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

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.

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.

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

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

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.

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).

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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 and Koko get mixed up with a live action gypsy fortune teller and then caught up with ghosts and monsters in this, as usual, delightful OUT OF THE INKWELL offering.

A Dave Fleischer Cartoon

Lighting Sketches of US Presidents and world locations.

Ko-Ko the Inkwell Clown and a baby get caught in a hurricane.