Post by @fvctum

Directed by Tex Avery and Michael Lah, Cellbound is a classic MGM animated short released in 1955 and set inside the hilariously named "Sing Song Prison," a parody of New York's real Sing Sing prison. The roughly 6-minute cartoon follows Spike, a prisoner serving an absurd 500-year sentence, who has spent 20 years secretly digging an escape tunnel using nothing more than a teaspoon. In typical Tex Avery fashion, the joke is pushed to ridiculous extremes, with Spike claiming to have removed 6,500,004,385,632 spoonfuls of dirt by the time his tunnel is finally finished. After finally escaping, Spike makes the unfortunate decision to hide inside an empty television set, only for that exact TV to be purchased as an anniversary present by the prison warden. With the warden sitting directly in front of the screen, Spike has to pretend the television actually works to avoid being discovered. Every time the channel changes, he frantically changes costumes and performs the program himself, becoming characters in a Western, a boxing match and a musical performance. When the warden wants horse racing, Spike simply creates fake rain and announces that the races have been cancelled. Beyond the ridiculous premise, Cellbound is an interesting piece of animation history because it became Tex Avery's final cartoon as a director at MGM. Avery and Lah co-directed the short, with Heck Allen writing the story and legendary MGM composer Scott Bradley providing the music. It also cleverly satirized television, which was rapidly transtorming American entertainment during the 1950s. Spike ultimately tries desperately to escape the television situation, only to wind up right back inside the set at the warden's home, where realizing he will have to perform everything again sends him into a complete breakdown. It was a fittingly chaotic ending to one of Avery's last pieces of MGM-era cartoon madness. #cartoons