Odor-Able Kitty (1945)

Pepe Le Pew is not one of my favourites, but he is a likable character and the sort that you appreciate much more as an adult. Odor-able Kitty is his debut, and is a very credible one. Okay, it is different to what we are used to from Pepe, perhaps there is a notion of not quite finding their feet yet- which is natural when it comes to debuts- and Pepe does look a little awkward here. On the other hand, the animation on the whole is very good, perhaps not as elegant as the later Pepe cartoons but it has a nice style to it. The music is typical Carl Stalling, the orchestration is lush and there is so much characters that proves a vital part of the humour. The dialogue has the freshness and wit that you'd expect from Looney Tunes, the cat bags the best lines actually. The gags, the best being the ending, are clever and imaginatively timed. Pepe is memorable for a first outing, though not as amorous or witty as he would be later, while the cat is a strong support character that I like even better than Penelope. Mel Blanc's(with his Pepe as ever sounding eerily like Maurice Chevalier) vocal characterisations don't disappoint. All in all, a more than credible debut, even if there was better to come. 8/10 Bethany Cox

One day a red alley cat is fed up of being kicked by people and attacked by dogs and muses that life would be better if he were a skunk. He then paints himself black with a white stripe down his back and adds a bit of Limburger cheese to make him stink. At first life couldn't be better for him, the dog flees and the butcher abandons his shop letting the cat walk off with a pile of meat. Just as he is thinking everything is perfect he is noticed by a real skunk, not just any skunk but the overly amorous Pepé Le Pew. Pepé mistakes the poor cat for a female skunk and pursues him thinking his protestations are just shyness. Our poor cat thinks he has escaped when he throws a skunk skin from a tall building so that Pepé will think he is dead, at first it seems to work but as he sneaks off Pepé sees him and instantly forgets the dead skunk. In the end the cat realises he was better off being kicked and attacked than being lusted after by a randy skunk... there is a nice ending for the skunk too when his wife finds out what he has been up to.This was a fairly funny introduction to Pepé Le Pew who back then was just overly amorous but now looks like a randy sexually harassing stalker, although he was punished for his behaviour in the end.

Chuck Jones's 'Odor-able Kitty' is the cartoon that introduced Pepe Le Pew to the world… sort of. There are a few key differences between the Pepe we know and love (or hate, in the case of some people) and the character in this cartoon. For one, the disguised cat who Pepe amorously pursues in 'Odor-able Kitty' is distinctly male. Also, Pepe is exposed as a fraud whose real name is Henry at the cartoon's climax, his French accent dropping away when his wife and family turn up. Pepe is not even the lead character here, the focus favouring the put-upon cat who disguises himself as a skunk to scare off his enemies. For the most part, the storyline largely follows the usual format of a Pepe Le Pew cartoon but Pepe's aggressive courtship is lacking the usual wisecracks and straight to camera addresses that make him such a great character. He is also not nearly as handsome as he would become and rather awkwardly animated. In fact, 'Odor-able Kitty' is a fairly ugly and clumsy looking cartoon all round. Its main source of appeal comes from its concept which was original at this stage before it became the template for every Pepe Le Pew cartoon that followed. This subsequent development has robbed 'Odor-able Kitty' of any impact whatsoever and to modern viewers it just looks like a rather dull Pepe Le Pew short with a weird surprise ending. As a child, I hated Pepe Le Pew. As an adult, able to appreciate his more sophisticated, verbal and risqué humour, I love the character and most of his cartoons. 'Odor-able Kitty' makes me feel like a child again!

Written by Tedd Pierce and directed by Chuck Jones, "Odor-able Kitty" is the first Warner Bros. cartoon to feature a famous French skunk who is an irrepressible "ladies' man": Pepe Le Pew. But what an unusual Pepe Le Pew cartoon! (If you haven't yet seen this film, DON'T read any further.) In "Odor-able Kitty," Pepe chases after a MALE cat! No, Pepe is not a homosexual; he simply believes the male cat to be a female skunk. And then, at the end of this cartoon, it turns out that Pepe is not really Pepe at all! He is Henry, a Brooklyn skunk with a wife and two kids. Thankfully, in most of the later Pepe Le Pew cartoons, these little flaws are rectified as Pepe becomes a more fully developed character.Here are my favorite scenes from "Odor-able Kitty." When the male cat first disguises himself as a skunk (so that he would be left alone), he dares an old lady to swat him on the rear with a broom, but before she does, he has a smug expression on his face as his tail points toward his Limburger odor! Shortly afterward he walks into a meat shop, and after a brief pause, everyone screams and rushes out! Thanks to the brilliance of composer/orchestrator Carl Stalling, we hear a familiar sprightly violin theme as Pepe/Henry pounces after the cat; contrast that with some sluggish saxophones to indicate the cat's gradual slowing down in escaping from the amorous skunk. AND, in another moment of quirkiness, we see BUGS BUNNY (actually the cat in disguise) saying his "Eh, what's up, Doc?" catchphrase while we hear the Warner Bros. cartoon theme "Merrily We Roll Along." In addition to "Merrily We Roll Along," there are three other songs in "Odor-able Kitty" that I recognize, again attesting the brilliance of Carl Stalling. These three songs are "You're Just an Angel in Disguise" (a snippet of which is sung by the cat when he first disguises himself as a skunk), "Trade Winds" (heard while the cat rests contentedly, his belly full of delicious meat), and "It Had to Be You" (heard several times throughout this short, particularly during Pepe's/Henry's first appearance).