Sniffles and the Bookworm

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Porky the Giant Killer	Screwball Football

Airdate:	Runtime:
2 December 1939 Blue Ribbon reissue: 10 November 1951	7 min. 45 sec. (reissue)

Series:

Merrie Melodies

MPAA Number:	Production Number:
5253	MM-11-9 1251 (reissue)

Copyright Renewed:

30 November 1967^[1]

Starring:

Sniffles
Bookworm

Crew

Voice Characterizations:

Mel Blanc (uncredited)
Margaret Hill-Talbot (uncredited)
Bill Days (uncredited)
Johnnie Davis (uncredited)^[2]
The Sportsmen Quartet (uncredited)

Layout Artist:

John McGrew (uncredited)

Background Artist:

Paul Julian (uncredited)
Art Loomer (uncredited)

Film Editor:

Treg Brown (uncredited)

Musician:

Carl W. Stalling

Sniffles and the Bookworm is a 1939 Merrie Melodies short directed by Chuck Jones.

Plot[]

One snowy, late evening, Sniffles is busy napping away. A strange figure bursts into the object he was resting on and accidentally startles Sniffles away. He sees a strange arm trying to look for its glasses and upon being spotted the worm quickly hides and scurries out of the books and into another one. The worm tells someone asleep in the book about Sniffles, making the Pied Piper think that he saw a monster or something huge. The Pied Piper goes to look until he thinks it over for a moment and realizes that the "monster" the worm saw may be very big in comparison to himself, so he backs away and refuses to go and look.

He tells someone else, a Viking who comes out of his own book and the two of them go to investigate. Sniffles curiously watches and follows behind the three of them until the worm spots him. He hides, accidentally running over the two men as Sniffles curiously studies them.

This makes both men angry with the worm, as they thought it was something much, much bigger. The Pied Piper then produces an instrument and begins to play it before giving a smaller one to Sniffles. They both play music together and approach a book of Nursery Rhymes. Another boy begins to sing while other books begin to dance and come to life!

Mother Goose and a goose dance out of their book, three other men from books sing, and even a trio of Bo Peep-esque girls who try to encourage the worm to sing and play with them. Eventually, he does, and he begins to blow a horn. None of them are aware of Frankenstein's Monster approach. The Pied Piper who appeared serves a pie to the Viking who cuts a piece revealing a bunch of little blackbirds, which get out and begin to dance. Sniffles sees Frankenstein's Monster approaching the bookworm and he yells at it to stop, causing the monster to then turn his attention to Sniffles.

Sniffles quickly backs away from the monster and begins to run. Coming to the edge of the shelf he hides behind a book, then trips the monster, causing it to fall onto the ground.

Tired and worn out, Sniffles goes back to his napping spot and is startled away by the worm, which has come by to thank him.

Availability[]

Streaming[]

Notes[]

Background artist Art Loomer's name is on one of the books. Other books mention Jones, Schlesinger, and Binder.
When Mother Goose dances out of her book, multiple books about Porky Pig appear behind her. Porky’s name also appears on a poster advertising his biography.
This is the only cartoon to have Sniffles only say one word instead of talking.
The USA Turner "dubbed" version replaces the original 1938-41 MWRA end cue with the 1941-55 MWRA end cue, while the EU Turner "dubbed" version keeps the original 1938-41 MWRA end cue.^{[citation needed] (December 2017)}
The film was completed and shipped to New York on 16 November 1939.^[3]
As late as 2008, a 35mm print of this short with its original titles was known to exist.^[4]
A model sheet reveals that the viking, who is unnamed on screen, had a name: Eric.
Vitaphone release number: 9197^[5]