Tashlin had a varied and active career following his initial exit from Warners – after a brief stint as a gag-man at Disney Studios, he took over Columbia's cartoon unit, where he created The Fox and the Crow series. Tashlin returned to Warner Brothers in 1942 and directed some of the most highly regarded Looney Tunes of the 1940s. Also in the 1940s, Tashlin wrote several books on cartooning, as well as a pen-and-ink illustrated children's book, The Bear That Wasn't. The book, which became a bestseller, was a parable about individuality – it is told from the point-of-view of a bear that, after a long hibernation, wakes to find that a factory has been constructed around his den. He wanders through the structure trying to remind everyone that he is a bear while being told by every dull-witted low, mid, and high-level executive that "You're a silly man that needs a shave and wears a fur coat." For all his success in the 1940s, Tashlin's real desire was to become a live-action director; he left cartoons for good and became a gag-man for Harpo Marx and Eddie Bracken, which led to a screenwriting stint. Following work on The Lemon Drop Kid (1951), Bob Hope gave Tashlin his first chance to direct with Son of Paleface (1952), and he went on to helm such comedies as The Girl Can't Help It (1956), Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957), The Glass Bottom Boat (1966), and no less than seven features with Jerry Lewis. Tashlin had several offers over the years to animate The Bear That Wasn't, but turned them all down until Jones came to him in 1965. As Tashlin told interviewer Michael Barrier in 1971, "I had seen the thing Chuck had made called The Dot and the Line, where they had taken a book and faithfully put the book on the screen. And that's all I wanted." Ultimately, Tashlin was less than happy with the end result:
I never went near it, 'cause I figured that was in the best hands. Why worry about it, [Jones] was gonna take the book and put it on the screen, and he was a very capable man. I went to see it in a theater, and the thing started, and I guess it wasn't into a minute and a half where they had done a thing that destroyed the whole picture, and that's why it never got anywhere. ...I almost cried. I never talked to Chuck about it, I've never talked to him since. It was a terrible thing. This bear, he goes to sleep under a factory, when he wakes up they try to convince him he's a [man], as you well know, and he keeps insisting he's a bear, and that's the point of it. Up front in the beginning of this thing, when they are telling him he is a man and he is insisting he's a bear, they put a cigarette in his mouth. Now, the picture was destroyed there, because by the acceptance of a cigarette - you never saw where he got it - by putting a cigarette in his mouth, he was already a man. You know what I mean? Psychologically, the picture was ruined.
As with The Dot and the Line and many of the later Tom & Jerry cartoons, The Bear That Wasn't was essentially co-directed by long-time Jones designer Maurice Noble. The MGM contract allowed for only one director's credit however. In a 1991 interview Noble modestly dismisses his contributions, saying "I would go in and check the animators, maybe sit in on a recording session. I was just all over the place, kind of pulling things together, ironing out a lot of spots while Chuck was going ahead with the next picture. I really don't recall a role as co-director. Someone called me the catalyst." Clearly, in both of the one-shot MGM theatricals, Noble played a key role in the fresh, modern look of the visuals. The characters, though – whether human, bear, or squiggle – bore the unmistakable stamp of Chuck Jones.
Producer: Chuck Jones, Frank Tashlin
Director: Chuck Jones
Story: Frank Tashlin, additional story by Irv Spector
Music: Dean Elliott
Production Design: Maurice Noble
Animation: Ben Washam, Tom Ray, Phil Roman, Richard Thompson, Don Towsley
Backgrounds: Philip DeGuard, Don Morgan.
Narration: Paul Frees. C-10m.
by John M. Miller
