| A Coy Decoy | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Bob Clampett |
| Story by | Melvin Millar |
| Produced by | Leon Schlesinger |
| Starring | Mel Blanc |
| Music by | Carl W. Stalling |
| Animation by | Norman McCabe |
| Color process | Black & White Color (1968 color edition and 1990 color version) |
Production company | |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 8:00 |
| Language | English |
A Coy Decoy is a 1941Warner Bros.Looney Tunescartoon, directed byBob Clampett.[1] The cartoon was released on June 7, 1941, and starsPorky Pig andDaffy Duck.[2]
The film is set in a closed bookstore at night, when the many characters and elements featured within the books come to life, similar toFrank Tashlin's own shortsSpeaking of the Weather,Have You Got Any Castles?, andYou're an Education. The idea would later be reworked five years later intoBook Revue, although only Daffy features in that.
The film begins withLudwig van Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata" playing as the scene descends on a bookstore. The camera pans across an array of the bestselling books of early 1941 (includingValtin'sOut of the Night,Fedorova'sThe Family, andNordhoff andHall'sNo More Gas), before reaching an older favorite,Uncle Tom's Cabin, which as a gag has aFederal Housing Administration sign in front of the cabin.
Porky Pig, featured on the cover ofThe Westerner, comes to life and sings "Ride, Tenderfoot, Ride". Across the way, Daffy Duck, featured on the cover ofThe Ugly Duckling, comes to life and sings "I Can't Get A Long Little Dogie". Daffy finds his way toBlack Beauty and comes out riding not a horse, but abig black woman, whom he rides toThe Lake.
A wolf emerges fromThe Wolf of Wall Street (presumably Blake McVeigh's novelization of the 1929 movie), sneaks behind Zane Grey'sThe Green Bay Tree and lures Daffy to him using a female duckdecoy from the bookToys. Daffy is entranced and exclaims (quoting a recent hit record), "Well,Beat Me Daddy, Eight to the Bar." He follows and woos the decoy, adopting aCharles Boyer accent at one point, but when he closes his eyes, the wolf enters, and Daffy mistakenly embraces the wolf's nose. Once he realizes he is in danger, Daffy (recycling some of the dialogue from 1939'sHare-um Scare-um) tells the wolf that he is not worth eating (he claims to have so many diseases that even the draft rejected him) and runs away.
Daffy runs towardEthel Vance's novelEscape, but the wolf blocks his way. As the wolf pursues, Daffy turns on him and exclaims the catchphrase from number one radio programFibber McGee and Molly "You're a hard man, McGee." He then uses the books to defeat the wolf. He opens a copy of Nordhoff and Hall'sThe Hurricane to blow the wolf away, and lightning from the bookLightning strikes the wolf. The wolf surrenders, fittingly underErnest Hemingway's recent bestsellerFor Whom the Bell Tolls.
Daffy returns to the decoy. Porky enters the scene addresses in derision of Daffy, saying that Daffy and the decoy could never "mean anything to each other." Daffy sticks up his nose and swims away with the decoy, followed by four tiny decoys that look like Daffy.
This cartoon is available on many public domain video and DVD compilations (includingCartoon Explosion, Volume 2 released in 2001 by Front Row Entertainment where it is presented in its 1968 redrawn colorized form). The original black and white print fully remastered and uncut was included on thePorky Pig 101 DVD on September 19, 2017, that was officially released byWarner Archive.
| Preceded by | Daffy Duck Cartoons 1941 | Succeeded by |