Hare-Abian Nights

Hare-Abian Nights is a 1959 Merrie Melodies cartoon starring Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam. The cartoon, directed by Ken Harris of Chuck Jones' unit at Warner Bros. Cartoons, was animated by Harris and Ben Washam, and recycles footage from Bully For Bugs, Water, Water Every Hare, and Sahara Hare. Hare-Abian Nights is a pun on Arabian Nights. Hare-Abian Nights is the only short in the Golden Age of American animation starring Yosemite Sam not directed by Friz Freleng or a member of Freleng's unit, although sequences from a Freleng cartoon are used in this short.

Plot
In a send-up of the "gong show" set in an Arabian palace (similar to the gong show in I Love to Singa), the short opens with a band Timbuk Two Plus 3 playing Sweet Georgia Brown trying to entertain the sultan, with the performance ending with the floor being dropped out from under them, sending the band into a crocodile pit below. Next, an Elvis-like musician scared by the fate of Timbuk Two performs a send-up of Hound Dog, Hound Camel, before meeting the same fate as Timbuk Two. Following that, Bugs, intending to travel to Perth Amboy but having missed a left turn at Des Moines, ends up in front of other prospective performers and is ordered to entertain the sultan. Assigned the role of "Teller of Tales", Bugs proceeds to tell his tale of how he ended up in the palace. Flashing back to 1953's Bully for Bugs, Bugs recounts his problems with the bull he met there while trying to find the Coachella Valley, and Bugs' outsmarting the bull with a hidden anvil. The sultan is prepared to press the button to send Bugs into the pit, but then Bugs recounts his experiences with Rudolph the monster in 1952's Water, Water Every Hare, where Bugs impersonates a hairdresser to outsmart Rudolph. Bugs also recounts his encounter with Yosemite Sam in the Sahara Desert in 1955's Sahara Hare, referring to Sam as "the stupidest character of them all", while recounting Sam's unsuccessful attempts to enter a desert fort. At this point, while Bugs is chuckling at Yosemite Sam's misfortunes in Sahara Hare, the sultan, who turns out to be none other than Yosemite Sam himself, tries to press the button to drop Bugs, only to find that Bugs has shut off the master switch, frustrating Sam. When Yosemite Sam tries to find out what is wrong, Bugs resets the master switch, dropping Sam into the crocodile pit, from which he escapes, but not before one of the crocodiles also escapes, sending Sam running off. Bugs, now dressed with turbans covering each ear, describes Sam's act as a "don't call us, we'll call you" act, along with some other remarks as the camera irises out.

Credits
Directed by: Ken Harris

Produced by: John Burton (uncredited)

Story by: Michael Maltese

Voices by: Mel Blanc

Music by: Milt Franklyn

Animation by: Ken Harris and Ben Washam

Layouts by: Samuel Armstrong

Backgrounds by: Phillip DeGuard

Studio: Warner Brothers Cartoons

Distributed by: Warner Brothers Pictures and Vitaphone Company

Release dates(s): February 28, 1959

Color Process: Technicolor

Running time: 6 minutes 56 seconds

Preceded by: Baton Bunny

Followed by: Apes of Wrath