Paramount Pictures had a cartoon department for 40 years (from 1927 to 1967), but the studio has done everything it could to erase it's animated past. It's backlog of cartoons have been sold off throughout the years, and the subsequent owners have not been kind to the original presentation of these films. FLEISCHER'S COLOR CLASSICS: U.M.&M. (and NTA see below) really abused the Fleischer negatives. They often placed hideous black bars to obscure all references to Paramount Pictures, Technicolor and the original copyright notice.
The COLOR CLASSICS series had a variety of different title treatments. The longest running was the "parchment style" (see DANCING ON THE MOON below) which was featured in 14 cartoons - from KIDS IN A SHOE (1935) to A CAR-TUNE PORTRAIT (1937). After that the titles varied slightly till the end of the series in 1940.
Go behind the scenes at Fleischer Studios • Read a production draft for A CAR-TUNE PORTRAIT (Color Classic, 1937).
In the early days of TV, the major movie studios distanced themselves from television. Television was considered the enemy of motion pictures, and the movie studios wanted to keep the theatre owners happy - by shunning the new medium.
Thus, when older product was sold to TV, great pains were taken to remove reference to the original movie distributor. But U.M.&M. and NTA did it without any style... as shown in these actual NTA titles (below on the left) versus the original Paramount titles cards (on the right).
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NOTE: Compare this title card with the one at left. This was Paramount's theatrical reissue title. It says: "A Paramount Champion, Brought Back By Popular Demand!" |
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Original NOVELTOON opening: Here is an example of the original Noveltoon theatrical opening used from 1943 to 1955. These titles were replaced in the late 1950s by Harvey Comics. Noveltoons became Harveytoons, with a modified "jack-in-the-box" opening and closing title, and jumpcuts instead of dissolves during the opening credits. Click here to see original artwork (cel & pencil drawing) from this opening.
FEATURING: Each NOVELTOON cartoon opening title ended with a "Featuring..." card containing the star of that particular short. Here is the evolution of that title card art, with examples ranging from the mid-1940s through the mid-1960s.
The Screen Songs often ended with a live action tag with the Paramount logo superimposed over it.
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Film editor Eric Albertson started his career at U.M.&M. - his first job was to replace the Paramount titles. He wrote me to explain: "I worked for UM&M, which was bought out by NTA in about 1957. That was Ely Landau's company. The title replacement was done in 1954 & 55. In film collecting circles, a common expression when gauging an old print's color condition is "NTA Red". That's because old color prints of cartoons with NTA logo have faded to beet-red, washed out to pink. The chemical process used didn't hold color well - unfortunetly that means that existing copies of many Fleischer Color Classics, George Pal Puppetoons, Famous Novetoons and Little Lulu films are today in very poor shape.
Reader Glenn G. sent in this info about NTA: "My great uncle worked for National Telefilm Associates (NTA) for many years. I mentioned to him once that a
lot of the TV prints I'd seen of color UM&M/NTA
cartoons were very reddish. He told me that part of
that was probably because of fading due to
Eastmancolor's instability. That I knew. What I
didn't know was this: in the 1950s and well into the
1960s, it was customary, when 16mm prints were being
made up for broadcast television use, to accentuate
the red in the printing process. He said that was
necessary to make those color prints "read correctly"
on the black & white equipment in use back then.
The color correction and the manufacturing of 16mm Eastman color negatives was done under my supervision at Pathe Labs. Some was also done at Tri-Art (Duart). Polarcolor, Magnacolor, True color, Technicolor, both two and three color separations.
You're correct in that the replacement B/W logos were cut into the 35mm negative. We then made IPs and a reduction IN from that. We also made 32mm INs, and 35/32mm INs. For Technicolor we made 35mm IPs from the separation negatives and reduction Eastman Color INs from those. All the above work was done at the old Pathe Labs in New York. For Polar Color, Magna Color, etc, we did most for the work at DuArt in New York, and some at Movielab who had developed the octet printer. One pass of the negative gave you eight prints.
All materials were ultimatly stored at Bonded Storage in NY."
He also told me that NTA originally made up prints
from the same negatives UM&M had prepared in the
1950s. NTA just replaced the old logo on the
negative.
Another thing he told me was that in the 1970s NTA
finally started making up new television negatives for
those cartoons, but by then, there wasn't much
interest in them by local stations, in part because of
the large number of black & white titles -- he said
trying to sell B&W cartoons after TV went all-color
was futile -- and in part because there weren't a lot
of cartoons with "big name" characters, such as Bugs
Bunny or Popeye."
SPECIAL END TITLES: Famous Studios occasionally did a special "end title" which would incorprate the Paramount logo into the cartoon. These were cut out when Popeye cartoons were sold to A.A.P. and others cartoons were sold to Harvey and U.M.M. TV Corp.
ALPINE FOR YOU (1951 - see image at right) and POPEYE THE ACE OF SPACE (1953 - see end title successive frames at bottom of this page) are two unique Popeye cartoons - both of which have been recently restored on Cartoon Network.
PEDRO AND LORENZO (1956) ends with a storybook closing, the Paramount logo on the backcover (see succesive frames at left).
RABBIT PUNCH (1955) has a special ending where Tommy Tortoise pulls the Paramount mountain closing credits from boxing canvas to full screen then walks in front of it.
NO IF'S ANDS OR BUTTS (1954) starring "Buzzy, The Funny Crow" also featured a special ending.
Considering this cartoon features Buzzy, a black crow, and the cartoon centers around smoking, I doubt we'll see this on television ever again. And the original end title has been missing for years.
Thanks to Cartoon Research detective Milton Knight we are pleased to present the original end title to this cartoon. Buzzy takes a drag on a "King size!" cigarette, blows the smoke into the air, revealing the Paramount logo. Very Kool!
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1941-42 Fleischer Studios black & white Popeye cartoon begins with the Paramount mountain logo, while the first bars of the Popeye theme is heard ("I'm Popeye The Sailor Man"). The mountain disolves to a close up of Popeye's pipe. The words "A Paramount Picture" fade away leaving the pipe to "Toot Toot", then the main title (at below left) appears.
You can see the pipe close-up behind the titles: the rim of the pipe is visible behind the "a" and "t" of the word "cartoon", and the lower part of the pipe is visible under the second "p" in 'Popeye'. After the main title disolves away to the pipe, again in close-up, then the camera pulls away to reveal Popeye's face, and the rest of the credits resume. The camera pull-back is still on most of the AAP prints (b/w and colorized).
1942-43 Season: The following season, Famous Studios began their Popeye run. The black and white Famous Popeye's began with Popeye coming out of a porthole (see below second from left) who toots his pipe to the "Popeye" theme. Then the main title appears and Popeye dissolves away (the porthole still appears behind the title lettering). The main title card dissolves away and the production credits appear.
POPEYE THE ACE OF SPACE (1953) One of the rarest of the POPEYE opening titles is the one for 1953's 3-D release, "POPEYE, THE ACE OF SPACE". Because it was originally shown in 3-D, it was even given a special designation: "A Stereotoon". Those words appear below the POPEYE logo (see the third color frame above). Note the titles are shifted slightly left. This print was combined with a "Right" print to create 3-D.
"Ace" cartoon researcher Ed Ryba reports: "In 1953's one and only Popeye "Stereotoon", Popeye, The Ace Of Space, have you ever wondered what the Martians were actually saying? It's
obvious that the voice tracks were run backwards in the cartoon.
However, according to cartoon researcher Mark Odell: "The Martian dialect isn't all "gibberish".
Below is how POPEYE THE ACE OF SPACE originally ended. Popeye toots smoke from his pipe which forms the Paramount logo letters.
I popped a disc into the
mini-disc recorder and made a copy of the audio. Then I took it into my studio, loaded the tracks into the computer and played them backwards.
So what are they saying? GIBBERISH!!
It sounds like the guy who voiced
Baby Huey (Sid Raymond), screaming in some nonsensical dialect or other.
I'm guessing
the director had him invent a Martian dialect. But when it didn't sound
Martian enough (and actually more like what you might hear coming from
the animated face of someone vaguely aboriginal), they ran the tracks
backwards. Now, that's just a guess about why the tracks are backwards,
but it makes sense."
Makes sense to me too, Ed.
And thanks to Ed, we can all listen to Sid Raymond's martian "gibberish" for ourselves! Click here to hear the backward vocal FORWARD.
While binding Popeye's feet to the pedestal of the Electronic
Disintegrator, the Martian says (subtitled) "This test must not fail!", but
if you play his vocalization backwards he distinctly says "I almost ruined
my machine!"
Paramount also made a 3-D Casper cartoon, BOO MOON, released a few months later. Perhaps "Stereotoons" would have replaced Noveltoons if the fad hadn't died out so quickly.
1935 -1940 Standard End Title: The anchor and cap end title, still visible on most A.A.P. prints originally led into the Paramount mountain logo.
1933 -1934 End Titles: The iris out goes into a bottle of ink - its mouth facing us. The bottle straightens up (via stop motion animaton) and the cork does a somersalt to cap the bottle. The Paramount logo is superimposed and a "The End" title appears over that.
Titles from GYM JAM (left) and FIREMAN'S BRAWL (right).
(Thanks, Stuart Cook)
Steve Mufatti drew this short-lived 1951 "Little Audrey" comic strip for King Features Syndicate. These strips were also reprinted in 1952-55 Harvey Comics. Here are a few more.
Written, compiled and copyright © 2005 by Jerry Beck
Special thanks to Ken Layton, Fred Grandinetti and Mark Kausler for contributing to this page.
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