In 1934-35, Ben Hardaway would direct eight cartoons for the Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies. Around that time, Friz Freleng and Jack King were the other two directors. Considering Tex Avery arrived at Warner Bros in 1935, the year Hardaway got demoted back to writer, it makes me wonder this: Did Tex Avery technically succeed Ben Hardaway's unit?
However there's another interesting piece of evidence on the release dates of Jack King vs Ben Hardaway.
The first 5 Jack King directed Looney Tunes shorts were released from June 23 to September 29, 1934, with his next one after those five not released until May 18 1935.
Notably between September 1934 and May 1935, 7 out of Hardaway's initial 8 cartoons were released.
It makes me wonder, was there actually a brief period where Jack King got demoted and Ben Hardaway took over his unit for a few months until King for some reason got promoted back to director? Notably, the only short Hardaway directed that overlaps with King is Buddy of the Apes released in May 19 1934. However, it could've just been a test run before getting the unit full time later in the year. There were also a few shorts between September 1934 and May 1935 where Jack King is strangely credited as just "animator", further supporting an alternate theory that Hardaway might have actually been taking over his unit during that time. Plus, aside from Rhythm in the Bow, Hardaway's shorts in this period were all Buddy cartoons. For context, Freleng seemed to be exclusive to the Merrie Melodies at this time (aside from three Buddy shorts early in 1934) while Jack King did the Buddy shorts.
Animator credits aren't very useful for this since every unit seemed to share the same animators in 1934 and didn't really start to split the animators up by director unit until Tex Avery arrived in 1935 (with Jack King and Friz Freleng's units getting more differentiated in animators in 1936).
So, how do you all explain Ben Hardaway's initial director stint from 1934-35? Was he a third director unit that was succeeded by Tex Avery? Or was he briefly replacing Jack King as the second director? If it's the latter, any theories why they demoted Jack King during that time and then decided to promote him back and demote Hardaway instead in May 1935?
However there's another interesting piece of evidence on the release dates of Jack King vs Ben Hardaway.
The first 5 Jack King directed Looney Tunes shorts were released from June 23 to September 29, 1934, with his next one after those five not released until May 18 1935.
Notably between September 1934 and May 1935, 7 out of Hardaway's initial 8 cartoons were released.
It makes me wonder, was there actually a brief period where Jack King got demoted and Ben Hardaway took over his unit for a few months until King for some reason got promoted back to director? Notably, the only short Hardaway directed that overlaps with King is Buddy of the Apes released in May 19 1934. However, it could've just been a test run before getting the unit full time later in the year. There were also a few shorts between September 1934 and May 1935 where Jack King is strangely credited as just "animator", further supporting an alternate theory that Hardaway might have actually been taking over his unit during that time. Plus, aside from Rhythm in the Bow, Hardaway's shorts in this period were all Buddy cartoons. For context, Freleng seemed to be exclusive to the Merrie Melodies at this time (aside from three Buddy shorts early in 1934) while Jack King did the Buddy shorts.
Animator credits aren't very useful for this since every unit seemed to share the same animators in 1934 and didn't really start to split the animators up by director unit until Tex Avery arrived in 1935 (with Jack King and Friz Freleng's units getting more differentiated in animators in 1936).
So, how do you all explain Ben Hardaway's initial director stint from 1934-35? Was he a third director unit that was succeeded by Tex Avery? Or was he briefly replacing Jack King as the second director? If it's the latter, any theories why they demoted Jack King during that time and then decided to promote him back and demote Hardaway instead in May 1935?
