Bugs Bunny made his debut in a cartoon called A Wild Hare, on this day. Warner Brothers' writers and animators set out to make a rabbit who would be the epitome of cool. They modeled bugs on Groucho Marx with a carrot instead of a cigar. Mel Blanc gave him a Brooklyn accent.
This cartoon is considered the first to feature both Bugs' and Elmer's catchphrases - "What's Up, Doc?" and "Be vewy quiet...I'm hunting wabbits" respectively.
As of January 2013, he has appeared in more films than any other cartoon character - more than 175 films.
July 27, 1949 -
Mighty Joe Young, an RKO Radio Picture made by the same creative team responsible for King Kong, premiered in New York City on this date, (in fact, when Joe smashes through the facade during the nightclub riot, the first scream you hear is that of Fay Wray, stock audio from the original King Kong.)
Second-unit director David Sharpe recalled an incident that happened on the nightclub set: "We were shooting some action stuff . . . which featured lions, tigers, elephants, and apes in cages around the table area. We had trained lions to run from one side of the set to the other. One of them broke loose, jumped onto the top of his cage and grabbed the trainer by the throat. I was in the camera cage. I pushed the iron door open, raced across the set and punched the lion in the face. I guess I shocked him so badly he let go, turned tail and ran into his cage."
(I've mentioned this before, I'm no longer going to direct you to Terry Moore's photo spread in Playboy. You go on ahead and find it yourself.)
July 27, 1968 –
Cass Elliot releases her first solo single, Dream a Little Dream of Me following the break up of The Mamas and Papas.
This song was written in 1931 and became a popular standard in depression-era America. Fabian Andre and Wilbur Schwandt composed the music and Gus Kahn wrote the lyrics. When she was 15, Michelle Phillips of The Mamas & The Papas met Fabian Andre. Years later, when Phillips heard that Andre died in a fall in an elevator shaft, she remembered meeting him and this song came up. They decided to record it with "Mama" Cass Elliot on lead vocals, and it became her signature song, and she performed it with The Mamas & The Papas and as a solo artist until her death in 1974.
July 27, 1968 –
The Who releases their single Magic Bus in the U.S. on this date. The song has become one of the band's most popular songs and had been a concert staple.
The song has been released in various renditions. The eight-minute version that appears on Live at Leeds, with Daltrey wailing on harmonica, may be the wildest. Martin Scorsese made it a high point of the soundtrack for Ray Liotta’s coked-up driving scene in Goodfellas.
July 27, 1978 -
National Lampoon's Animal House, the grandfather of all gross-out comedies, premiered in New York City on this date. (Toga party, anyone?)
Donald Sutherland was so convinced of the movie's lack of potential that, when offered a percent of the gross or a flat fee of $75,000 for his three days' work, he took the upfront payment. Had he taken the gross percentage, he would have been worth an additional $3-4 million.
July 27, 1983 -
Little Tommy's break out film, Risky Business, opened on this date. This film is not, as usually noted, an above average teenage sex comedy but the precursor to 'Greed is Good' mantra that sunk this country for years to come.
The sunglasses Joel wears are the Ray-Ban Wayfarer model. Annual sales of Wayfarers were languishing as of 1983 but skyrocketed 2,000 percent after the movie's release. This film and The Blues Brothers have contributed to the popularity of the Wayfarers since.
July 27, 1984 -
Warner Bros. gift to an unsuspecting world, Purple Rain, starring Prince, premiered on this date.
A few days before the premiere, Prince had a nightmare that Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert despised the film, with Ebert ripping the film apart. He said, "I dreamed those two guys on the TV were reviewing the movie and that fat guy was tearing me up!" Siskel and Ebert both loved the film in their reviews.
(you may put your arms down now, dab your eyes, and resume your day.)
July 27, 1985 -
Paul Young hits #1 with the single, Everytime You Go Away, a cover of a Hall & Oates song released in 1980. It's the only Hall & Oates cover ever to make the Top 40.
Young's success with the song didn't produce any sour grapes for Daryl Hall, who credited him with tapping into the commercial potential he failed to see the first time around. Hall told Music Connection: "I never thought of it any other way than the way it was 'til Paul Young did it ... I was just doin' a kind of gospel/soul song; that was all I had in mind for it. I was really surprised to hear the production they did because it kept the elements but commercialized it - made it sound like a pop record."
July 27, 1985 -
The Eurythmics' song There Must Be An Angel (Playing With My Heart) went to No.1 on the UK singles chart on this date, the duo's only UK No.1 single.
The song features Stevie Wonder, who provides the harmonica solo. Wonder worked on this own schedule, so when Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart went to Los Angeles to record the song, they weren't sure if or when he would show up. "It was getting very late and we were getting pessimistic whether he'd even turn up at all," Lennox recalled in Q magazine. "Finally he showed up, and he was really an adorable person. He had these braids on his hair with beautiful gold beads, and when he plays he shakes his head so the beads make a loud noise. But his assistant, who takes care of him, took out this beanbag thing and gently tied Stevie's hair into it so it didn't make a sound down the mikes. The man is a supreme musician, worth waiting for."
July 27, 2007 -
20 Century Fox finally go around to releasing the film version of the very long running series, The Simpsons, The Simpsons Movie, featuring the voices of the regular television cast of Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith, Hank Azaria, and Harry Shearer, on this date.
In total, The Simpsons Movie took nine years to complete. This is because Fox greenlit the project back in 1997 but in the years up until release, they had to get the voice cast to sign deals, which they didn't do up until 2001. Producing a final script also took several years because almost 160 different versions were written before choosing the final one as plots were continuously being repurposed for the television episodes.
Another ACME Safety Film
Today in History:
July 27, 1586 -
Sir Walter Raleigh and some of his men returned to England and disembarked at Plymouth smoking tobacco from pipes, which caused a sensation, on this date.
William Camden, a contemporary witness, reports that "These men who were thus brought back were the first that I know of that brought into England that Indian plant which they call Tabacca and Nicotia, or Tobacco" Tobacco in the Elizabethan age was known as "sotweed."
President Johnson celebrated this momentous date in history by signed the 1965 Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act on this date (in 1965); it required cigarette makers to print health warnings on all cigarette packages about the effects of smoking.
July 27, 1890 -
At the Chateau d'Auvers, Vincent van Gogh presses a revolver to his chest and pulls the trigger.(Or did he?) Somehow the bullet misses the vital organs, and the painter manages to stumble over to a friend's house.
The following night, Van Gogh died of an infection in the arms of his brother Theo.
July 27, 1922 -
Life is made up of small pleasures. Happiness is made up of those tiny successes. The big ones come too infrequently. And if you don't collect all these tiny successes, the big ones don't really mean anything.
Norman Milton Lear television writer and film and television producer was born on this date, (and still going strong.)
July 27, 1931 -
A swarm of grasshoppers destroyed thousands of acres of crops in Iowa, Nebraska and South Dakota on this date
Bunkies, remember when I told you not to search for images concerning Ed Gein yesterday, maybe you don't want to watch the videos below.
The corn fields were totally destroyed, without a stalk left standing.
July 27, 1953 -
The armistice that ended the Korean War was signed on this date. It was a war that began in June 1950 when North Korea invaded the south. Almost 35,000 Americans were killed in the conflict, more than 5,000 captured or went missing. A corporal in the 1st Marine Division named Anthony Ebron said, "Those last few days were pretty bloody. Each time we thought the war was over we'd go out and fight again. The day it ended we shot off so much artillery that the ground shook. Then, that night, the noise just stopped. We knew it was over."
Harry Truman said that if he had signed the same armistice, the Republicans would have drawn and quartered him, but Dwight D. Eisenhower had run for president on the platform that he would end the war, and when he was elected, that's what he did.
Unfortunately, someone forgot to inform the North Koreans that they, in fact, signed the armistice, because technically, they are still at war with someone, possibly us.
July 27, 1980 -
Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, the exiled Shah of Iran, died of lymphatic cancer in Cairo on this date.
July 27, 1996 -
During a celebration for the Atlanta Olympics, security guard Richard Jewell notices a suspicious green knapsack in Centennial Park. He immediately alerts police and helps to clear people from the area shortly before the pipe bomb explodes. For his trouble, Jewell becomes the FBI's preliminary suspect and news organizations ran wild with the story.
Because he didn't do it, numerous media outlets end up paying him large undisclosed settlements. Eric Rudolph was later charged with the bombing. He was arrested May 31, 2003. Rudolph later pleaded guilty to the bombing.
And so it goes.
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