Fight Club Popeye

Popeye was invincible after eating spinach, so the Fleischer staff found ways to make it backfire.

In Can You Take It (1934), Popeye leaps into a Fleischer version of the fight club and (non-twisker) punches the guy to his right. The fighters are in a circle and fall like dominoes. But the force of the punch is so strong, Popeye gets knocked down, too.



He punches the guy on his left. Same result.



Finally, Popeye hits on a solution by hitting the wooden floor with his fist. Perspective animation follows.



The music in the background is “You’ve Got to Be a Football Hero,” though there are no footballs in sight. Myron Waldman and Tom Johnson get the rotating screen credits. The cartoon was made when Bonnie Poe was playing Olive Oyl.

The Prude Vs. Tex Avery

Swing Shift Cinderella's fairy godmother waves a wand and TA-DA! Tattered clothes turn into a mink fur.



The Avery wolf flips his lid. See the multiples and brush work.



Avery adds to the take with growing eyes.



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

The Exhibitor concluded “This is an attractive entry that draws a few good laughs, and is generally amusing. GOOD.”

But someone was upset about it, and wrote the Showmen’s Trade Review. The letter was published in the Sept. 1, 1945 edition.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer recently released a cartoon entitled "Swing Shift Cinderella," which most certainly is not suitable for children to see—and I doubt if few adults appreciated it. It is hard to understand how Metro would place the MGM trademark on such a disgusting piece of film.
The story was given over completely to a so-called “wolf” and a strip tease artist wiggling and squirming like a hula dancer. It was anything but entertainment or constructive to the minds of adolescents.
I am a small town operator, managing several central Illinois theatres. We constantly battle whistlers who have been taught by cartoons and features to whistle at a good-looking girl who makes her appearance on the screen. They have been educated by the motion picture industry itself by reason of the fact that often a sequence will show a soldier or possibly a civilian whistling at a girl going down the street, or in a night club, and in various other circumstances. Naturally if the youth sets this on the screen, he feels he has a perfect right to do the same thing because he is "educated" along this line by the pictures.
Often times, in a serious part of the feature, a beautifully dressed girl will make an appearance, and someone will let out a whistle, which kills the effect of the particular scale. We have fought this practice by paying bonuses to ushers who catch a whistler of this type; and of course, he is promptly given a good lecture or, in some cases, asked to leave the theatre. Motion pictures in the making should take these things into consideration; and I am sure that no box-office value would be disturbed by merely leaving out the whistling sequence in any particular picture.
Referring back to the "strip tease" cartoon Metro released—they were and are primarily made and shown for the children, and should in no way be suggestive or downright dirty as was the ease of "Swing Shift Cinderella." Adults, naturally go for cartoons too, but they are not impressed by "cheap dirt" if they have children of their own.
As mentioned above, I am a small town operator and seldom feel the urge for writing suggestions or criticising the efforts of companies who have been very successful and their important executive heads. However, when I look at a cartoon, referred to in this article and when I hear patrons, particularly the bobby-seeks group, whistle and I know that it was promoted by the screen itself, "blow my top" and sit down and write a letter, getting the heated steam out of my system.
Most of my letters are never mailed; and I am not sure I will mail this one. On the other hand. I think I will. Maybe it won't do any good, but at least have the satisfaction of "telling" them a thing or two. "Out of the mouths of babes" sometimes comes a fertile and suggestion.
Samuel T. Traynor
Gm. Mgr.
Bailey Enterprises,
Princeton, Illinois

Mr. Traynor has an unusual definition of the term “strip-tease” as no clothing is even partially removed by Red in this, or any of her cartoons. If the concept of sexual attraction bothered him so much, why did he book the cartoon? It’s not like Red was making her cinematic debut.

Fred Quimby paid no attention to the complaint and Avery made three more films starring Red.

Matrons Need Radio, Too

Something for everyone could be heard on the air during radio’s Golden Era. That included matronly women who flocked to radio studios for some fun and attention.

In New York, Johnny Olson and Dennis James (on TV) hosted audience participation shows featuring (and aimed at) women approaching their golden years. In Los Angeles, the duty was taken on by Tom Breneman.

His Breakfast in Hollywood show on ABC had enough of a following that a movie was made around it in 1946. The show was ripe for parody as well.

John Crosby gave his assessment in his syndicated column of February 18, 1947 (drawing to the right from the Los Angeles Daily News.

RADIO IN REVIEW
By JOHN CROSBY
The Man Who Tries on Ladies’ Hats
Wolcott Gibbs, a parodist of great skill and no mercy, speaks his mind on the art of parody in the preface of his book, "Season in the Sun." "Successful parody," he says, "demands a great many things from the writer: . . . It should contain a certain amount of real criticism of what the author is saying as well as his manner of saying it . . . Real parodies are not written on grotesque books. For one thing it would be superfluous since they are parodies to begin with, and for another there is no particular entertainment in it for the writer, since intelligent criticism prefers to have something rational to criticize."
That is possibly a sensible criterion of parody for literature but it’s rather too austere for radio. If a program had to be rational before it could be parodied, most of Fred Allen's parodies on radio would be ruled out automatically, In fact, if Allen adhered to any such criterion, his choice of material would be so severely limited he'd have difficulty getting through a thirty-nine-week season.
• • •
Fortunately, Allen has devised his own methods of burlesquing the grotesque, methods which are, at least to me, thoroughly satisfying. Not long ago Allen did a parody on Tom Breneman's "Breakfast in Hollywood" (A. B. C. 11 a. m. E. S. T. Monday through Friday) a program which no one in his right mind could possibly accuse of rationality. It is Mr. Breneman's custom to end this program each day by pinning an orchid on the oldest lady in the audience. In the six years he has been on the air Breneman has dredged up some fairly decrepit specimens of humanity. In parodying this curious monkey business, Mr. Allen went Breneman one better; he produced a lady of such extreme fragility that the weight of the orchid snapped her spine.
I thought it was hilarious, and still do, though it meets none of Mr. Gibbs's standards. As I see it, it’s perfectly possible to parody something that is already inherently ridiculous but only by taking it to outrageous limits. In the case of Breneman's "Breakfast in Hollywood." it requires more imagination than I possess.
This is one radio program which I have carefully side-stepped for months, simply because it defies criticism. It even defies explanation. Over a period of five months I have amassed a great many notes on this program, but they are of little help. They appear to consist almost entirely of the names of ladies of uncertain vintage, many of them from Amarillo, Tex., whose hats Mr. Breneman invariably tried on. I can't conceive of any one being interested in these ladies' names even if I had their telephone numbers, which I haven't.
• • •
There isn't a great deal else to the program. Mr. Breneman simply wanders from table to table at his restaurant in Hollywood, saying 'Hello, who are you?" The lady replies nervously that she is Mrs. Dorothy Z. Brockhurst, of East Orange, N. J. After a little coaxing she may be persuaded to add that this is her first trip to California; she's visiting her daughter-in-law, Mrs. Beulah M. Hodgins, of Santa Barbara, who has two children of indeterminate sex; she wishes it wouldn't rain so much in California—tee hee—and she'd like to say hello to her husband, Richard X. Brockhurst, back in East Orange. Right here Mr. Breneman patches away the microphone. It's against the rules of the Federal Communications Commission to deliver personal messages over the radio. Though the ladies are fully aware they are being naughty, they never stop trying and they frequently succeed.
What entertainment value this has for the listener is one of the dark, inscrutable mysteries of broadcasting. There is no music on the program and the few jokes that are attempted reach a level of idiocy almost beyond mortal comprehension. ("Why is a midget sailor like a short order of mashed potatoes? Because he's just a little gob.")
There's also some nonsense about a wishing ring, but I'm too tired to explain it even if I understood it, and I don't. Mr. Breneman's habit of donning ladies' hats is too well known to require further amplification. However, the screeches of laughter which this spectacle provokes have such an unearthly duality that they deserve some special comment. It is a louder, brassier, more strident, more raucous and infinitely more terrifying noise than the squealing the bobbysoxers used to deliver at Frank Sinatra's broadcasts, An unusually sensitive friend who heard this shrill and terrible din said he detected in it note of horrible panic. The same sort of lunatic laughter, he is convinced will rise to the heavens the day the world comes to an end.

If you are up for it, you can hear the Oct. 2, 1946 show below.

Breneman was 47 when he died in 1948. One of his pall bearers was Jack Benny, whose writers borrowed from Breneman’s show when elderly Martha (played by Gloria Gordon) gave Jack an orchid and told him he had to kiss her.



As for Crosby’s other columns for the week:

Monday, February 17: How radio in that land of Commies, the U.S.S.R., has something in common with radio in that land of freedom, the U.S.
Wednesday, February 19: Radio writing in Hollywood, especially for comedy shows.
Thursday, February 20: Part two on the life of West Coast radio writers.
Friday, February 21: How the radio stars in Hollywood get around.

You can click on them to read them.

Boom

The makers of silent films didn’t rely on the theatre pit orchestra to provide sound effects. Like title cards to make the plot understandable, words would appear on the screen to indicate sounds.

Here are good examples in Felix Turns the Tide, a war picture released not too many years after fighting in the trenches of France and Belgium. The word “BOOM” is formed as a cannon is fired by a rat and lands in a trench filled with cats. The cartoon depicts non-comedic death as the cat soldiers are thrown into the air by the bomb blast.



As a side note, “BOOM” appears on rare occasion in sound cartoons. Tex Avery's Blitz Wolf (1942) is one. A really late example is the opening of Rocky and His Friends (1959).

The visual highlight of this short may be the depiction of the war. There are silhouettes, black and white cards in between the action to give a flashing effect, alternating black and white backgrounds, and an animated explosion where the smoke fills the screen. Unfortunately, the versions of these films on-line are murky, as if an old print was recorded onto a VHS tape.

Felix was a huge star and deserves better treatment.

Moving Picture World of Jan. 13, 1923 opined that, even then, “many will be able to anticipate” the ending of the cartoon.

The short was released on Oct. 15, 1922. Felix was distributed on a States Rights basis by Margaret Winkler. There were new Felixes every two weeks. The others around this time (from the Motion Picture News):

Felix Gets Revenge, Sept. 1, 1922
Felix Wakes Up, Sept. 15, 1922
Felix Minds the Kid, Oct. 1, 1922
Felix on the Trail, Nov. 1, 1922
Felix Lends a Hand, Nov. 15, 1922
Felix Gets Left, Dec. 1, 1922
Felix in the Bone Age, Dec. 15, 1922
Felix the Ghost Breaker, Jan. 1, 1923
Felix Wins Out, Jan. 15, 1923

Other than Winkler and Pat Sullivan’s names, there are no credits.

Gangster Hideout

A streetcar carries Duck Twacy to the gangster hideout in The Great Piggy Bank Robbery (1946). Neon signs and search lights give him some directions. A quick pan across a background shows the hideout is so close, the signs and lights aren’t necessary.

Here is the scene snipped together.



Phil De Guard is the background artist in this cartoon. Layouts are by Tom McKimson.

This wild effort of the Bob Clampett unit was officially released July 27, 1946 but, as usual, it appeared on screens before then. At one theatre in Burlington, North Carolina, it was shown starting the 23rd, as advertised in the local newspaper. What’s funny about the ad is it leaves the impression Porky Pig is the star of the cartoon. He’s not. He appears in disguise in two scenes taking up less than 10 seconds.

The Showmen’s Trade Review rated the cartoon “Good” and gave as a summary: “Daffy Duck, who follows Dick Tracy with great avidity, decides to look into the mystery of the stolen piggy banks. After many horrifying encounters with macabre characters and animals like you’ve never seen before, he locates the banks in a cave. It is all a dream, but don’t worry—Daffy is as Daffy as ever. Good anywhere, although there is some doubt about it for over-impressionable children.

This was the second-last Clampett Merrie Melodies cartoon at Warners. He got through part of Bacall to Arms and left the studio. Whether he quit or was fired is something only Dick Tracy could solve.

Tralfaz Sunday Theatre: Soapy the Germ Fighter

“Why, you’re a living cake of soap,” exclaims young Billy Martin to double-exposed footage of a guy in a soap outfit.

The rest of Soapy the Germ Fighter doesn’t live up to this sparkling line, but it comes close at times, especially with Billy’s odd concept that being clean is being a “sissy.”

This short film was made in 1951 by Avis Films of Hollywood, which also brought the world Eyes Bright and Foundation Foods in the same year.

The cheapness of being shot silently is pretty evident. Billy has the back of his head to the camera, all the better to add dialogue in post-production because you never see his mouth move. And Soapy moves his arms around to emphasize his words—even when he isn’t talking.

The short features a female narrator who knows the bathing habits of every kid as she declares he’s “one of the cleanest boys” in town. We can only hope she’s not staring into bathrooms.

It’s a shame the star of Soapy, who keeps calling Billy “pardner” but doesn’t have a Western drawl, never came forward to claim the role as his.

The film was made available to groups in British Columbia by the provincial health department, as the Women’s Institute in the very small settlement of Quick decided to rent it and show it at the local school in 1952 (the Institute still exists).

A Date With a Date

Jack Benny’s radio show made stops outside of Los Angeles after moving there from New York in the mid-1930s. It even returned to New York, especially if Fred Allen could be booked for mutual visits on the air.

One of Jack’s fairly regular destinations was Palm Springs, starting in 1941 and ending at Christmas time in 1954 during the final radio season. Jack’s writers seemed to find inspiration there, even using it for one of his Christmas shows where he harasses clerk Mel Blanc through indecision. There were jokes about dates, the quickly-changing climate and high prices. And there were several variations on the “Murder at the Racquet Club” story, no doubt pleasing Charlie Farrell, whose club got plenty of free publicity. (One wonders if Farrell’s appearances revived his career, as he filmed My Little Margie on TV in the mid-‘50s).

The Desert Sun published stories about Jack and the show in its Feb. 21 and 28, 1941 issues, and took advantage of the situation by selling “Welcome Jack” ad space to various businesses. Here’s what the paper of the 28th said about the broadcast; this was the final season Jack did a second live broadcast for the West Coast.

Benny Broadcasts Give Palm Springs Fine Publicity and Entertainment; Will Repeat Programs Next Sunday
Jack Benny and his crowd of inimitable entertainers had Palm Springs literally sitting in the aisles last Sunday. What's more he's repeating the process next Sunday. And while stores, newspapers, Chamber of Commerce, hotels and others are fully appreciative of the wonderful publicity and entertainment he is giving the town, they will breathe a collective sigh of relief when it's all over. This ticket demand, all concede, has been too, too tough.
Next Sunday’s national broadcasts will take place, as did last Sunday’s, at the Plaza Theatre at 4 p. m. and 8:30 p. m. It is anticipated that Ed Beloin and Bill Morrow, Benny’s writers, again will devote a good part of the script to Palm Springs. Certainly Palm Springs got its full share of notice last Sunday. Jello may have been paying for the program, but Palm Springs got most of the attention.
Nothing Like It Before
This village has never witnessed anything like the Benny broadcasts. Accustomed to celebrities of every kind and supposedly blase, it went into a dither about Benny. And the comedian did well by the town. So great was the demand to see the broadcasts that the theatre was jammed half an hour before each broadcast. People were even sitting in the aisles.
For the half hour before actual broadcast, Benny wise-cracked, smoked his cigar, strolled up the aisles. Phil Harris and his orchestra helped out in the impromptu entertainment. The actual broadcasts were perfect half hours of comedy and music. Denny Day’s singing entitles him to his top ranking as a singer of popular songs. Don Wilson, Mary Livingstone, Phil Harris, Rochester and the rest all provided superb entertainment.

Columnist Roy Medby of The Desert Sun pronounced the following in the same issue:

JUST TO AVOID being accused of taking advantage of defenseless readers we are announcing here and now that we are going to say a little something about Benny. You know, Jack Benny. So, if you’ve heard enough about the guy, better check out right here.
* * *
WE WISH we would follow our impulse to write about things, such as the broadcast, right after they happen. We are all stirred up then and bubbling over with pretty words. But, as usual, we’ve waited a few days. The warm enthusiasm is still there, but we’ve lost the fancy words. They were only two-bitters anyhow, so you haven’t missed anything. But to get back to Benny. What a show-man that guy is!
* * *
PERHAPS WE ARE a little naive in our pleasures and enthusiasms. But we will say forthrightly and without equivocation that we enjoyed that Benny show about as much as anything in the way of entertainment that we have ever come across. And we cannot ever remember any instances in which Palm Springs got even remotely so much good publicity, whether it paid for it or not.
* * *
WE FIGURE THAT any guy who likes this village well enough to hand it publicity worth twenty thousand bucks, at a conservative estimate, can come around and play in our yard any time. We figure too, that when he does the thing twice in order not to disappoint a lot of people who couldn’t get into the first broadcasts, he ought to have at least a vote of thanks.
* * *
AND AS A LAST little word, just to you personally, Mr. Benny, when you get around to passing out permanent ducats or something, to all of your broadcasts, don’t forget to put our name down good and heavy. You have long had our vote for the best and cleanest entertainment in radio.

There were some pretty enjoyable shows from Palm Springs. And a couple that were disjointed. The broadcast of Apr. 11, 1948 not only suffered a drop out that was filled with studio music, but ran so long that a scene with Paul Lukas was cut short because of time. The following week, Sam Goldwyn and Jack broke each other up, and then Goldwyn unexpectedly changed a line, getting laughs from the audience as Jack explained what had happened.

After Mary Livingstone twisted a line from “grease rack” into “grass reek,” Jack berated her the following week on the Dec. 10, 1950 show from Palm Springs, saying there was no such thing. The police chief of the city showed up to prove otherwise to the delight of listeners.

The gang spent part of Dec. 1951, 1953 and 1954 in Palm Springs.

Writer Milt Josefsberg goes into a number of Palm Springs stories in his book, including one about something that happened off the air.

Jack's favorite night spot was Charles Farrell's Racquet Club. One night he drove there alone to have some coffee and talk with a few friends. After a couple of hours he left and started to drive back to his hotel at a leisurely pace. Jack was an extremely careful driver, so as he drove down Indian Avenue and heard a police car's siren and saw the flashing red lights behind him, he was sure that the law was after someone else, not him.
He was wrong. The police car pulled alongside and Jack realized that he was their quarry, so he drove his car into an open parking space, wondering what law he had violated. His wonder turned to fear as one of the two policemen in the black-and-white car jumped out, drew his gun, and sharply ordered him out of his car with his hands up.
When Jack opened his door to exit, the cop got his first clear look at Jack and he gasped in recognition and amazement, "Mr. Benny!"
Jack said, "Y-y-yes. What did I do?"
The policeman carefully put his gun away and said, half-amazed and half-apologetic, "You stole this car." Jack smiled at this and thought it might be some sort of practical joke. He told the policeman, "Look, it's mine. I drive a black Cadillac Coupe De Ville." Then he told him the license number. The policeman motioned Jack to the front of the car and pointed to the license plate. It was an entirely different number.
What had happened could only have happened to Jack. Another man driving a car that was identical in make, year, model, and color had parked alongside of Jack at The Racquet Club. Jack came out, walked to where his car was parked, got in, put the key in the ignition, and it fit perfectly. However, when the other man came out, he got into Jack's car, which was an exact duplicate of his, but for some reason his key didn't fit Jack's ignition. He phoned the police, and they spotted Jack a few seconds later.
Jack then drove back to The Racquet Club with the police, and they told the worried victim that they had apprehended the car thief. Then Jack came in and the man's eyes nearly popped out of his head. He kept saying, "They'll never believe this, they'll never believe this."
Jack laughed and said, "They will because I'll give you an autographed picture which says 'To the man whose car I stole.' You won't even have to pay me for the picture if you'll drop the charges."

Not only did Jack broadcast from Palm Springs, he and his writers came up with set-up shows on both radio and TV with the plot revolving around him on his way to the city.

We're Not Disney

Walt Disney had been praised in the 1930s (with some help from his publicists) for the creation of Mickey Mouse and his foray into feature-length cartoons. As theatrical animation approached 1950, people—certainly film critics—wanted something different.

They got it, thanks to UPA.

The studio’s art looked modern. The stories seemed more mature. And critics tired of what some people called “slapstick violence” pitting animated humanised animals against each other.

Among the commentaries about the studio’s work was a one-page article in the May 21, 1952 issue of Pathfinder, the magazine for American Boy Scouts.

Movies: no more cats hitting mice?
UPA’s Gerald and Mr. Magoo typify the new school of cartoons with ‘intelligent freshness’
Two years ago Theodor Seuss Geisel, a La Jolla, Calif., advertising man, writer and cartoonist, wrote some cute verses about a boy whose vocabulary was limited to the sound of a gong. All the little fellow could say was “boing.”
Children’s records made from Geisel’s verses were a flop, although as “Dr. Seuss” he had written and illustrated successful children’s books including And to Think I Saw It on Mulberry Street and 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins. Undismayed, Geisel took the verses and the story idea to United Productions of America, a cartoon studio started seven years ago by Stephen Bosustow, a former Walt Disney artist. Bosustow liked the story and bought it for $500, the second cartoon ever to command so high a price.
Heart Tugs. The tragedy of Gerald’s peculiar speech affliction—other children would not play with him and his teacher sent him home from school—plus his winsome smile and three-pronged forelock (added by cartoon director Robert Cannon) won the hearts of millions of moviegoers.
Geisel and Cannon provided a happy ending for the cartoon called Gerald McBoing-Boing: Gerald tries to run away from home, but is stopped by a radio scout who hires him to be the station’s chimes. After that, Gerald rises to fame and fortune.
His creator’s story had a happy ending too. Last spring, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences selected Gerald McBoing-Boing as the best cartoon of 1950.
Myopic Star. But UPA had another ace up its artistic sleeve—nearsighted Mr. Magoo, an amiable old fumbler with good intentions. Already eight Magoo pictures have been shown, and currently a ninth (Fuddy Duddy Buddy) is in the making. Magoo, who was developed by UPA artist-director John Hubley, is good enough to rate marquee billing in many a movie house, a rarity generally reserved for Mickey Mouse or Bugs Bunny.
Meanwhile, Cannon, who did not want to make McBoing-Boing into a series, was persuaded by public reaction to the original cartoon to cast around for a new story. Last week he was hard at work putting the final touches to Gerald’s Symphony (to be released next fall), in which Gerald replaces an entire symphony orchestra.
What is the secret of UPA cartoon successes? Cannon explains:
“We are not interested in making cartoons of cats hitting mice over the head with clubs. That sort of thing is dead. We are trying to bring an intelligent freshness to cartoons, plus an application of modern contemporary art.”



Another one-page summary can be found in the Feb. 1, 1952 edition of The Art Digest in a story written by the film advisor to CBS.

UPA, Magoo & McBoing-Boing by Arthur Knight
The cartoons of Walt Disney have dominated American screens for the past 20 years, setting both the artistic and technical standards for the dozen or more companies that are at once his competitors and his imitators. The imitators press close. As soon as the Disney studios invent a new character, a reasonably exact facsimile appears in the cartoon series of the competition. Disney introduces the Multiplane camera, a device to give the illusion of depth to his two-dimensional world, and variations of that camera immediately turn up everywhere.
But much as they try, the imitators never quite overtake their master. Disney has always been willing to spend more money, to take more time, to shoot higher than any of the others. Clearly, the only thing that any new outfit coming into the field could do would be to attempt something that Disney himself does not. And that is just about the story of United Productions of America, more familiar as UPA, the creators of “Gerald McBoing-Boing’” and “The Near-Sighted Mr. Magoo.” What the UPA people have set out to do—what the Disney studios have been neglecting —is to make cartoons.
Somewhere along the line, after the tremendous push that Disney early gave to the entire animation field, the first principles of cartooning seem to have gotten lost. The cartoon, whether in art or in the funny papers, is a simplification the details of which may be distorted for emphasis. The cartoon makes no attempt to imitate life: rather, it exaggerates and satirizes and underscores. In the animated cartoon especially, this freedom of the artist to depart from pure representation into pure imagination becomes the very basis of the form. Why attempt to draw a world that can be photographed so much more easily? Yet Disney and his imitators have been moving persistently toward an increased naturalism in their cartoon films. They draw water that shimmers like water, rain that falls like rain, people who move like people. They even photograph live action, laboriously tracing its outlines to guide the movements of their cartoon people. Inevitably, the art of the cartoon has been lost in the woods of its technique.
With the old established companies blindly following Disney’s lead, it is impossible to guess where all of this might have ended. But UPA, founded in 1945 by Stephen Bosustow, was set up in conscious reaction against both the Disney style and the Disney method, the method of a large-scale movie factory. Himself a former Disney artist, Bosustow gained additional cartoon experience in the creation of visual aids for industry before the War. From simple illustrations he moved to slide films, then on to animations. During the War his “Few Quick Facts” for the Army newsreels and his Navy training films were outstandingly successful in getting information across to troops painlessly yet tellingly. UPA still does considerable work for both the Armed Services and for industry.



The keynote of the UPA films is simplicity, a technique which Bosustow relearned from the poster and the training illustration, and which he then returned to the cartoon film. One of the first UPA subjects to receive nation-wide attention was “Brotherhood of Man,” an ingenious and effective film argument for inter-racial, inter-cultural amity. As designed by John Hubley and Paul Julian, it emphasized the two-dimensionality of its characters, played with line and form and color. In many of the sequences, characters were no more than simple outline sketches.
In 1948 the young studio signed with Columbia Pictures to make a series of cartoons for theatrical distribution. At first they were constrained to use the sort of characters that turn up in conventional cartoon series—crows, foxes, bears, the usual barnyard personnel. But UPA refused to make its characters cute and cunning. “The Ragtime Bear,” for example, was a goggle-eyed, shaggy, simple-minded creature who only wanted to be left alone so that he could play his banjo. But soon the irascible Mr. Magoo—the first authentic caricature of a human in cartoons since “Koko the Clown”—put in his appearance, and he was followed by the prize - winning “Gerald McBoing-Boing.” UPA began to parody popular ballads, to satirize the gangster films, prepared modern versions of fables and legends. The animals have now all been returned to Disney and his confreres.
In all of UPA’s pictures, the creators’ familiarity with art, and particularly with modern art, is immediately apparent. In the recent “Family Circus” there is a dream sequence executed in a style reminiscent of the works of Klee or Miré. “The Oompahs,” their newest, tells the story of a family of brasses —Papa Tuba, Mamma Melophone and Junior Trumpet. All are delightfully stylized and grouped in patterns.
This is no accident, this familiarity with modern art. Many of the key figures on UPA’s small but gifted staff are men who have already won honors in the art world. John Hubley, now vice-president and supervising director of the organization, has exhibited at the Los Angeles and San Francisco Museums. Abe Liss, their production designer, is both a sculptor and painter. Paul Julian, designer and color expert for UPA, exhibits at the Los Angeles Museum and the Ferargil Galleries in New York. C, L. Hartman, an animator, has exhibited both at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the National Gallery in Washington. While Jules Engel, UPA’s color expert, won the purchase prize at the San Francisco Museum in 1950.
This same consciousness of modern art influences UPA’s choice of composers for their pictures. No baby-voiced sopranos lift their voices in soupy song hits here. The music is neat, efficient, expressive. It may be tuneful, but never hit-tuneful. Its writers are often the young moderns.
It is significant that the public has not merely accepted but welcomed these daringly different cartoons. A whole world of art separates their style from Disney’s, yet the mere appearance of the brightly colored UPA “Jolly Frolics” title card these days sets audiences twittering with the same delighted anticipation that once greeted a “Micky Mouse” or a “Silly Symphony.” A UPA industrial cartoon sponsored by Timken Bearings was so clever that it has been shown successfully in many regular theaters. “Bailing Out,” one of the UPA instructionals for the Navy, won acclaim at both the Edinburgh and Venice film festivals a year ago. And, as final proof of its popularity, UPA has grown in six years from a six-man outfit to an organization now employing over 75 people, has progressed from a cramped loft in a three-story walk-up in downtown Hollywood to a new, handsomely styled building in Burbank.
Does this mean that American movie audiences have suddenly acquired a taste for modern art? It would almost seem so—at least, for modern art presented in this manner. For although UPA’s pictures are shown simply and purely as hilarious and ingenious cartoons, the public is responding not only to their humor but to their freshness, their originality, their high imagination as well. Their reception strongly suggests that the American public, increasingly apathetic in the presence of the conventional cartoon, fully appreciates the stimulus of the UPA approach, an approach that is at once modern and basic.

UPA didn’t remain the darling of animation for long. Attention was being turned from theatres to television. The studio’s artists seemed to have been more hung up on design for design’s sake instead of entertainment. A CBS TV show with Gerald failed; its potential audience wanted to (and did) watch Mighty Mouse beat up cats in chopped-up old cartoons.

By then, John Hubley had become a victim of the nefarious blacklist. Soon Columbia lost interest in distributing its shorts. Internal squabbles resulted in Herb Klynn and others quitting to start Format Films. Then Bosustow was ousted after selling the studio to investor Hank Saperstein. By the mid-‘60s, Saperstein declared “Animation’s dead,” got rid of his studio’s equipment and artists, and was satisfied with re-packaging used cartoons.

Conducting the Conductor

“What will the audience least expect” was the Tex Avery credo. And he pulled it off in cartoon after cartoon after cartoon.

An example starts off the proceedings in Hamateur Night, a 1938 cartoon for Warner Bros. A theatre pit conductor gets the attention of his musical crew.



Swiftly, Avery switches the situation and the musicians conduct the conductor.



His eyes extend when the slide on his trombone extends.



The number being played is “It Looks Like a Big Night Tonight” by Harry Williams and Egbert Van Alstyne. After one chorus, the conductor ducks down and switches instruments for a fanfare.



Being a professional of the theatre, he bows to the audience in appreciation.



Jack Miller is given a story credit, though we wonder how much he contributed as the gags are typical of Avery’s sense of humour. Paul Smith is the credited animator. Did Virgil Ross do this scene?

It’s good to see this cartoon has been restored. It’s one of Avery’s finer efforts for Leon Schlesinger.