Snagglepuss is a Hanna-Barbera cartoon character created in 1959, a pink anthropomorphic mountain lion voiced by Daws Butler.
Contents |
Snagglepuss first appeared in several episodes of The Quick Draw McGraw Show and became a regular segment on The Yogi Bear Show. In his earliest appearances he was orange instead of pink and called Snaggletooth. In later episodes, Snaggletooth was referred to as Snagglepuss's cousin. He also appeared in other Hanna-Barbera series such as Yogi's Gang in 1973, as a co-host of Scooby's All-Star Laff-A-Lympics in 1977 and Scooby's All-Stars in 1978, Yogi's Treasure Hunt in 1985 and as a teenager on Yo Yogi! in 1991.
Snagglepuss lives in a cavern, which he constantly tries to make more habitable for himself. No matter what he does, however, he always winds up back where he started or worse off than he was before.
In some episodes, Snagglepuss is chased by Major Minor (voiced by Don Messick), a tiny-sized hunter, whose chases seem similar to the ones which involve Elmer Fudd and Bugs Bunny (due to the scripts by Michael Maltese).
Butler's voice characterization is reminiscent of the more soft-spoken aspect of Bert Lahr's broad-ranging characterization for the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz.
Snagglepuss has two catchphrases. Before dashing off (whether to escape or for some other reason), he exclaims "Exit, stage left!" (Or stage right, and sometimes even up or down), a phrase related to acting. He also utters the expletive "Heavens to Murgatroyd!", which Bert Lahr said in the 1944 movie Meet the People. Snagglepuss also adds the grammatical suffix "..even" to seemingly every phrase. Later incarnations of Snagglepuss would modify these catchphrases, such as changing the direction of his exit, or saying "Heavens to planetoids!"
When the character of Snagglepuss was used for a series of cereal television commercials in the 1960s, Lahr filed a lawsuit, claiming that the similarity of the Snagglepuss voice to his own might cause viewers to falsely conclude that Lahr was endorsing the product. As part of the settlement the disclaimer "Snagglepuss voice by Daws Butler" was required to appear on each commercial, thus making Butler one of the few voice artists to receive a screen credit in a TV commercial.
No comments have been added.