We've got a Popeye animated feature coming from Sony Pictures Animation, and now a Betty Boop movie from Animal Logic.
I'd love to see a Betty Boop film done 'right' (dripping with equal portions of swingin' jazz, surrealism, and titillation) .. but she was a tricky character to handle, even way back when.
Here's hoping the producers of The LEGO Movie prove to be up to this challenge..!
There are artists out there who 'get' the aesthetic that this movie should aim for ..
.. populate the running-time with a dozen or so song sequences with that amount of verve and appeal, and I'll be
.. but if this movie casts Betty as a 'fish-out-of-water' misfit in modern-day New York City -- or attempts to shoehorn her into any sort of 'origin story / hero's journey' plotline .. I'll be all
/yes, I'm aware which is more likely to happen. But I can dream, can't I?
I've been collecting the Olive Films Blu-rays and enjoying those shorts again, which I've loved since the mid 1980s when they played on TV here. Hopefully, with Cowell's involvement, music will be at the forefront, and Mark Fleischer's supervision might keep them from going totally hip-hop with things. Ironically, Cowell's deal is with Sony, so they'll end up putting out both Popeye and Boop pictures!
I'll stay cautiously optimistic. I'd love to see a cool Betty film, but there seems to be too much Hollywood history stacked against it. Oh, I do hope they can get this (and Popeye) right!
I'm concerned about both, but I think Popeye will come out better than Boop. The thing with Boop is that it's going to be a music vehicle for whatever artists, albums and songs Cowell wants to push at the time, since that's the world he knows and this new venture with Animal Logic/Sony will be all about promoting the music and acts, although hopefully not over what's needed for a good *film*: characters and story...!!!
Well, a Betty Boop film done 'right' would not be made for kids.
The cartoons which catapulted Betty into stardom mostly predate enforcement of the Hayes Code. Not to say it should be a 'Ralph Bakshi / Spike & Mike'-style grunge-fest .. but (ideally) there would be a constant stream of PG-13 'wink-and-nod' gags throughout.
1930s jazz-age music -- or at least newer songs in that 'style' (as "Monkey Rag" above) -- would also be ideal .. this really should be a giant Busby Berkeley-esque film musical celebration. I 'get' the fact that Simon Cowell's involvement makes that possibility remote. The prospect of Betty 'twerking' rather than 'boop-a-doop-ing' is sad to contemplate.
According to Cartoon Brew, this may be a live action / animation 'hybrid' film, rather than a fully-animated feature. So, yeah .. my initial enthusiasm upon reading yesterday's announcement has already been pulled wayy back.
Dacey wrote:Because, after all, if there's one thing that's all the rage with kids these days, it's Betty Boop.
I'm a little baffled by this one, really.
Like Mighty Mouse, she's one of those characters that everyone sees, in iconic marketing, but nobody really knows about, and gets producers and licensors to think, "How hard could it be?"
Betty's obviously a little more entertaining, but there's still the trap that Drawn Together fell into, namely considering her as some kitschy example of "ancient" squeaky-voiced/pie-eyed 30's toons, and backhandedly ridiculing her 30's-Fleischer image at the same time.
Like Droo, I'm dreading the backhanded big-studio "CGI character in the real world" genre (which is a DISTINCT possibility with the Lego Movie producers), that wants to hedge its audience bets by ridiculing the character as much as selling it.
Betty's too cool for that--Like she told Eddie, she's still got it.
90 years ago today -- August 9, 1930 -- the Fleischer 'Talkartoon' Dizzy Dishes was released in theaters .. featuring (in one brief song sequence) the debut appearance of a character who would quickly be refined over the ensuing months to become Betty Boop!
Yes; Betty was originally conceived as a cartoon dog .. and was often paired with the Fleischer's then-ostensible 'star' character: Bimbo, the Boston Terrier .. as the 'Minnie' to his 'Mickey' (although her popularity quickly eclipsed his).
Betty's dog ears eventually became hoop earrings; her jowls would remain (but soften) as her overall character design became 'human' .. but she would continue to be 'assisted by' Bimbo & Koko the Clown throughout the early-1930s, in her best and most enjoyable cartoons.
Though her appearance was based in part on a caricature of then-popular songstress/comedienne Helen Kane (who later sued Max Fleischer -- and lost the case in court), it was Mae Questel's squeaky voice performance as Betty Boop which contributed most to the character's stardom and enduring popularity. Also of note was the animation of Grim Natwick, Myron Waldman and Shamus Culhane (among many others) .. who drew Betty as 'sexy' (but never 'trashy') as they plunged her into a variety of distressing situations -- but always with her dignity intact.
It was in a Betty Boop cartoon that Popeye The Sailor made his first animated appearance, in 1933. Betty was also the star of the first (two-strip) 'Color Classics' Flesicher cartoon, Poor Cinderella in 1934. In addition to fairy tale adaptations (Snow White, Alice In Wonderland, various iterations of Mother Goose), Betty Boop's early cartoons were infused with delightfully-bizarre surrealism and the hot jazz music of the 1930s .. chief among them Cab Calloway, Don Redman and Louis Armstrong, who would themselves appear in the series in live action and rotoscoped animated form.
The institution of the Hays Code in 1934 brought changes to Betty's appearance .. gone were her iconic 'backless' dresses (replaced by longer, more-modest frocks) and her occasional 'wardrobe malfunctions'. Gone, too, were Bimbo & Koko. A 'human' love interest -- Fearless Freddy -- was briefly experimented with, but soon abandoned.
With limitations on what Betty was 'allowed' to do, Fleischer began to feature guest characters .. among them, stars of other King Features comic strips, such as Henry or The Little King (perhaps an attempt to discover another 'breakout' success, as Popeye had been). But it was wacky inventor Grampy and Betty's hyper-cute puppy Pudgy who eventually became the series' focal characters; often relegating Betty Boop to 'guest star' status, in her own cartoon! Interestingly, Betty was also launched as the star of a self-titled Sunday newspaper strip for King Features, during this period .. and found herself often 'upstaged' by her wacky Aunt Tillie and precocious younger brother Bubby there, too..!
By the time the Fleischer studio moved down to Miami to make the animated features Gulliver's Travels and Mr. Bug Goes To Town .. Betty's popularity had faded considerably. Her final cartoon was released in July of 1939.
Betty's cartoons enjoyed a brief resurgence in the 1950s, when UM&M TV Corp purchased the entire pre-1950 Paramount cartoon library (minus Popeye & Superman), and distibuted them to be run on local afternoon 'kiddie shows' across the country. But -- as Betty would later lament herself, in Who Framed Roger Rabbit -- her cartoons disappeared from television as well, once color TV became the norm.
With the Fleischer studio long-gone, and the Paramount studio's lack of interest in its cartoon productions .. Betty Boop might only be regarded today as a mere relic of the 1930s. But the King Features comic strip syndicate has maintained her as a popular licensed character which adorns merchandise and figurines, to this day.
Nice little remembrance! I’m glad you mentioned the figures at the end, since if there’s anything Betty is known for thesedays, outside of animation fans, it’s those thousands of figures that line the shelves of many a trinket store! And pretty darned nice some of them are too!
And don’t forget the infamous Betty Boop For President, aka Hooray for Betty BOOP, feature from 1980, which colorized and complied some of the best shorts into a semi-cohesive storyline. Unfortunately, this is how I was introduced to the majority of her cartoons, though the brilliance shone through and I was glad to get a chance to see them in their pure form later in the 80s, when there was another mini-resurgence via reshowimgs of the cartoons and a one-off Betty Boop Mystery Movie, a half hour TV special that was weird but also quite reverential to the cartoons at the same time. So awesome that Mae Questel was around to provide Betty's voice for Roger Rabbit!
Between the LD sets (horrible DVNR, but still the most complete set out there), the lovely Olive BDs, and a couple of obscure DVDs that have the weird but lovely TV special and Betty Boop for President, I am well situated in my Boop collecting. I'm also still waiting on a Thunderbean special that will have HD shorts that Olive didn't get to. Meanwhile, my desk at home features a Betty figural clock that is fairly cool. I also have the comic special that came out in 1990 from First Comics, plus the more recent Dynamite comic. And the comic strip collections from Kitchen Sink Press and Titan.
I actually posted this very rare interview with Mae Questel on the YouTube thread a year or so back, but it’s just so awesome, I thought it appropriate to post here as well.
That TV appearance featuring Mae Questel is an absolute delight.
Here's Betty in perhaps the sexiest outfit she wore in her 'pre-code' days .. assisted by some nifty 'mad scientist' business from Bimbo & Koko ..
Even when I was a kid, Betty Boop cartoons had long since vanished from television. However, Popeye cartoons were a rerun staple .. and even l'il '7-year-old' me noticed that "the black & white Popeyes tend to be the best ones." As I grew older and began to read about classic cartoons, I learned those Popeyes were made by the Fleischer studio .. and that knowledge led me to one of my first 'animation history' book purchases, in my late-teens (and which I still have within arm's reach of my desk, today) ..
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.. which is where I first read a good deal about Betty Boop. I was aware of her, of course .. thanks to her visage gracing calendars, coffee mugs and figurines .. but I'd never seen any of her cartoons before then (I missed out on the Hurray For Betty Boop special, somehow).
Shortly after I'd bought my first Laserdisc player, Betty Boop: The Definitive Collection was released by Republic Pictures (as part of the celebration of Betty Boop's 60th anniversary, in 1990) as two massive LD boxed sets (and also as VHS sets; but who'd want those..?! ) While priced dearly to my 'college-aged' self, I happily paid .. and devoured the cartoons over the course of a month, or so. As Randall said, the video is plagued a bit by DVNR .. but the brilliance of the cartoons remained .. and those two LD sets contained darn-near all of them.
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Also released in celebration of Betty Boop's 60th anniversary (and also mentioned by Randall above) was Betty Boop's Big Break, a trade-paperback comic book from First Publishing .. pencilled by Milton Knight and inked by Leslie Cabarga (yes, the author of The Fleischer Story). I've long felt that this book could be adapted into a Betty Boop: The Movie, with a minimum of tweaking .. its conceit of Betty being 'discovered' by a small-time movie unit (consisting of Max & Dave Fleischer) as they're shooting a Koko the Clown short at a Coney Island amusement park is just plain fun. I especially enjoy the little touch of Dave Fleischer being drawn with the same body proportions as Koko (since it was Dave who performed in the rotoscope reference footage used for Koko's cartoons) ..
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The more-recent Betty Boop comic mini-series published by Dynamite (also mentioned by Randall) is likewise excellent .. with acerbic writing by Roger Langridge and gorgeous illustration by Gisèle LaGacé. This, too, could be the template for an entertaining Betty Boop: The Movie. I especially appreciate that this story features Sally Swing among Betty's inner circle. Sally only appeared in one Betty Boop cartoon (one of the many 'guest stars' during Betty's waning years of popularity), but it makes complete sense that they'd be close friends .. and that she'd be the source of a good deal of goofy humor, in the bargain ..
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Again: a happy 90th birthday to Betty Boop! Perhaps there'll be a Betty Boop: The Movie in time for her 100th birthday ..
Last edited by droosan on August 10th, 2020, 3:10 am, edited 1 time in total.
I'm pretty sure it was the original voice actress too.
Gone, too, were Bimbo & Koko. A 'human' love interest -- Fearless Freddy -- was briefly experimented with, but soon abandoned.
) While priced dearly to my 'college-aged' self, I happily paid .. and devoured the cartoons over the course of a month, or so. As Randall said, the video is plagued a bit by DVNR .. but the brilliance of the cartoons remained .. and those two LD sets contained darn-near all of them. 
