Glen Keane Sells Dog Food

This is a new one on me: Glen Keane animated a Burger ‘n Bones dog food commercial ca. 1983. Wow!

The commercial was produced by Kurtz & Friends, and the jingle was recorded by Leon Redbone, who was well known for his rendition of the Mercer/Carmichael song “Lazy Bones”.

Keane’s expressive and inventive animation steals the show. Can anybody think of any piece of commercial character animation today that’s as competently drawn or fun to watch as this? I sure as heck can’t. Some parts of the spot seem unnecessarily complicated–the moving camera at the beginning, the design of the dog–but perhaps those were intended to add some flash and glitz to what is essentially a simple, character-oriented piece of animation.

(Kudos to Michael Ruocco for discovering this on YouTube)