Cinderella and Jiminy Cricket “Nash Spots”

As I sit here on a Wednesday night, thinking back about the past weekend and week so far, I’m looking forward to a time when there isn’t quite as much of a variety of things going on at the same time. Then again, maybe I’ll look back and *wish* there were more projects happening at that magical point. Currently, the pieces for each of the things are exciting and very much in flux. Many ’special’ sets are getting closer to being done, three of the ‘official’ sets are coming together quickly, and other projects are getting some of their many needed pieces into place.

In Thunderbean News:

I’m happy to say we’re finally finished with our films to clean up for Arnold Liebovit’s Puppetoon Movie 2 set. It’s been a heavy lift to make them as beautiful as possible. I think Arnold will have a wonderful set when it’s all finished.

The ‘Thunderbean’ closet upstairs started to be cleaned out this weekend, leading to the discovery of many cool things I had forgotten about on various tapes over the years. I’ve started putting a lot of these things together. It’s amazing to look at how many cool things you own and forget about. We’re assembling a special disc called ‘Steve’s Closet’ Details here.

Being able to have a regular small staff scheduled at Thunderbean has helped to free up time to work on so many of the sets. I’ve happy to be switching gears so many times through the week, and even happier to send whole projects out the door.

Quite a few 35mm Technicolor prints of Popeye cartoons have been showing up as of late, and scanning them has been really fun. It’s always nice to see Paramount cartoons in Technicolor; it’s such a stark contrast compared to the 16mm versions that often didn’t have very good color.

The Stop Motion Marvels sets are getting more and more films closer to the finish line. The *only* films we’re still on the lookout for are some of the few missing ‘Kinex’ shorts. If you have in your own collection any of the following, we’d love to borrow them (with compensation of course!):

The Goose and the Golden Egg (An archive/ stock footage company has a super rare print of this, but wants $25 a second! That’s $3,500 for this one cartoon! I wish I was that rich!)
Down on the Farm (Chip the Wooden Man)
Candyland (Chip the Wooden Man) (Someone contacted me about this one, but I can’t find your message)
The Thrilling Rescue (Daffy Doings in Doodlebugville series)
Down in Mexico (Chip the Wooden Man)
The Vaudeville Show (Daffy Doings series)

I think we now have all the rest covered. Thanks to everyone that has helped to track these rare shorts down all these years…

I’m hoping to record some commentary tracks in the coming weeks for the Rainbow Parade cartoons… and then the first half set will be almost in the can!

I met a collector friend in Ohio over the weekend and borrowed two reels full of commercials. I haven’t looked at these yet, but they’ll supplement the Cartoon Commercials, Volume 2 set we’ve had in progress for many years (and likely some will be on Mid Century Modern, Volume 3. These reels are labeled ‘UPA Commercials’ but I’m not sure if they all are or not (the front leader of one of the reels *does* say UPA, though. Both of these 1600’ reels are ‘going vinegar’ at this point, so it’s good they’re getting scanned before they’re unscannable.

My friend Luke, who holds both Paramount and color Van beurre shorts close to his heart, reminded me to not use the same MPAA production number for the credits on any of the recreated Rainbow Parade titles. He’s keeping me honest now that I’ve posted this publicly.

A Nash Rambler

Now, onto *this* week’s — commercials!

I think it’s only fair to have full disclosure: My parents were in an accident in a little Red Rambler just before I was born while turning into a Big Boy’s Restaurant. So, I was either saved – or almost never born, depending on your take, thanks to that Red Rambler. Either way, here’s a little thanks to Nash. I wonder if there’s a connection to my liking of these spots that were produced at Disney by Hurrell and Bounds (as independent producers utilizing Disney’s production staff). The Cinderella and Jimmy Cricket commercials are two of my favorites. These beautiful prints were lent for the Blu-ray Mid Century Modern, Volume 1, courtesy of cartoonist, cat scratcher, Walter Brennan impressionist and jazz music aficionado Mark Kausler. Here they are, complete with purposeful sprockets:

And, a little bonus found on the ‘net:

Interestingly, A CG artist took Tom Oreb’s Mickey Mouse Design from the Nash ads and made a CG model!

Have a good week all!