[2] When the cartoon animators/directors Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising left producer Leon Schlesinger in 1933, they took their main creation, Bosko, with them to Metro-Goldwyn Mayer.
Among the staff Schlesinger had accrued was Tom Palmer, a former Disney animator who was appointed director of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies.
Brown even receiving credits for directing two Merrie Melodies shorts) and began to search for new directors to effectively keep the Schlesinger studio afloat.
Schlesinger tasked the two with creating new characters to replace the sterile Buddy, and the two created a group of anthropomorphic animals to show to Schlesinger, which included Beans, a mischievous cat, Little Kitty, a female cat and Beans' love interest, twin puppies named Ham and Ex, Oliver Owl, a stubborn, spectacled owl, and Porky, a stuttering pig.
Beans and his friends made their first appearances on I Haven't Got a Hat, a Merrie Melodies animated short directed by Freleng.
Michael Barrier describes Beans under King's direction as resembling the Mickey Mouse version of the early 1930s.
But in characterization Beans was a pint-sized hero, resembling the plucky, boyish, and heroic Mickey featured in The Klondike Kid (1932) and The Mail Pilot (1933).
Avery got exclusive use of four animators for his unit: Bob Clampett, Chuck Jones, Sid Sutherland, and Virgil Ross.
It was to be the last animated short featuring either Beans or the rest of the cast of I Haven't Got a Hat, with the exception of Porky Pig.
[3] Barrier suggests that Leon Schlesinger may have been giving Avery a vote of confidence, when deciding to keep only Porky as a continuing character and to drop Beans.
[3] In 1937 and 1938, Schlesinger's studio began creating various potential replacements for Beans, producing characters such as Gabby Goat, Petunia Pig, Daffy Duck and a little white hare.