''Quasi at the Quackadero'' is a 1975 American

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in Pennsylvania, United States * Independentes (English: Independents), a Portuguese artist ...

animated short Animation is a filmmaking technique whereby still images are manipulated to create moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Animati ...

Sally Cruikshank Sarah "Sally" Cruikshank (born 1949) is an American cartoonist, animator and artist, whose work includes animation for the Children's Television Workshop program ''Sesame Street'', and whose short '' Quasi at the Quackadero'' (1975) was inducted i ...

. This cartoon follows two anthropomorphic ducks and a pet robot at an amusement park where phenomena such as time travel, telepathy, and reincarnation are exhibited as

sideshow In North America, a sideshow is an extra, secondary production associated with a circus, traveling carnival, carnival, fair, or other such attraction. They historically featured human oddity exhibits (so-called “Freak show, freak shows”), pr ...

attractions. In 2009, it was selected for preservation in the United States

National Film Registry The National Film Registry (NFR) is the United States National Film Preservation Board's (NFPB) collection of films selected for preservation (library and archival science), preservation, each selected for its cultural, historical, and aestheti ...

by the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

Plot

The short stars Quasi, "an infantile duck with buck front teeth, thick glasses and a red cape", voiced by

Kim Deitch Kim Deitch (born May 21, 1944 in Los Angeles, California) is an American cartoonist who was an important figure in the underground comix movement of the 1960s, remaining active in the decades that followed with a variety of books and comics, somet ...

; Anita, whom one writer described as "

Betty Boop Betty Boop is a cartoon character designed by Grim Natwick at the request of Max Fleischer. She originally appeared in the '' Talkartoon'' and ''Betty Boop'' film series, which were produced by Fleischer Studios and released by Paramount Pic ...

with a New Wave wardrobe" and whose

Mae West Mary Jane "Mae" West (August 17, 1893 – November 22, 1980) was an American actress, singer, comedian, screenwriter, and playwright whose career spanned more than seven decades. Recognized as a prominent sex symbol of her time, she was known ...

-like voice was supplied by Cruikshank; and robot Rollo. They progress through the Quackadero, a

Coney Island Coney Island is a neighborhood and entertainment area in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is bounded by Brighton Beach to its east, Lower New York Bay to the south and west, and Gravesend to ...

-esque sideshow with such attractions as the Hall of Time Mirrors, which depict the viewer as he or she will look in "old age" or "100 years from now"; the Roll Back Time Machine, in which Rollo watches a skyscraper's life running backward; the Think-o-Blink Machine, which illustrates one's thoughts; the

game show A game show (or gameshow) is a genre of broadcast viewing entertainment where contestants compete in a game for rewards. The shows are typically directed by a game show host, host, who explains the rules of the program as well as commentating a ...

-like act "Your Shining Moment"; Madame Xano's, where the audience can see last night's dreams; and the Time Holes, in which one can lean on a railing and see a live slice of three million years ago unfold. Having found themselves unable to tolerate Quasi's rude behavior any further, Anita and Rollo quickly come up with a plan to permanently get rid of him using the Time Hole, which no one can escape from after falling into. Anita distracts Quasi with a chocolate cake and places it slightly over the railing for him to try to reach. Rollo is then given the signal by her to push Quasi into the Time Hole, sending him back to the year 3,000,000 BC. Now forever trapped in prehistoric times, Quasi is last seen eating a slice of watermelon until he is forced to run away from an odd-looking creature.

Production

Animator

, while a graduate student at the

San Francisco Art Institute San Francisco Art Institute (SFAI) was a Private college, private art school, college of contemporary art in San Francisco, California. Founded in 1871, SFAI was one of the oldest art schools in the United States and the oldest west of the Mis ...

, in

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

, created the

''Chow Fun'' (1972), editing it at the city's Snazelle Films, a commercial-film company that also rented space and film equipment. This led to Cruikshank being hired there, and becoming head of animation by the end of summer 1972. While working at Snazelle, Cruikshank developed ''Quasi at the Quackadero'', her best-known work. Initially given

working title A working title is a preliminary name for a product or project. The usage is especially common in film and TV, gaming, music and publishing. It is often styled in trade publications as (wt) and is synonymous with production title and tentative ...

s that included ''I Walked with a Duck'', ''Hold That Quasi'', and ''Quasi Quacks Up'', the 10-minute, 35mm short, with 100 watercolor backgrounds and approximately 5,000 cels, took two years for Cruikshank to draw, followed by four months for photography and

post-production Post-production, also known simply as post, is part of the process of filmmaking, video production, audio production, and photography. Post-production includes all stages of production occurring after principal photography or recording indivi ...

. Cruikshank independently financedCounts, p. 44 the $6,000 budget, which went primarily for cel painting,

sound recording Sound recording and reproduction is the electrical, Mechanical system, mechanical, electronic, or digital inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of ...

and lab and camera work. Underground cartoonist

, then Cruikshank's boyfriend, did much of the inking, using dip pen and

rapidograph Rotring (stylized rOtring) is a manufacturer of technical drawing tools and writing implements. Established in Germany in 1928 as a fountain pen manufacturer, Rotring went on to be acquired by Newell Brands in 1998. The name "Rotring" directly ...

, with Kathryn Lenihan doing most of the cel painting.Counts, p. 42 The music, by

Bob Armstrong Joseph Melton James (October 3, 1939 – August 27, 2020) was an American professional wrestler, better known by his ring name, "Bullet" Bob Armstrong. In the course of his career, which spanned five decades, Armstrong held numerous championsh ...

and Al Dodge, of the

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Anglo-Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland, Cali ...

band the Cheap Suit Serenaders, used slide flute, xylophone, ukulele, duck call, boat whistle and bagpipe to create what Cruikshank called the "strange, gallopy feeling" of 1920s/1930s dance-band music, of which she is a devotee.Counts, p. 45

Reception and legacy

''Quasi at the Quackadero'' won awards and was shown at the Los Angeles Film Exposition, and made its first theatrical booking at the Northside Theater in Berkeley, not far from Cruikshank's home at the time at 1890 Arch Street in that city. In 1994, ''Quasi at the Quackadero'' was voted #46 of the 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field. In 2008, a portion of it appeared in the opening credits of the

direct-to-DVD Direct-to-video or straight-to-video refers to the release of a film, television series, short or special to the public immediately on home video formats rather than an initial theatrical release or television premiere. This distribution strateg ...

animated feature '' Futurama: Bender's Game''. In 2009, it was selected for preservation in the United States

by the

.Biography for Sally Cruikshank, TCM.com
/ref>

References

External links

* *{{YouTube, dH7LcVNusQE, View film (uploaded by Cruikshank)
Quasi's Big Day
1975 animated short films 1975 films 1970s American animated films 1975 comedy films American animated short films American comedy short films American animated comedy films United States National Film Registry films 1970s English-language films Animated films about ducks American independent films English-language comedy short films

Plot

Production

Reception and legacy

See also

References

External links