Scrappy is probably featured here on Thunderbean Thursdays more than any other character, so far be it from me to break that trend! I’ve scanned a lot of Scrappy’s over these years — mostly my own prints, but other collector’s prints as well. Let’s hope that some day there will be a Scrappy Blu-ray. So–on with the show…
But first! Some news from the Thunderbean dungeons (or “house” in this case):
We’re trying to get Mid Century Modern 3 out the door still! It’s done — but we’re working the finances to cover the replication. Heavy work continues on the Rainbow Parades, Volume 2 set. Here’s Luke Virgin working on Felix and the Goose that Laid the Golden Egg, a title near and dear to him that I promise he’d get to work on.
There’s lots of good things brewing at Thunderbean right now; as soon as we’re through the Rainbow 2 set we’ll be concentrating on the Lou Bunin collection and Iwerks’ Comi-Color, Volume 1. I love these projects and am having a great time working on them.
Over the weekend was the Columbus Moving Picture Show, the continuation of the long-running Cinevent show. It was great catching up with a lot of old friends, and some newer ones as well. Here’s some of us at the show:
Dan O’Shannon, me, Jerry, Michael Schlesinger and Nick Santa Maria
As I’m writing this, there’s a render going on on this computer for a film I’m working on for Tommy Stathes’ Cartoons on Film label. The collaborations over the years with Tom date back ten years now, with the results — and standards — getting better and better. The search for quality goes well beyond just finding a film, scanning and cleaning it up a bit; they usually involve finding just the right elements, and frequently combining all the best prints to make the most complete version. I really admire both the search for the kind of quality results we’re getting on these titles, and the collaboration to be able to achieve the results. It’s improved the quality of what I do as well since a new set of standards required further work to achieve. I can’t wait for these titles to be completed. When the time is right, I’m sure Tommy will talk more about them here on Cartoon Research. I’m thrilled to be able to lend a hand on the projects.
Some news at the Thunderbean Shop: We’ve got a 20% off sale going on through the end of the month (so today and tomorrow are the last days!). We also have a new ‘Special Set’ called All Original Title Cards, featuring some really cool material. All at Thunderbeanshop.com.
…and now — onto today’s cartoon: Scrappy’s Big Moment (1935)
Quite honestly, this really isn’t a great one. You all know that I’m a Scrappy die-hard, so, even though it isn’t a top cartoon, it’s not terrible either, and the animation quality itself is sort of enough to keep our interest through the picture. The title is sort of a misnomer though— it’s sort of Oopy’s big moment in the actual film more than Scrappy’s.
We start out with Scrappy happily training in their gym with his little brother. Their rivalry results in concussions for both of them, leading to a shared fever dream (ala Sandman Tales) featuring Scrappy fighting the then-famous boxer Max Baer (father of Max Baer Jr. – aka “Jethro” on The Beverly Hillbillies). Max is actually pretty nice to Scrappy, giving him a little spank rather than knocking him to the ground in any way. Oopy, his ringside partner, ends up going in to the fight, doing a much more effective job beating up Max. Of course, both kids wake up at the end.
A nice, breezy little 7 minute cartoon that was meant to be enjoyed and never thought of again. The little comedy bits between Scrappy and Oopy throughout are nicely animated and have some nice personality stuff going on. it’s funny that the New Yoprk animators, now in Hollywood, still set many cartoons in New York, including this one. As a minor film in the series it’s still a good companion to the films around it. Funny enough, there are more prints of this particular title because Official Films made 16mm prints for the home movie and rental market.
I hope you enjoy this little film— now, it’s time for your opinion.
Have a good week all!
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.
I’ll say this for “Scrappy’s Big Moment”: Max Baer is a much more sympathetic figure here than he was in “Cinderella Man”. I hope he had a good laugh at the cartoon. I certainly did.
That caricature of Max Baer was surprisingly well done. It’s remarkable how well the Columbia animators were handling human anatomy when even Disney was still struggling at this time.
The Columbia cartoons are fascinating in how widely the quality varies over the years, even within the individual cartoons themselves. The caricature of Max Baer shows a level of sophisticated anatomical animation that you wouldn’t think possible from the Charles Mintz artists in the circle-and-rubber-hose Scrappy/Krazy Kat era.
“concentrating on the Lou Bunin collection”
Music to my ears.
Many years ago, my mom had an old, short Excel 16mm cartoon called “Scrappy In Slumberland”. I’ve tried looking for this cartoon, and can’t seem to find it anywhere…at least, under that title. Anyone have any ideas on how I can find/view this old toon? Thanks!
Excel supplied 100′ cut-downs of certain Columbia short subjects. Mentioned in this Thunderbean Thursday post:
https://cartoonresearch.com/index.php/know-your-old-film-distributors-part-1/
Also:
https://www.madeinchicagomuseum.com/single-post/excel-projector-corp/
Not exactly the answer to your question, I know…
Someone asked that exact question on Harry McCracken’s Scrappyland site, and the answer that came back was that it was a reissue of the 1933 cartoon “Sandman Tales,” which can be found here for your comparison: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAUapx1Ra44
That’s not a bad rendition of the marquee at Madison Square Garden; this was the third of four iterations of the Garden, and was on 8th Avenue between 49th and 50th Streets. (The current iteration, #4, was built in the 1960s on the site of the former Pennsylvania Station.) You can see the real marquee, for comparison, here: https://www.alamy.com/1940s-pedestrians-and-cars-passing-marquee-of-madison-square-garden-when-the-circus-was-in-session-performing-new-york-city-usa-q45170-cpc001-hars-session-conceptual-new-york-cities-new-york-city-eighth-avenue-was-black-and-white-madison-madison-square-garden-old-fashioned-image261842310.html MSG would have been very well known to movie-goers of the time, because of the great popularity of, among other things, the championship boxing matches held there. Scrappy’s Big Moment was released on July 28, 1935; interestingly, Baer lost the heavyweight championship to James Braddock in Long Island City just a few weeks before this cartoon came out (at a place called Madison Square Garden Bowl, not to be confused with the 8th Avenue venue). That was the fight dramatized in the 2005 film “Cinderella Man,” as noted above.
Another boomer thing: Watching old theatrical toons from before we were born, we grasped that characters with overly detailed faces or otherwise differentiated from the rest of the cartoon were caricatures of real people. But who?
Some we figured out, thanks to equally vintage movies and a vague understanding of history. Others would remain mysterious until we were much older, like Mahatma Gandhi and Paul Whiteman. Yet others remained puzzles (for me, anyway) until adulthood, when DVDs identified the gremlins from the Kremlin and other insider jokes.