86. Shake Your Powder Puff (1934)

Release date: October 17th, 1934

Series: Merrie Melodies

Director: Friz Freleng

Starring: The Varsity Three (Chorus)

Both Bobs share the animation credit! I always find stuff like that interesting—especially considering Bob McKimson would animate FOR Bob Clampett. A relatively plotless yet entertaining cartoon, we observe a variety of vaudeville acts.

All good vaudeville shows occur in a barn, right? A slew of animals stroll into the bar, and there’s a closeup of fireflies being used as the matinee lights. That’s an oldie but goodie for sure.

Inside, an orchestra pit warms up for the night, a triumphant fanfare indicating the start of the show. Eagerly the orchestra members direct their attention to a piano, where the maestro crawls out of and perches himself on a stand. The delivery is great! Very nonchalant and natural.

Audience members shush each other loudly, a literal hush falling over the crowd as the maestro scowls on impatiently. A few taps of the wand to the metal barrier separating the crowd shuts them up, and we launch into our first peace, the classic “Morning Song” from William Tell Overture, a pig piping a flute solo and a dog garbling water. The animation is fluid and crisp as always.

Lovely transition between the gentle, sweeping tones of “Morning Song” to the brash, thunderous, dynamic roar of “Poet and Peasant Overture”, a personal favorite of mine and Carl Stalling’s. Here, a number of gags accompany the music. A turtle introduces the sound by beating his chest like a timpani drum. The maestro becomes so fervent in his conducting that he jumps right through his conducting stand. Elsewhere, mice jog in place on an xylophone, a duck providing intermittent vocals. A sleeping man is awoken by the percussion, repeatedly doing takes with each beat of the music.

The song ends and the conductor is greeted with uproarious applause—the orchestra members also express their bashfulness. Nice crowd shots of the audience applauding, including two ducks swimming in a tub labeled “RESERVE BOX”.

Finally, our “true” musical number comes into play, “Shake Your Powder Puff” sung exquisitely by three bunnies (who shake their powder puffs—good! When I think of powder puff, I do think of a bunny’s tail. Though I may have seen pictures of this before and just internalized it, it’s happened before).

This entire cartoon certainly has its Harman-Ising roots, further heightened by three Donald Duck lookalikes. I’ve missed the Disney copyright infringements! In terms of character design, that is. The ducks contribute their vocals (also very pleasing to the ear) and each duck has a bunny to stroll off stage with hand in hand.

After the act concludes, two goats do a dancing routine of their own, interrupted by the drunken boos and jeers of a plastered pooch. His disruptive behavior lands him a spot outside in the grass as he’s forcibly kicked out. Be it booze or personality, who’s to say, the dog’s got determination as he marches back in there... only to be kicked out once more.

We take a break for a moment to highlight some more music, three pigs singing some more bars of “Shake Your Powder Puff”. As they sing, we cut back to the dog, who approaches the ticket manager and introduces himself as “One of the Jones boys”, a joke sadly lost to the sands of time. 

Determined to get inside, the dog spots a bellows and some pepper: a great combination! He pours the pepper into the bellows and scales a ladder on the side of a barn. He peers down below from the roof, a nice overhead shots of some hens doing a can-can, music beautiful and lush.

The dog pumps the bellows, filtering pepper flakes into the barn bellow. A very nice shot of the pepper floating around in the air, the texture is lovely! What a pain that must have been to animate! The audience members all sneeze in unison, their collective sneeze so powerful that all of the feathers are blown off the hens onstage. Good variation in animation as the hens scramble about to hide.

First we had Donald(s), and now we have Goofy—the dog even LAUGHS in an offbrand Goofy laugh! Keeping the Harman-Ising spirit alive and well! As he gets one good look into the barn, the dog ends up falling through, landing right on the stage. A perfect spot for him to get pelted with fruit! He receives his karma, a curtain closing and rising as he asks “Is everybody happy?” à la Ted Lewis. The verdict? A pumpkin to the face. Iris out on the curtain dropping on him that reads THE END.

Probably Friz’s best effort so far, what an entertaining cartoon—at least for now! I’ll be very happy to see Friz’s style take a life of its own instead of him imitating Harman and Ising, but the Harman and Ising imitation is very spot on. It certainly feels like it belongs in the Bosko era of WB cartoons. The humor reminds me of the style of Tex Avery, maybe because it reminds me so much of his Hamateur Night. Good! This cartoon didn’t have much plot, but I don’t think it ever felt TOO tedious. I suppose a little discouraging when realizing that the climax is just people sneezing the feathers off of hens, but the maestro stepping out of the piano was inventive and amusing. Give this one a go! Much livelier than the cartoons we’ve been seeing so far. Probably the best of the Buddy era yet! 

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