Tralfaz Sunday Theatre: The Light in Your Life

One of the busiest industrial studios in the 1940s and ’50s gets no notice from animation fans today. It was Raphael G. Wolff studio at 1714 North Wilton Place, not all that far from the old Warner Bros. cartoon studio. For a time Earl Klein was Wolff’s art director after leaving the Chuck Jones unit and the musical director was a chap named Hoyt Curtin.

Ray Wolff was an advertising photographer from Chicago who came to Hollywood and opened a photographic business in 1937. He somehow expanded into advertising films. His studio made hundreds of shorts for businesses. Some included animated portions. One (of many) of them was made for General Electric in 1949 and called The Light in Your Life.

Business Screen magazine devoted two pages of its May 5, 1949 edition to this film (“Thirty types of lamps are featured,” we’re told). It would appear G.E. (who would later use Mr. Magoo as its spokescartoon) wanted to be represented by an animated character like many other businesses of the day and came up with J. Lumen Lightly. He co-stars with nine-year-old Eilene Janssen, an MGM contract player who was crowned Little Miss America of 1948. She later recalled G.E. sent her on tour with the film along with her mother, her pianist and her marimba. Eilene continued acting until 1980 (she had a recurring role on The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet on TV). I can’t tell you who is playing the Cliff Arquette-ish Lightly. I thought it might be Earle Ross.

The story owes something to Alice in Wonderland and, to a small extent, Tom and Jerry cartoons where the black housekeeper is seen from neck down. Jonathan Boeschen located the print below on-line.

There’s virtually no biographical material about Wolff on-line. An obituary article was written in the South Pasadena Review of Monday, February 21, 1972. Oddly, it doesn’t make a direct mention of his career in industrial films; it focuses on art instead. And it avoids mentioning he was six-foot-five.

Raphael Wolff Died. Funeral Held Feb. 16
Funeral services for Raphael G. Wolff, Sr., well-known Southern California artist, were held at the Wee Kirk O’ The Heather, Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Wednesday noon, Feb. 16. Interment Forest Lawn, Glendale.
Wolff was born in St. Louis, Mo., June 3, 1901. He was a sickly boy and, at the age of 14, was given only one year to live. With this in mind and to enjoy that short period of time, he and a friend went to the head waters of the Missouri and floated down of the Gulf of Mexico. [Note: Wolff was 22 and with two other friends according to contemporary newspaper reports).
Later, with his health restored, Wolff came to California and became a noted photographer for advertising, eventually entering the scenic art field, doing backgrounds for television advertising spots. At one time, his studio employed 85 artists.
Ray’s father was a noted artist around the turn of the century, but the son didn’t follow in his father’s footsteps.
About ten years ago, Wolff sold his studio and business, and began the study of art, painting with oil colors. He developed rapidly and soon was taken into many of the leading art groups. He was a member of the California Art Club, the Valley Artists Guild, the San Gabriel Fine Arts Association, and just recently was voted a member of the Artists of the Southwest, Inc. He had been active in the Business Men’s Art Institute and had served on its board of directors. He had won many ribbons and honors.
Ray was a member of the William D. Stephens Masonic Lodge No. 698, F. and A.M. and the Masonic Press Club, Los Angeles.