A Ham in a Role (1949)

Directed by

Robert McKimson

Genre

animation, comedy

Country

United States

Runtime

7 min

Rating

6.5 of 10 from 22 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

Two gophers cause trouble for a dog actor who is trying to perform scenes from Shakespeare. The gophers interrupt his lines and mess up his props, turning the plays into slapstick comedy.

zanywhimsicalslapstickfast-pacedtheatricalplayfulsilly

What happens

A Ham in a Role is a 1949 Looney Tunes short starring the Goofy Gophers along with an unnamed dog who is based on stage/film actor John Barrymore. The cartoon was planned by Arthur Davis, but was finished and directed by Robert McKimson. It was released by Warner Bros. Pictures on December 31, 1949, but some sources list the release date as January 1, 1950. The cartoon draws heavily from the works of William Shakespeare, with its gags relying on literal interpretations of lines from Hamlet, Julius Caesar, Richard III, and Romeo and Juliet. A Ham in a Role was the last cartoon in the Golden Age of American Animation to star the dog that had opposed the Gophers in their first two appearances. (The dog was recycled for a single short in the 1990s in the World Premiere Toons series.) (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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