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Father of the Bird is a 1997 Looney Tunes short directed by Stephen A. Fossati.

Title[]

The title is a play on the 1950 film Father of the Bride and its 1991 and 1995 remakes.

Plot[]

A hungry Sylvester tries to find breakfast. He sees a feather, and realizes when there's feathers and birds, there's breakfast. He walks up and snatches a sparrow egg in a nest. He thinks about what he can make with the egg, but before he can eat it for breakfast however, a little bird hatches out and calls him "Mama." He realizes that his breakfast is talking but still eats the bird. However, the bird talks inside of Sylvester's mouth and keeps calling Sylvester his mama. Despite his attempts to make the bird leave, the bird just keeps following him. At one point, Sylvester tells the bird to not to call him "Mama", but the bird calls him "Papa." However, Sylvester suddenly warms to the idea of being a father and instead of eating it again, he protects the bird throughout a series of near-disasters.

He first sees the bird dangling on a telephone line and walks up to it. The telephone line pulls down, and the bird walks off, launching Sylvester to a construction site to be slammed into an I-beam and nearly get threatened to be smashed by an anvil. The bird walks into the construction site and it crawls into a bulldog's mouth. Sylvester fishes out the bird, but the bulldog manages to reel in Sylvester and attack him. The bird walks into a railroad track and walks up into a train. Sylvester follows, and is slammed into a train tunnel. The anvil from earlier smashes onto Sylvester's head and then another train runs down on him.

Sylvester is extremely upset, and tries to threaten to eat the bird. The bird calls Sylvester "Papa" and Sylvester kisses the bird, causing him to nearly eat it. At the end, Sylvester is now the father to a series of similar birds, who keep calling Sylvester "Papa," much to his dismay.

Availability[]

Notes[]

  • The short is somewhat similar to "A Mouse Divided" (1953), directed by Friz Freleng 44 years prior. Both cartoons feature Sylvester resisting against his natural feline instincts to raise a newborn infant animal, which the cat initially attempts to eat, that calls him father; in this case, a baby bird instead of a baby mouse. Coincidentally, both cartoons end with Sylvester getting the short end of the stick.
  • The little bird is never explicitly given a name, but in one scene, Sylvester derisively calls it Cornbread.
    • The Chuck Jones website refers to the bird as Cornbread.[1]
  • This is the last short to be entirely animated on cels, and the last produced by Chuck Jones, ending a career that began in 1938, and the first and only Sylvester cartoon Jones worked on in any way since "Jumpin' Jupiter" (1955) 42 years prior.
    • This is also the last Sylvester cartoon made in the 20th century.
  • For unknown reasons, this short is not available on Boomerang or HBO Max.
  • This cartoon was originally intended to be released theatrically with The Man Who Knew Too Little. However, for unknown reasons, it remained unreleased until 2011, when it was included in the Blu-ray version of Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 1.[2]

Gallery[]

References[]

Sylvester Cartoons
1945 Life with FeathersPeck Up Your Troubles
1946 Kitty Kornered
1947 Tweetie PieCrowing PainsDoggone CatsCatch as Cats Can
1948 Back Alley OproarI Taw a Putty TatHop, Look and ListenKit for CatScaredy Cat
1949 Mouse MazurkaBad Ol' Putty TatHippety Hopper
1950 Home, Tweet HomeThe Scarlet PumpernickelAll a Bir-r-r-dCanary RowStooge for a MousePop 'Im Pop!
1951 Canned FeudPutty Tat TroubleRoom and BirdTweety's S.O.S.Tweet Tweet Tweety
1952 Who's Kitten Who?Gift WrappedLittle Red Rodent HoodAin't She TweetHoppy Go LuckyA Bird in a Guilty CageTree for Two
1953 Snow BusinessA Mouse DividedFowl WeatherTom Tom TomcatA Street Cat Named SylvesterCatty CorneredCats A-weigh!
1954 Dog PoundedBell HoppyDr. Jerkyl's HideClaws for AlarmMuzzle ToughSatan's Waitin'By Word of Mouse
1955 Lighthouse MouseSandy ClawsTweety's CircusJumpin' JupiterA Kiddies KittySpeedy GonzalesRed Riding HoodwinkedHeir-ConditionedPappy's Puppy
1956 Too Hop to HandleTweet and SourTree Cornered TweetyThe Unexpected PestTugboat GrannyThe Slap-Hoppy MouseYankee Dood It
1957 Tweet ZooTweety and the BeanstalkBirds AnonymousGreedy for TweetyMouse-Taken IdentityGonzales' Tamales
1958 A Pizza Tweety-PieA Bird in a Bonnet
1959 Trick or TweetTweet and LovelyCat's PawHere Today, Gone TamaleTweet Dreams
1960 West of the PesosGoldimouse and the Three CatsHyde and Go TweetMouse and GardenTrip for Tat
1961 Cannery WoeHoppy DazeBirds of a FatherD' Fightin' OnesThe Rebel Without ClawsThe Pied Piper of GuadalupeThe Last Hungry Cat
1962 Fish and SlipsMexican BoardersThe Jet Cage
1963 Mexican Cat DanceChili WeatherClaws in the Lease
1964 A Message to GraciasFreudy CatNuts and VoltsHawaiian Aye AyeRoad to Andalay
1965 It's Nice to Have a Mouse Around the HouseCats and BruisesThe Wild Chase
1966 A Taste of Catnip
1980 The Yolks on You
1995 Carrotblanca
1997 Father of the Bird
2011 I Tawt I Taw a Puddy Tat
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