As the school year has started here and things have been busy at the school, they’ve also been super busy preparing the latest Cartoons on Film TCM Broadcast. It’s nearly together now and looking really nice, and the surprises that are part of the broadcast are just part of the fun. Getting things ready for a broadcast, like any production work, is challenging and time consuming – and I’m really looking forward to finishing it up within the next few days. I’ve been working on it so much that it sort of feels like I’ve been away from everything else except the school.
Since it’s Thunderbean Thursday eve as I write this, I pulled out the hard drive of things in progress and was very happy to see the VB Tom and Jerry masters looking as good as I remembered them being. While I’ve been “away” some have popped up in 35mm, including Magic Mummy. This one is a holy grail to get in 35mm if it’s possible, so as soon as I have a free moment (and manage to also visit my own Felix the Cat archive to let some of the cats loose to visit Mark Kausler) I’ll be following up on working to acquire it.
As while back we showed the raw scan on Pencil Mania here, a cute little entry in the Tom and Jerry series with a magic pencil. It was really a fun one to clean up too; I really enjoy how New York cartoony this particular film is. I also like that the bad guy at times owes more than a passing thank-you to Segar for design inspiration. The aforementioned Mr. Kausler lent this really nice print for the set, easily the best I’ve seen on this title. It’s a nice Cartoon Research send off to show it here before Tom and Jerry are off to replication (or holding for just a bit longer if we can manage to get Magic Mummy in 35mm — and if it looks good!).
The next months are both challenging and a time of transition as some major projects go out the door finally. We’re all looking forward to getting Flip out the door. This week we brought back the pre-order (along with a new special disc) for anyone that missed it and wants the special bonus disc that comes with it. Visit the Thunderbean Shop for details.
Steve Stanchfield is an animator, educator and film archivist. He runs Thunderbean Animation, an animation studio in Ann Arbor, Michigan and has compiled over a dozen archival animation DVD collections devoted to such subjects at Private Snafu, The Little King and the infamous Cubby Bear. Steve is also a professor at the College for Creative Studies in Detroit.
That’s a very clear, beautiful looking restoration. Sorry to quibble, but I hope you were able to fix that glitch in the soundtrack about a minute in, when Jerry makes his entrance.
You’re right about the Segar influence in the villain’s chin — and the hero’s forearms!
John Foster later remade “Pencil Mania” at Terrytoons as “The Magic Pencil”, with Sourpuss and Gandy Goose filling in for Tom and Jerry. It has the gag with the falling egg, the eighth notes from the saxophone turning into honking geese, the getaway car drawn on the side of the house, and the same ending, but it lacks the blond hero and the singing produce with the merging mouths. Those mouth-mergers are Van Beuren all the way!
The hero in “Pencil Mania” appears to be a precursor to Fanny Zilch’s suitor J. Leffingwell Strongheart. I’m not sure if he was created by John Foster as well.
If the 35mm print of “Magic Mummy” is good, get it! It’ll be worth the wait!
I believe this “audio glitch” is a splice or piece of “bloop” tape present on some manner of soundtrack master – whether that be on the part of Library Films or Gutlohn or Van Beuren themselves – I recall the same brief silence appearing on old PD copies of this cartoon. If a better soundtrack element can be found, then by all means it should be used!
I am submitting this post from California (suburban San Francisco), and I’m delighted to listen to this wonderful Tom and Jerry cartoon. I very much look forward, as usual, to “flip the frog“ being shipped to me, and when I get back to New York I will be glad to fully enjoy its contents!
I love Tom and Jerry (not to be confused with Tom & Jerry)!
Good going, Steve! Pencil Mania looks fantastic with a cleanup even without a sharper element at hand compared to what you showed me two years ago.
You kind of messed up the white balance on this one, though, the blacks and grays look calibrated well but the whites are blown. The Van Beuren cartoons had some very light backgrounds so it’s very sensitive to me when I can’t see them properly.
Somewhere in the middle seems appropriate between your clean up and the raws, can you take a look?
https://ibb.co/M24h3vK
Glad to be on my way and pre ordering Flip eventually, it’s looking to be a great set.
Who is the girl singing in “You’ve Got Me in the Palm of Your Hand”? She has a kind of a Betty Boop style, which not many singers specialized in.
Van Beuren’s studio at 49th and Broadway was right across the street from Max Fleischer’s, so it’s possible that a voice artist did double duty.
According to Leonard Maltin, it’s very probably Margie Hines herself did voice work at Van Beuren around this time for their “flapper” characters (see also “The Farmerette”, “Magic Mummy”, and “Piano Tooners”). I believe this to be the case, but to my knowledge there isn’t concrete proof.
Y, Margie Hines was signed by Van Beuren to a contract (it even made the papers). She had done Betty Boop which is why “Silvery Moon,” “Magic Mummy” and a number of Van Beuren cartoons have a Betty sound-alike singing.
The IMDb credits Margie Hines as the voice artist as doing the female character. That makes sense to me, as I believe Ms. Hines would later work at Fleischer’s and voice “Betty Boop” and “Olive Oyl” in the later ’30s.
This is great! Thank you, Steve! Thank you, Mark! Now wondering if the singing Betty Boop voice in Tom & Jerry “Tight Rope Tricks” is Margie Hines.
When I was five these things used to freak the crap out of me.
Happy restorings!
I know I’m late to this party – I always am – but I have some additional information about Margie Hines supplying voices for Van Beuren cartoons. And the proof is about as “concrete” as you can get.
The following is from Hal Erickson’s 2020 book “A Van Beuren Production,” p. 110:
“History hasn’t recorded who supplied the voices of Tom and Jerry (when they _had_ voices, which wasn’t often), but in the team’s ‘Magic Mummy’ (1933) and several other Van Beuren cartoons we hear a squeaky-voiced female singer who sounds exactly like Betty Boop. That’s because she _is_ Betty Boop – or rather, the first actress who provided Betty’s voice in the Max Fleischer cartoons produced right across the street from Van Beuren Studios. The December 10, 1932, edition of ‘Film Daily’ announced that Margie Hines, ‘well known radio artist and musical comedy star,’ had been signed to an exclusive contract by Van Beuren to provide cartoon voiceovers. Hines remained with the studio until 1934; four years later she returned to Fleischer where she provided the voice of Olive Oyl in the ‘Popeye’ cartoons. From 1939 to 1942 Margie Hines was married to Jack Mercer, the voice of Popeye himself.”
There ya have it – I’d call _that_ concrete proof. “Tight Rope Tricks” – I’d give that a “yes,” too.
By the way, Hal Erickson’s “A Van Beuren Production” covers _all_ the films Van Beuren produced, both live action and animation. There’s a good appendix that lists everything by release date, but few details. The cartoons are covered in Chapters 4, 11, and 19. Regrettably, there are some “erorrs” in it – after all, what non-fiction work doesn’t have errors? – but I recommend it anyway.
For example, his description (p. 179) of Tom Palmer’s experiences at Leon Schlesinger’s cartoon studio (Warner Bros.) has – to steal a line from an old “P.D.Q. Bach” record album – “more errors in it than an early Mets game.” He also puts Mickey Mouse in the “Silly Symphonies” series early on (bottom p. 58), and we know that’s wrong. But it’s still a good reference.
Actually, I recall it more than short-sightedness than error about Tom’s stint at Schlesingers. They didn’t mention him directed the first cartoon with Buddy which Leon was not too happy with.
Believe me, there are a LOT more errors in that paragraph than that.
Good point about the VAN BEUREN book by Hal Erickson, Mr. Roebuck! As a movie serial fan, there is some interesting information about the only sound serial RKO released: THE LAST FRONTIER (1932) with Creighton (aka Lon, Jr.) Chaney and the fun jungle documentary films by Frank “Bring ‘Em Back Alive” Buck!
What is the Van Beuren cartoon where Waffles (I think) was forced to masquerade as a girl by a bunch of hoodlums?