Tweetie Pie is a 1947 Merrie Melodies short directed by Friz Freleng.
Title[]
The title is a play on the term of endearment "sweetie pie," and also a play on Tweety's own name
Plot[]
Thomas captures Tweety, whom he finds outside in the snow, warming himself by a lit cigar. The cat's mistress, whose face is never shown, saves the bird from being eaten by the cat, whom she promptly reprimands.
Tweety is brought inside, and the mistress warns Thomas not to bother the bird. Ignoring this command, Thomas initiates a series of attempts to get Tweety from his cage such as stacking up furniture and tables as a ladder, each ending in a noisy crash thanks to Tweety foiling his plans to eat him, bringing the lady of the house to whack Thomas with a broom every time.
Next, Thomas uses the table fan as a propeller to fly himself upwards Tweety's cage, but Tweety immediately unplugs the fan, causing Thomas to fall down on the floor hard. Afterwards, Tweety then immediately yells for help frequently at the noisiest volume twice, resulting the mistress, who has finally had enough of Thomas ignoring her commands to stop eating Tweety, then throws him out into the cold.
The cat tries to get back into the house through the chimney. Tweety puts wood in the fireplace, pours gasoline on it and lights it. The explosion sends Thomas flying right back up the chimney and into a bucket of frozen water.
However, Thomas gets back in the house via a window in the basement and creates a Rube Goldberg-esque trap to capture Tweety, which of course, backfires and injures him instead. Finally, Thomas tries to capture Tweety by running up to the attic and sawing a hole around Tweety's cage, but he ends up causing the entire inner ceiling to collapse (sans Tweety's cage, which is being held in place by a beam). The faux pas creates such a racket that Thomas is sure the mistress will come downstairs and wallop him, and so, he takes her broom, breaks it in half, and tosses the pieces into the fire. This proves to be a bad move, as he finds himself being walloped on the head repeatedly with a shovel...by Tweety.
Availability[]
Streaming[]
Production[]
- Bob Clampett was working on a fourth Tweety cartoon in which he was going to be paired with Friz Freleng's then-unnamed cat, Sylvester. The project, which had a storyboard produced under the title "The Fat Rat and the Stupid Cat",[2] was left dormant when Clampett left on 1 May 1945, for reasons unknown. The project was ultimately scrapped.
- Friz Freleng took a liking to Clampett's canary, however, he would heavily modify the character, decreasing the exaggeration of his feet and a fresh coat of yellow feathers. "Tweetie Pie" would start production in June 1945.[3] According to the documentary Friz on Film, producer Eddie Selzer believed pairing Sylvester and Tweety was not a good decision. This argument allegedly caused Freleng to threaten Eddie that if he knew so much about cartooning, he should take a pencil and do it himself. Eddie apologized to Friz over the phone later that night and allowed him to continue his project as attended.[4] Furthermore, Friz and his unit proved themselves as not only was "Tweetie Pie" a hit with audiences, it was screened at the Academy and won the 1947 Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film. It also proved that Sylvester and Tweety were some of the most endearing Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies characters.[5][6]
Notes[]
- This was the first cartoon to pair Tweety and Sylvester.
- This was the first Warner Bros. short to earn an Oscar for Best Animated Short Film.[6]
- The Rube-Goldberg-esque contraption was previously used in "Trap Happy Porky", although unlike this cartoon where the trap fails, in "Trap Happy Porky" it was successful. Coincidentally, both "Trap Happy Porky" and "Tweetie Pie" were written by Tedd Pierce.
- The "kiss the wittow birdie" scenario of Sylvester asked to kiss Tweety, only to eat the bird and get forced to spit it out would be re-used two more times: "Gift Wrapped" (1952) and "Catty Cornered" (1953).
- In this cartoon, Sylvester is called "Thomas", a play on the term "tomcat" and possibly a nod to Tom Cat from MGM's Tom and Jerry. In 1948, the name was changed to Sylvester, beginning with the cartoon "Scaredy Cat".
- Although not a direct remake, most of the cartoon's concept was derived from "The Cagey Canary", a 1941 one-shot Merrie Melodies cartoon planned by Tex Avery and finished by Bob Clampett, also featuring another cat-and-canary pairing with a similar premise. Coincidentally, both "Tweetie Pie" and "The Cagey Canary" were written by Michael Maltese.
- Sylvester does not speak in this short; the other Tweety shorts where Sylvester is mute are "Bad Ol' Putty Tat", "Putty Tat Trouble", and "Tree Cornered Tweety".
- In the Polish, French and German redubs of this short[7][8][9] Sylvester is named in this short as his actual name "Sylvester" instead of his original given name "Thomas".
- Harley Quinn and Cassandra Cain watch this cartoon in a scene in the 2020 movie Birds of Prey.
- The animation of Sylvester running while getting hit with a broom by his owner was later reused in "Gift Wrapped".
- This is the first time Sylvester has a white-tipped tail, which would become his standard look.
- On early TV airings of the cartoon from the 1970s or 1980s (including Atlanta TBS affiliate WTBS), the original opening soundtrack was heard over the a.a.p. and opening titles of the cartoon for some reason.[10][11][12]
- Although the short was re-released into the Blue Ribbon Merrie Melodies program in 1955, the original titles are known to exist in black and white. As Warner Bros. does not restore black-and-white prints, the Blue Ribbon titles were restored instead.
- This short's Vitaphone release number is 1534.[13]
Music-Cues[]
- Why Don't You Fall in Love with Me? (by Mabel Wayne)
- Plays during the opening credits[14]
- Rock-a-Bye Baby (by Effie I. Canning)
Gallery[]
References[]
- ā https://archive.org/details/catalogofcopyrig3281213li/page/91/mode/1up?view=theater
- ā https://comics.ha.com/itm/animation-art/-sylvester-and-tweety-110-original-storyboard-drawings-for-fat-rat-and-the-stupid-cat/a/997060-1048.s
- ā https://cartoonresearch.com/index.php/bob-clampetts-a-gruesome-twosome-1945/
- ā Polson, Tod (2013). The Noble Approach: Maurice Noble and the Zen of Animation Design (in en). Chronicle Books, page 26. ISBN 978-1452127385.
- ā Sperling, Cass Warner; Millner, Cork; Warner, Jack (1998). Hollywood be Thy Name: The Warner Brothers Story (in en). University Press of Kentucky, page 187-188. ISBN 978-1559585897.
- ā 6.0 6.1 https://www.oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/1948
- ā https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6r26mc
- ā https://drive.google.com/open?id=1qq9moBSHzbjHEQ7gaXuF7VCKgYE-q7wC
- ā http://chomikuj.pl/Nieznam123/Zwariowane+Melodie/Z*c5*82ota+Kolekcja/Z*c5*82ota+Kolekcja+2/Dysk+3+-+Tweety+i+Sylwester+-+Najlepsze+z+Najlepszych*2c+cz*c4*99*c5*9b*c4*87+1/09+-+*c5*81akomy+k*c4*85sek+(1946),6254399967.avi(video)
- ā http://bloglarry.blogspot.com/2006/06/wb-cartoon-credit-weirdness.html
- ā https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vn27c5lrr7c
- ā https://cartoonresearch.com/index.php/missing-footage-as-well-as-remembering-things-that-never-existed
- ā https://books.google.com/books/about/Vitaphone_Films.html?id=mmtZAAAAMAAJ
- ā https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmSJwyiMQg0
- ā https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0039923/soundtrack/
ā Kitty Kornered | Sylvester Cartoons | Crowing Pains ā |
ā A Gruesome Twosome | Tweety Cartoons | I Taw a Putty Tat ā |