Daffy Duck

▪ cartoon character

      cartoon character, a gangly, black-feathered duck whose explosive temperament and insatiable ego lead him into an endless series of comic misadventures. He is a cornerstone of the Warner Bros. stable of animated characters.

      Daffy first appeared in director Tex Avery's (Avery, Tex) and animator Bob Clampett (Clampett, Robert)'s short Porky's Duck Hunt (1937). In his early days he was a hyperactive, at times silly, character whose madcap capers were fueled by an unpredictable personality. His frequent sidekick was the bashful and stammering Porky Pig. Daffy's own manner of expression included a prominent lisp often accompanied by the expelling of saliva.

      By the 1950s Daffy was struggling to reclaim the spotlight from Bugs Bunny, who had become the leading Warner Brothers character. Led by Chuck Jones (Jones, Chuck), the directors of this era brought out a darker side of Daffy's personality, showing him as desperately self-glorifying and consumed by jealousy—though also more introspective. Perhaps the defining moment for this interpretation was Jones's Duck Amuck (1953), in which an omnipotent animator torments Daffy by shuffling him between quickly changing backgrounds, dropping props in and out of the scene, and even briefly erasing him. The culprit turns out to be none other than Bugs Bunny himself.

      Daffy remained a staple of the Warner Bros. franchise, including the 1980s television series The Bugs Bunny and Tweety Show and the 1996 feature film Space Jam. From his first appearance through 1989, Daffy Duck was performed by famed voice actor Mel Blanc (Blanc, Mel). In later years he was voiced by a number of actors, notably Joe Alaskey and Jeff Bennett.

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