159. She Was an Acrobat’s Daughter (1937)

Release date: April 10th, 1937

Series: Merrie Melodies

Director: Friz Freleng

Starring: Mel Blanc (Dole Promise, Who Dehr, Heddie Camphor, Hippo, Stickoutski, Donkey), Jack Lescoulie (Leslie Howard), Cal Howard (Dizzy Duck, Ned Sparks)

Mel Blanc’s roles are growing increasingly larger and larger, as they should be! Not only is this a popular motif used in cartoons, BUT footage from the cartoon itself has been reused. Bob Clampett and Art Davis’ Bacall to Arms uses a hefty amount of footage from this cartoon, but for good reason. It’s a turning point for Freleng for sure as we observe parodies of news reels, songs, movies, and more.

The title song is underscored as we iris in and pan down to the outside of a movie theater, advertising 36 HOURS TO KILL WITH HIS BROTHER’S WIFE (intentionally read as one single title). Pan over to the other side: 15 FEATURES 15¢ – ALSO REJECTED SHORTS (a pun on selected shorts). I believe this gag was in Buddy’s Theatre as well. 

Inside, reused in Bacall to Arms, a lone moviegoer gets up and switches his seat. Another decides to do the same, and then another, and soon enough the interior of the theater is whipped into a frenzy as everyone scrambles to change seats. A very funny gag with succinct timing.

One of the many WARMER BROS. Puns that we will be seeing in many a short (I believe debuted with Hollywood Capers?) as we open to the beginning of the show, a screen flashing WARMER BROS PRESENTS – GOOFY-TONE NEWS – SEES ALL-KNOWS NOTHING. The “sees all - knows nothing” is a take on “sees all, hears all, knows all”, from Fox’s Movietone news reels back in the day. The puns just keep on coming! 

A caricature of Movietone news reporter Lowell Thomas, caricature design courtesy of T. Hee, opens us up, billed as Dole Promise instead. Mel Blanc provides the vocals as Dole announces “Good evening, folks. This is, uh…” He pauses, forgetting his own name. The gag is wonderfully structured, as he has a nameplate and a sign posted on his desk, as well as his name posted in big letters right on the screen, yet he still squints at his script with the most analytical, stupefied concentration he can muster. The offscreen whisper of “Dole Promise!” is just the cherry on top. “Oh yeah. This is Dole Promise, bringing you the latest news events of the day.” 

The first news reel: U.S. BUILDS LONGEST LINER IN SHIP BUILDING RACE. Wonderful timing (and a neat overhead layout!) as we see the longest liner in person: an extremely elongated ship right in the middle of New York and London. The ship inches forward to London, and then back to New York, and then we cut away to the next order of business. 

Next: FLASH! SPECIAL! Heddie Camphor (a take on Eddie Cantor, of course) finds “Little Oscar”, vitamin (a take on Vitaphone) newsreel man gets exclusive interview with Oscar. We see a little bug next to a purse (that has the initials of JW on them, Jack Warner of Warner Bros fame) and hear Mel Blanc talking in a Russian accent. “Ahh, dere you are! Tell us, Oscar, how does feel for to be back home after being lost for such long time?” The little bug rambles on in high pitched, nonsensical garbles. “Oh, thank you very much, Oscar! How you like that? He say he would rather be lost!” I haven’t found anything as to what the gag means, so unfortunately the meaning has been lost to the sands of time. But, if anything, it’s amusing hearing Mel do one of the voices we’ll be hearing so often in many cartoons.

Bosko’s Picture Show in 1933 was the first cartoon of any studio to ever depict a caricature of Hitler, and now we have a gag where a man is invited to sit in the last seat in the row. Unfortunately, his view is seldom ideal: we see some rather impressive perspective and animation as Hitler on screen marches forward, eventually disappearing into nothingness because the moviegoer can’t see anything. Aggravated, he moves a few seats down, right in the front row and in the middle. 

I believe this is Bob McKimson animation–this scene would be reused two years later in The Film Fan, with porky in place of the dog trying to crane his neck to see animation of a jockey riding on the horse. The warped perspective is quite impressive and does a good job of hitting home. We’ve all been there, stuck in the front row and trying to see what’s happening. Nevertheless, the dog begrudgingly accepts his fate, forever doomed to view the news reel at inadequate angles.

Also reused in Bacall to Arms is a gag of a hippo trying to get out of the row, proving to be a nuisance in the process. He’s a polite nuisance, at least, repeating “Pardon. Pardon me. Pardon,” as he bulldozes his way through. Tex Avery would also lampoon overweight hippo moviegoers in his Hamateur Night in 1939. 

Time for the birth of a caricature! We have our first caricature of vaudevillian Lew Lehr (penned as Who Dehr in this case), whose catchphrase “Monkeys is da cwaziest peoples!” would be lampooned in many, many, many, MANY Warner Bros cartoons (it seems Bob Clampett took a particular liking to this phrase, featuring it in Porky in Egypt, Porky’s Snooze Reel, Russian Rhapsody, and so forth). Here, he opens us up with Nit-Wit News. “Ladies and peoples, listen while explaining you the latest news of da day.” The Napoleon hat/garb in general is a nice touch, often used to symbolize insanity.

Lehr (or in this case, Dehr) narrates the malady of a strange dog bite affecting the city of “Boondoggle”, MO. That strange malady has turned the citizens of Boondoggle into boonDOGS as everyone runs around on all fours. “Look at dat! Even da mayor leads a dog’s life in Boondoggle!” The mayor, digging a hole, comes across a dog and growls (I love the detail of his sideburns raising like a dog’s ears in defense), both him and the actual dog engaging in a tussle. The brushing on the fight is very well done for this time period, feeling like a precursor to drybrushing which would be so prevalent in so many cartoons. The mayor wins the fight, running away with a bone in his mouth. 

Elsewhere, BOONDOOGLE’S LEADING SOCIETY MATRON IS LATEST VICTIM OF SCOURGE. Amusing animation and narration by Blanc/Dehr as a woman sits on a pillow, panting like a dog, eagerly running up to her butler and eating a piece of steak thrown at her. Dehr wraps up the presentation, he himself getting a taste of the scourge as one of the affected residents crawls onscreen and bites Dehr right in the leg. Nonsensical? Absolutely. But it’s the GOOD kind of nonsensical. The use of black and white is a nice touch with this being a technicolor cartoon. Many of the other news reel cartoons have been/are in black and white, so the mixing of technicolor and B&W really adds some authenticity.

“Boulevardier from the Bronx” seems to be a theme for slow, lumbering characters as the lumbering hippo makes his return, squeezing himself through an angry row of patrons while he dismissively pardons himself. He sits himself down just in time to see “STICKOUTSKI at the fertilizer”. 

A lion caricature of Leopold Stokowski invites the moviegoers to a rousing chorus of “She Was an Acrobat’s Daughter”–not unlike Bosko getting his own audience to sing in Bosko’s Picture Show. The song is very catchy, the slideshow visuals equally as entertaining as the lyrics. I especially love the gag where one picture, not a part of the slideshow, reads “please do not spit on the floor”, yet the patrons sing it in tune regardless, then correcting themselves and singing the next verse in the same tune. A hilarious gag with great timing. A short Merrie Melody for sure, but a good one at that.

Next is a parody of the MGM lion, crowing like a rooster instead of doing its signature roar. The film is Petrified Florist, a take on Petrified Forest. After an interminable cast scroll through (reused in Bacall to Arms), we see the star of the film, a caricature of Leslie Howard unsuccessfully hitchhiking, tying his thumb to a railroad crossing sign, making the light swing. 

While the film is playing, a random donkey decides to peddle peanuts, crackerjack, chewing gum (with an underscore of “Puddin’ Head Jones”, a favorite of mine). The donkey is booted out of the theater, hitting his head on a streetlight and still repeating his peauts, crackerjack, chewing gum mantra in a daze. A little incongruous and random, but there are some interesting angles and closeups as the donkey walks straight towards the audience.

Back to the film, the Leslie Howard caricature summons a Bette Davis caricature, demanding some food. Bette flirts with him, smitten. “What’s your name?” “Puddin Tame. Ask me again, and I’ll tell you the same.” “Are you a poet?” “After a fashion. “Ooh, I love poetry!” “Would you like me to recite?” “No.” 

Even better than the “no” gag is Howard struggling to recite mary had a little lamb. “Mary lad a little hamb. Mary mad a little amb. Mary had… oh, she had a goat.” While Leslie struggles to retell the story, Better sighs, completely enamored.

A little known character makes his debut—Dizzy Duck would reappear two more times in 1939, in It’s an Ill Wind and Porky’s Hotel, both as an informal sidekick for Porky. As you can surmise, the other talkative duck sidekick took off much faster. An interesting bit of history, considering he seems to have appeared out of nowhere (as all cartoon characters do.) 

Here, he pesters his dad, barraging him with questions. “Why, daddy? Why did the man look at her like that, daddy? Why, daddy? Does he like her, daddy? Does he like the lady, daddy?” and so on. While the dad furiously attempts to hush his kid, his efforts are futile. The duck is only silenced once the entire row in front of him turns back to shoot him down with glares. 

That is, until the duck starts rambling again, asking a bunch of obnoxious questions. Even better is when the angry front row shushes him once more with angry “NYEHHHH!”s. Now, the father speaks up in a W.C. Fields voice. “Heyyy, what’s going on?” He’s answered by a punch to the face from an offscreen fist.

The kid, not getting the memo, pesters his dad once more, who shooes him away. Now, the kid darts out of the theater and up to the projection booth. I love the animation of the kid turning his head in wonderment, staring at the door (Bob McKimson maybe? It’s pretty solid and constructed). He barges in, fiddling with the controls, a fun score of “Nagasaki” to boot.

He turns a lever from MED. To FAST, and the movie is sped up to frightening speeds. The kid panics, trying to fix his error, but to no avail. Now, the movie plays backwards. The animation is quite good–skipping and jumping around, but still room for there to be inbetweens of SOME sort. I can only imagine trying to sort those frames out in the (in)correct order! It’s easy to mess up, but hard to mess up on purpose! 

Now desperate, the kid sticks his beak inside the projection camera, where it gets caught. He kid gets caught in the gears, his body twisting up and down and around, feathers expelled into the air. Iris out as the kid flops to the ground, unscathed, cursing as his body is covered in film.

This cartoon is a GREAT one, probably the best we’ve seen from Friz. Or, at the very least, the funniest. It’s so ahead of it’s time–so much so that it was reused in chunks in Bacall to Arms in 1946, which proved to be quite anachronistic. You have the conflicting styles of Clampett/Davis (mainly Clampett, this is probably the most Clampett-y short in terms of looks out of the ones he didn’t finish) from 1946, and the simplistic 1937 friz style. That’s QUITE a contrast, but that tells you how well the humor holds up. 

Mel has quite the expansive repertoire of voices in this one—it’s very exciting to see him climb up the ranks. Next cartoon, he gets to voice our favorite pig (and duck!) In all, this is a hilarious cartoon. Some of the gags are a little (or a lot) dated, often skewing the joke–I wish I knew what the meaning behind the little Oscar joke was–but it wasn’t a constant detriment. 

The song number was hilarious (i love the “please do not spit on the floor” gag) and catchy, the animation was good, the caricatures were lovely… while there are many more funny cartoons than this one, in terms of this time period and comparing it to what Friz has churned out up to this point, it’s probably his funniest one yet, and that in itself constitutes a watch. It’s definitely the funniest news reel cartoon we’ve seen so far. Go for it! 

Link!