Apes of Wrath
| Apes of Wrath | |
|---|---|
 Lobby card. | |
| Production company | Warner Bros. Cartoons |
| Distributor | Warner Bros. Pictures The Vitaphone Corporation |
| Release date | April 18, 1959 |
| Starring | Mel Blanc June Foray |
| Producer(s) | John W. Burton |
| Music composed by | Milt Franklyn |
| Story by | Warren Foster |
| Animation | Art Davis Virgil Ross Gerry Chiniquy |
| Director(s) | Friz Freleng |
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Apes of Wrath is the four hundred and forty-seventh Merrie Melodies theatrical short. It was released by Warner Bros. Pictures and The Vitaphone Corporation on April 18, 1959. It was written by Warren Foster, produced by John W. Burton, and directed by Friz Freleng.
A drunken stork, while having arrived at his destination, loses a baby gorilla and makes Bugs a substitiute until he finds the real baby. Elvis the gorilla, however, sees through the act.
Detailed summary
Memorable quotes
Bugs: Take one step on that rope and I'll cut it!
(Elvis pulls the rope along with the cliff and bridge close to him)
Bugs: My... what... big arms... you got.
Bugs: I'd like to see 'im, OOK, AAK, EEK, outta this one.
Characters
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Locations
Objects
- Club
- Rolling pin
- Bucket of water
- Large boulder
Production
Development
Filming
Music
The music was composed by Milt Franklyn.
Release
Dates are in order of release:
- United States: April 18, 1959 in theatres
Behind the scenes
- The title is a pun on the 1939 John Steinbeck novel and its 1940 film adaptation, The Grapes of Wrath.
- This cartoon is a remake of the 1948 Looney Tunes theatrical short, Gorilla My Dreams. It also uses some plot elements from the 1953 Merrie Melodies short, A Mouse Divided.
- While Bugs was pretending to be a the baby gorilla, he says, "Give him another, mummy! And another! And another! Bad ol' daddy!" A similar line was also said by Tweety in Tweet and Lovely, which came out a few months after this short.
- When this cartoon was first restored on the Looney Tunes Super Stars' Bugs Bunny: Hare Extraordinaire DVD, the cartoon had been cropped to a 16:9 widescreen ratio. For its later releases on the Stars of Space Jam and Looney Tunes: Parodies Collection DVDs, it was reverted back to its original fullscreen format.
Errors
Legacy
- This short was used in Bugs Bunny's 3rd Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales with some changes:
- Bugs' line, "So I'll be a monkey." is replaced with "I'll sell books later."
- The ending was cut so that Bugs could easily escape.
- It was also used in the television special, The Bugs Bunny Mother's Day Special.
- The gag of Bugs threatening Elvis on a bridge by cutting the rope, only for the gorilla to pull the entire opposing cliff became an internet meme around December 2021.
Home availability
- In the United States:
