws Butler as the voice of Yogi Bear and about a million other Hanna-Barbera cartoon characters. You will know Stan Freberg as the creator of a long string of hit comedy records, and a longer string of immensely funny TV and radio commercials.
But you can search the archive for Freberg, Butler, and Clampett without turning up any of these pictures. Perhaps Google will eventually incorporate a way of crowdsourcing tags or captions for these images.
Freberg has said that the show was physically demanding because the diminutive Daws was stretched on tippy-toe reaching his puppets above the level of the stage, while Stan hunched his tall frame over to avoid being seen by the camera.
The show also gave rise to a vogue for propeller beanies among Fifties children.
In the following decade, Clampett produced a cel-animated Saturday morning show using the same characters, and recycling many of the same puns.
Daws Butler and Stan Freberg, puppeteers on Time for Beany. Left to right: Beany, Daws Butler, Captain Huffenpuff, Dishonest John ("NYAH-ha-ha!"), Stan Freberg, Cecil.
Cecil gets soaked in the face, and Stan and Daws try to avoid getting caught in the crossfire, as unidentified man operates seltzer bottle.
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