Mickey's a Hit

So much has been written about Steamboat Willie that I am loath to say much about it on this blog. Mind you, I said that the last time I briefly posted in 2018 about its debut.

However, I came across a 1928 clipping from Kansas City where, I’m sure you know, Disney and a slew of people involved in animation came from. It’s about a showing at the Madrid Theatre at 38th and Main.

Ads for the Madrid in the Kansas City Star for the week ending Saturday, December 1 don’t mention any cartoon at all (with the exception of a Fable shown on the Monday). The newspaper did publish an article about it on December 2. The name of the cartoon isn’t given, so I can only guess it is Steamboat Willie. The story is not bylined.

A Madrid theater audience last week was entertained with a well-appreciated although unadvertised short subject from the Walter Disney studios. It was an animated and synchronized cartoon, “Mickey Mouse,” and marked the entrance of three Kansas City men—Mr. Disney, Carl W. Stalling and H. O. Wheeler—into the synchronized animated cartoon field.
Synchronization of such a subject differs from that of a legitimate movie. All the cartoons must be drawn and photographed, the score written, and then the accompanying music played by an orchestra and recorded. In the case of “Mickey Mouse,” the picture was made in Hollywood and the music recorded in New York. The score was written by Mr. Stalling, who also directed the orchestra. Mr. Wheeler assisted in the arrangement of the music.
Trade papers have given the Disney synchronized cartoons most flattering reviews. The Disney studios are synchronizing on the Powers Cinephone, but the records are made on both film and record and are interchangeable with Phototone, Movietone and Vitaphone.

If I have to explain who Carl Stalling is, you are reading the wrong blog. Henry O. (Harry) Wheeler died in Kansas City in 1940. He was a music teacher and band leader there for decades and, at one time, the arranger for the Newman Theatre Orchestra, the theatre where Disney drew the animated Laugh-O-Grams before going west.

Considering the torrents of publicity Mickey Mouse, Walt Disney and his studio have flooded the public with over the generations, it’s surprising to see very little talk about them in the studio’s early months. Unfortunately, newspapers then didn’t always list the cartoons they were showing. And some haven’t been scanned well to show the correct text on-line.

The Mark Strand Theatre at Fulton and Rockwell in Brooklyn (“The House of Talkies”) showed Mickey Mouse cartoons toward the end of 1928 and into 1929. Newspaper theatre stories conflict but it would seem Steamboat Willie played a week starting on December 29, 1928, with The Gallopin' Gaucho appearing on screens beginning January 12, 1929.

There are some reviews. Willie was advertised with the Warners all-talking On Trial starting January 13, 1929 at the Fabian (“The House of Sound Talking Pictures”) in Paterson, New Jersey. The Morning Call of January 18 had this to say:

One of the latest novelties that has been produced with sound accompaniment is a Walt Disney cartoon, making this individual subject the most popular subject on the program. It is the first time since the sound motion pictures have been at the Fabian that great applause has greeted any one subject.

The Wilmington, Delaware Every Evening of January 29, 1929 simply said “Sound has been added to comedy cartoons and in ‘Steamboat Willie’ now at the Aldine, there are many original laughs.”

The Buffalo Times of Feb. 4, 1929 announced it was being shown with the H.B. Warner-Louise Fazenda “100% Talking Picture” at the Great Lakes Theatre (another Warners house). Its review:

One of the outstanding features on the bill is a cartoon, “Mickey Mouse,” in sound. The ink comedies that always drew laughs before the advent of sound pictures, now throw the audiences into a paroxysm of mirth with such incidents as a mouse “razzing” a cat, and a goat who swallowed a sheet of music, singing “Turkey in the Straw.” It is as entertaining as it is unique.

With favourable comments like these and theatres in early 1929, perhaps reluctantly, realising sound pictures were here to stay, is it any wonder that the Fleischers started production on the Screen Songs, both Oswald the rabbit (Lantz, sound was announced in Exhibitors Daily Review on Nov. 19, 1928) and Krazy Kat (Mintz) began making noise, and Van Beuren added music and effects to the Aesop’s Fables in May (against the wishes of Paul Terry, who was fired).

Recently, Steamboat Willie itself has taken a back seat to all the chatter about going into the public domain, but it’s not only a significant cartoon in the history of animation, I think it’s still a fun one.

Cat Fight

Animators will use ghost images, multiples or airbrush strokes to indicate speed in cartoons.

In Ub Iwerks’ ComiColor short The Brementown Musicians (1935), an uncredited animator uses lines to show speed as a cat attacks one of the robbers in his home. Here are some random frames. The drawings are shot on two frames.



Only Iwerks and composer Carl Stalling receive screen credit on this short, distributed on a state’s rights basis.

Singing Weenies

Everybody sings in the Krazy Kat cartoon Weenie Roast (1931).

The cartoon opens with Krazy and his Minnie Mouse-knockoff girl-friend happily singing “By the Sea.”



Cut to the fire on the beach. It blows on some horns and dances.



The weenies over the fire unite in song.



The sun gets in some beh-beh-beh scatting.



The fire jumps over the weenie rope.



Cut to a fish plucking Minnie’s legs like a string instrument.



This is an inventive cartoon (certainly compared with the Columbia cartoons toward the end of the decade) with Ben Harrison getting the story credit and Manny Gould the sole animation credit.

Was There A TV Show He Didn't Do?

Do you remember watching Local 306 (1976) on TV? Or People Like Us (same year)? Or The Crime Club (1975)? Or The Corner Bar (1972, 73)?

They all have something in common. They all either starred, or featured in the cast, one of television’s most recognisable character actors of the decade—Eugene Roche.

I wouldn’t want to start to list even a tenth of his appearances on television or movies. He was everywhere. He did so many things, that the May 7, 1986 TV listings for where I live have him on the movie Pigs Vs. Freaks (1980) on one channel and Corey: For the People (1977) on another at the same time. I’m sure someone’s reading this post and shouting “Don’t forget about....”

Yeah, I know. You could be shouting “Don’t forget” for a long time, though likely not about his appearance on “The Theatre and the Devil” on The Catholic Hour in 1961.

He was so much in demand that, in 1963, he played three roles in the comedy The Time of the Barracudas opposite Elaine Stritch and Laurence Harvey at the Curran Theatre in San Francisco.

Given his ubiquity someone, somewhere, must have interviewed him.

First, we found a short bio after he returned to the West Coast in 1955. Wrote Anita Garrett in the Vallejo News-Chronicle on Aug. 29 that year:

NEXT TO STAR in our series of “Local Boy Makes Good” is Eugene Roche, son of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Roche of 229 Hermosa street. He has the leading role in the play, "Girl on the Via Flaminia,” which opened recently at the Marine Memorial Theater in San Francisco. No doubt many Vallejoans will recall Eugene, for he spent his vacations here with his parents and worked during the Summer at Kaiser Foundation where his father is business manager.
The rest of the year he attended Emerson College in Boston, where he majored in drama. He has played leading roles in the Red Barn Playhouse, Westboro, Mass., and the Casino Theater in Newport R.I. However, the current play is his first professional lead and his first performance for the Actor’s Workshop.
The play is Alfred Hayes’ touching drama of an American love affair with an Italian girl during World War II. Eugene is cast as Robert, an American non-commissioned officer, described by R. H. Hagan, San Francisco drama critic, as "a kind of nondescript Kilroy.” Playing the opposite lead is Priscilla Pointer, a former Conover model, who takes the part of Lisa, an Italian girl. She is also son to be featured in the forthcoming "China Jones” series on television.
CRITICS RATED the acting in the production as “first rate,” and again we quote Hagan, “The acting is a magnificent example of how domestic talent can disprove the myth of Broadway superiority.” However, Hagan was not quite so enthusiastic about the play itself, which was adapted from a book, never, he says, a completely happy vehicle for the stage.
Recently Mr. and Mrs. Roche had the thrill of hearing their son interviewed over the radio. He was asked how he, a relative newcomer, was awarded the leading role. Modestly Robert told them that he was one of a number of candidates who tried out, and he had the good fortune to be chosen by the director as the type required. He was also interviewed over television, but his parents did not learn of it until later, so missed seeing him.

It turns out an entertainment columnist DID interview him. We found this feature story by Don Lechman in the April 15, 1979 edition of The Daily Breeze of Torrence, Cal. He was asked about being an ever-present but relatively unknown actor.

Roche: Acting means a lot
Eugene Roche and Ted Bessell recently made a television pilot, "Good Time Harry," for showing later this year on NBC.
Everyone remembers Bessell from "'That Girl" (Marlo Thomas), but does anyone recognize the name Eugene Roche? I bet you would know him if you saw his craggily handsome Irish face on the beefy frame. You should.
He played the Wright brothers' father in TV's recent "The Winds of Kitty Hawk" and also starred in "The Child Stealer" about a father who abducts his hown [sic] kids. Soon he will be in another television film, "Hart to Hart," with Robert Wagner.
His first motion picture was "Splendor in the Grass," and his most recent are "Foul Play," and “The Late Show."
Roche is one of a group of actors—like Jack Elam, Pat Hingle, Henry Jones, Strother Martin and Denver Pyle—who have been playing character parts for so long that they're supporting stars now. And all of them are instantly recognizable by face if not by name.
Does Roche object to such shadowy fame?
Hardly, he says. "I’ve really enjoyed it (being a character actor.) I've had a good time."
And, he indicated, he's very proud of being an ‘actor.’
"The word 'actor' is misunderstood," Roche said. "Anyone is called an actor who's said one or two lines. The immediate reponse [sic] is 'How do you like being an actor?’ It really gripes me," he laughed. "I've done about 130 plays (in addition to decades of TV and movies.) And, actually, the work is just as hard here (on TV) as it was there (on stage). I have to prepare a lot at night, and we don't have the luxury of rehearsal."
In "Good Time Harry," he plays a sports editor to Bessell's sports reporter, a guy who is terrific when he can be bailed out of trouble long enough to write a story.
It may not sound too original, but "it's organic type of comedy," Gene says, "not just one joke after another.”
Roche, who was born in New England, moved to California when he was 16 and returned to the East to attend college where he met his future wife, Marjory.
And now they have nine kids. Nine kids?
"I wouldn't have missed that" (having, those children), Roche sighed. “I would've missed everything else except those kids."
Ranging in age from 24 to 7 and having names infused with a little bit of Ireland are Jamie, a medical student in Rome; Sean and Chad, actors in Hollywood; Tara, a student at Loyola Marymount in Los and Megan, Brogan, Liam, Eamon and Caitlin, still living at home—Los Angeles or the Catskills in New York, depending on their dad's assignment.
And Gene Roche still has time to act?

Nine kids? No wonder he didn’t star in Eight is Enough (Insert laugh track here. That one needs help).

Roche’s steady and lengthy body of work made him an appropriate person for an obituary in the popular press. Here is part of the Los Angeles Times’ memorial, published Aug. 2, 2004.

Eugene Roche, 75, Character Actor in Films, Television
By Myrna Oliver
Times Staff Writer
Eugene Roche, a character actor remembered for roles such as the offbeat detective Luther Gillis in “Magnum, P.I.,” Squeaky Clean of Ajax commercials and an ill-fated prisoner of war in the classic 1972 film “Slaughterhouse Five” has died. He was 75.
Roche died Wednesday in an Encino hospital after suffering two heart attacks. He lived in Sherman Oaks.
With a face more familiar than his name, Roche worked steadily for more than four decades. He began his career as a teenager, voicing characters on radio in his native Boston, served in the Army, then studied drama at Emerson College. Devoting himself to acting, he honed his talents in small theaters in San Francisco.
Roche made his Broadway debut in “Blood, Sweat and Stanley Poole” in 1961. He continued to play stage roles until late in his life, appearing at the Geffen Playhouse in “Merton at the Movies: in 1999 and at San Francisco’s Theater on the Square in Carroll O’Connor’s “A Certain Labor Day” in 1997.
Adept at both comedy and drama, Roche made his film debut in 1961, playing a private detective in “Slendor in the Grass.” In the film “Slaughterhouse Five,” based on the wartime fantasy novel of Kurt Vonnegut, Roche portrayed the likable POW Edgar Derby, who reverently plucked an intact porcelain figurine from the ruins of Dresden only to be executed by his German captors for looting.
But the puckish Roche gained his widest fame on television. He became a household face in the 1970s when as Squeaky Clean, he made kitchens sparkle in commercials for Ajax household cleaner.
Through the 1970s he became Archie Bunker’s neighborhood nemesis on “All in the Family,” and the sly attorney Ronald Mallu on the sitcom “Soap.” In the 1980s he portrayed curmudgeonly Luther Gillis, trying to teach upstart Tom Selleck the old- school sleuthing ropes in `Magnum, P.I.,” the lovable landlord Bill Parker on “Webster,” and newspaper editor Harry Burns in “Perfect Strangers.”
Roche often earned critical claim for running parts in sitcoms fated for quick demise. He played Julie Andrews’ on-screen television producer in the short-lived “Julie” in 1992, and in 1990 portrayed Lenny Clarke’s father in “Lenny.” In 1987 he took on the role of the retired founder of a public relations firm considering hiring George Segal in “Take Five.”
“Roche is marvelous as the tough-minded businessman who makes no bones about wanting to hire someone to run the firm without letting his son know he isn’t in charge,” The Times’ Lee Margulies wrote, while predicting the series would fail. “Unfortunately, Roche isn’t a regular.”

When he showed up on Soap, I was quite happy. He was the only actor on the show I recognised and thought “He’s finally getting a regular role.”

As you can see, it’s a wonder he had the time for it.

The Ubiquitous Anvil

Anvils. What would cartoons be without them?

There’s one in Screwy Truant (1945), directed by noted anvil enthusiast Tex Avery. First, Screwy Squirrel pounds Meathead’s nose on one.



The anvil returns after a nose gag as Screwy (off-screen) has developed super squirrel strength and tosses it through the air at Meathead. Here’s one frame of the take.



Meathead runs away. In one drawing (on one frame) the anvil actually goes past his head. The action is so fast, you don’t notice. I’ve seen this before in impact drawings in other cartoons.



And now the gag.



Preston Blair, Ed Love and Ray Abrams are the credited animators.

Has anyone reading this seen a real anvil? I don’t mean in a museum. It isn’t like there are blacksmith shops or livery stables around today.

Milking a Gag

Something to watch for in Friz Freleng cartoons, besides the comedy and timing, are the subtle expressions and hand/finger movements.

See how the kitten is handled in this part of Kit For Kat (1948). Elmer Fudd can only keep one animal and has to choose between Sylvester and the kitten. Sylvester tries all kinds of things to make Fudd angry at the kitten, but they fall apart. In one segment, Sylvester breaks a milk bottle in the kitchen, then waits for Fudd to come in and see what happened.



Instead of being angry, sympathetic Fudd feels the kitten is hungry and considerately gives the little thing some milk. The innocent kitten leaps for joy. See the expressions.



Cut to the frustrated Sylvester, who realises he screwed up.



Fudd also offers the kitten “some delicious cheese, and hamburger, and pickled herring, and smoked barracuda.” The absurd dialogue must be from Mike Maltese.

Paul Julian provides some wonderful backgrounds, with highlights and shadows. Note the bare light bulb in Elmer's kitchen.

This is one of those cartoons that opens with a garbage can/cafeteria scene, with a cat using a garbage can lid as a tray.

Tralfaz Sunday Theatre: Once Upon a Time

“The business of America is business,” newly-elected president Calvin Coolidge is quoted as saying about 100 years ago. Certainly business believed that. And likely still does.

After the Second World War, the great paranoia of America was Communism. To business, Communism meant the government ran everything, not business. Government interference was bad for business. This sentiment found its way into propaganda cartoons produced by John Suthlerland Productions for Harding College. Its message slips through the Industry On Parade TV series given free to stations by the Manufacturers Association of America.

We’ve found another example in a mainly animated short produced as a “public service” for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 1965 by the Calvin Company. Industry On Parade spoke of “wise government spending.” This one is more pointed, criticising government agencies for the “problems” they’ve caused businesses in the U.S. It favours “essential regulation,” no doubt meaning regulation that favoured increased company profits.

The Sutherland cartoons featured interesting designs and solid animation. This one is a little lacklustre and stiff, I’m afraid. Its main attraction is the work of Mel Blanc, who is the only person who gets a screen credit. The King’s voice has more than a slight resemblance to Cosmo Spacely, including, in jowly manner, the immortal words “You’re fired!”.

There’s no indication who was responsible for the animation. A background drawing, appropriate for a cartoon, shows one of the businesses is named “Acme Firewood.” The building next to it is “Jones Wood.” It’s probably just a coincidence, but it would be neat if this “illustrated radio” film was honouring you-know-who.

Let's Talk to Rochester

If you listen to any of the Jack Benny radio broadcasts from American military bases, you’ll hear huge cheers for Eddie Anderson.

Soldiers, sailors, marines and air force personnel likely could identify with Rochester. He basically did what he felt like in the Benny home and even got in some one-liners making fun of his boss. They must have dreamed about doing that to their superior officers.

Some people couldn’t see why the character was popular. They couldn’t look past the fact that Rochester was a “servant” and the writers tossed in some black stereotype behaviour. The latter was mainly during the early years. By the time the Benny television show came on the air in 1950, the Benny character treated Rochester about the same as he did his non-black cast (eg. Benny asked Mary Livingstone to answer the phone or the door).

One story in a black newspaper in the eastern U.S. included a column roasting the Rochester character; the paper put a disclaimer on the article, saying it was the opinion of the writer.

Anderson briefly addressed the issue in a feature story in The North West Enterprise, April 26, 1944. The four-page weekly was published by a black fraternal group in Seattle.

BACK STAGE WITH ‘ROCHESTER’
By John L. (Jack) Blount
It isn’t every celebrity that wants to be interviewed and “pawed over”—just to help someone else get his (the celebrity’s) name in print again—and I don’t blame them at all! I rather sympathize with them. Isn’t it enough to spend days and months (and maybe more) in preparation for the benefit or entertainment, or pleasure of Mr. and Mrs. Public—without having to dig up and rehash all the facts in the case—plus the history of your great-grandfather’s life. If you have done your job well, and they like it, the public will know all about it!
And so I don’t blame Eddie (Rochester) Anderson when, Sunday night in Vancouver, B. C., he was reluctant to talk about himself. He seemed to prefer to talk about Jack Benny, whom (the company) all love as a big good natured brother.
But I had gone all the way from Bremerton, Wash., U. S. A., up to Vancouver, B. C. (I just learned about that “U. S. A.” part after getting outside for about 48 hours)—with a kind of triple purpose in view: To see “Rochester” on some private business, and then to see Rochester on some public business, and finally, just to see Rochester! You see, I had promised some friends on two big Seattle papers that I would bring back a “story” if they would get me a pass to the big Jack Benny broadcast in Vancouver—and so-o-o-o
And now about Rochester. He is really a “humdinger” (if you can understand my language)—and he has got idea of his own-with dignity, poise and self-confidence.
Sunday afternoon out at Hastings Park I buttonholed him, backstage, sometime near the end of the big broadcast, after he had “gone on” and set nearly 10,000 people on their left ears gasping for breath. Of course I buttonholed him by appointment, and so, after meeting most of the company and Jack Benny himself, I got down to business, the private talk part, and Rochester obligingly promised to do what I asked in the way of helping me with a certain project. Then, to complete the visit, I switched the talk to the other thing: Rochester’s start and climax to fame. I wanted to know when and how he did it and hinted that I wanted to write something about it.
He “smelled a mouse” right away and faltered.

“Look here,” he warned me. “A lot of newspaper people have got the wrong idea about Negro actors and players.” (He referred to the Negro press).
“And although they are not hurting me at all, I hate to see them gum up the works for young actors coming on by trying to be “all holy” and [“]exacting in their criticisms.”
He went on to say that the pleasure-seeking and theatre-going public liked the portrayals and it liked fun and laughter, and if it takes a dice game to give them this then a dice game must be included in the “picture.” He further hinted at an “overdose of race-consciousness[”] on the part of the critics. He finally put me off on the matter of how and when he had started.
“Come on backstage again tonight,” he told me, “when we will entertain the service man and their families.”
You can bet I was there—although I had to drag Rochester back into a dark corner to escape autograph fans—boys and girls, men and women, everybody.
He said that he had been with Jack Benny since Easter seven years ago. He had been given an audition for the selection of a character of “Train Porter.” He had scored and then applied himself in earnest to the role, and all future roles—all of which has resulted in Eddie (Rochester) Anderson attaining something close to “stellar attraction” in the Jack Benny broadcasts and pictures.
I wasn’t satisfied with the brevity of the interview—but he promised more when the “Jack Benny Company and Rochester” come to the Puget Sound Navy Yard soon. Of course, I wanted to ask some of the other members of the company about Rochester to get another angle, but I did not want the answer favorable “for my benefit.”
However—they didn’t wait. They had seen me backstage talking with him and some of them came to me while Rochester was “out front.” He was praised, and I was told that he “tops” with every last one of them!
Also—none of them failed to mention how “lovely” Jack Benny is.
And about the Jack Benny broadcast and show in Vancouver: well, that’s not my subject—but it couldn’t be beat anywhere—anytime!

Regretfully, it doesn’t appear the columnist wrote a follow-up story.

Benny knew listeners loved Rochester. You don’t hear a whole scene at the start of the radio show handed solely to Mary Livingstone, Dennis Day or Phil Harris. But you do with Rochester, in later years in dialogue with fine actor Roy Glenn. Eddie Anderson was trusted by Jack to deliver laughs. And he did, time and time again.