Out of the Inkwell Films

“Tramp, Tramp, Tramp the Boys Are Marching” features a song that dates back to the Civil War, one which was still familiar to audiences of the 1920s. The cartoon begins as Koko the Clown emerges from an inkwell-- an iconic image for animation buffs --and then steps over to a chalkboard to draw an orchestra. The band, “Koko's Glee Club,” marches to a nearby cinema (accompanied by a dog who beats cymbals with his tail) where they lead the audience in the title song.

Max and Dave Fliescher are eating hot dogs in their animation studio and begin drawing. The hot dog becomes a "real" dog, and it and Ko-Ko the Clown alarmingly end up inside a Gas Chamber.

This fascinating series features Max himself, filmed in live action, sitting at a drawing board and concocting adventures for his star performer Ko-Ko the Clown. Max is supposedly the guy in charge, and he takes sadistic glee in putting Ko-Ko through various forms of hell, but the clown usually fights back and sometimes gets the best of his Uncle Max. FADEAWAY elevates this charged relationship to new heights (or depths?) of nightmarish surrealism; it's also one of the most enjoyable Inkwell cartoons I've seen to date, packing lots of imaginative, unpredictable twists and turns into an eight minute running time.

Koko The Clown continually interrupts an animator, who turns his attention to trapping the clown.

Max and Koko The Clown bet who can blow the biggest soap bubble.

Ko-Ko the Clown is brought to life with a needle and thread.

Koko the clown is sent to the nut house by Max.

Max is moving out of his studio, so Ko-Ko the Inkwell Clown packs up everything in sight (even using a super-charged vacuum cleaner that sucks up the furniture and the moving men).

In this one, Max has run low on ink, so Ko-Ko finishes drawing himself and then heads over to the camera room, where he creates his own characters, a mechanical dancing Dresden doll with whom he falls in love and a couple of automaton musicians. He gets rid of the musicians, but, alas, the projectionist gets oil onto Ko-Ko's soon-to-be bride, melting her.

Max Fleischer is going to a shooting gallery, so he practices on Koko and Fitz, sending them both to Paradise in this slightly erratic but funny cartoon.

The Clown causes trouble for the Cartoonist, and a sculptor using the studio, when he escapes from his backdrop and hides in the wet clay of a bust.

Max has a toothache, and it's up to The Clown and a bespectacled rabbit to pull out the aching tooth.

When a Native American artist sells a selection of his background drawings and original characters to Fleischer, Koko gives the new arrivals a cold reception.

Koko the Clown discovers a machine that can make cartoons.

Ko-Ko and Fitz find that everything in their cartoon world is moving backwards. After entering the real world, they go inside a clock and move the hands backward, causing life all around the city to run in reverse.

Ko-Ko is chased by a cartoony spider while Max deals with a mouse in his office.

Koko likes to join Max and his friends for Thanksgiving dinner. He can, under the condition of screening his films.

Max is taking a railroad trip and pulls out his pen to draw Koko, Fitz and a railroad. Maybe the trip is too bumpy, because nothing works as it is supposed to.

First, Max, in his pyjamas, gets back up and draws an isolated mountain area and puts Koko on top of a steep mountain. "That will keep you busy for the night," says the real-life somewhat nasty cartoonist to his subject. The cartoon really gets wild from that point with guest appearances from Mutt and Jeff, and other "stars" of the day as Koko experiences one adventure after another from the "Cave Of The Winds" to Goliath chasing him all over.

Neighborhood cats come to the tiny Ko-Ko Theatre to watch Ko-Ko and Fitz stage a variety of entertaining acts, from acrobatics to high-diving to statuelike tableaux vivants.