Studio: Leon Schlesinger Productions (Merrie Melodies)
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures, The Vitaphone Corporation
Produced by: Leon Schlesinger
Short Synopsis
A library at midnight, introduced by a town crier who is a caricature of the critic Alexander Woollcott. The books come alive: Mr. Hyde, Fu Manchu, the Phantom of the Opera and Frankenstein's monster roar from their covers and then dance a gavotte; Rip Van Winkle sleeps through everything; the Thin Man, Topper, the Three Musketeers, Uncle Tom, Little Women and dozens of other titles turn into song-and-dance acts on their spines, with Cab Calloway, Fats Waller and other stars caricatured as the books' heroes and the whole shelf swinging to the title song. The noise wakes Rip Van Winkle, who ends it. The 1947 Blue Ribbon reissue cut the Woollcott scenes at the critic's own request and lost the original titles; home-video releases have restored the cut footage.
Why It Matters
- The book-cover revue was a Warner speciality, from Speaking of the Weather to Book Revue, and this is the richest of the 1930s versions, a dense, fast catalogue of 1938 bestsellers and movie tie-ins in which every title is a pun and every spine a stage. Tashlin's cutting and his taste for caricature give it a pace the Merrie Melodies rarely had.
- The film lapsed into the public domain in 1966 when United Artists failed to renew the copyright, which is why it has circulated so widely in poor prints, and why the restored version with the Woollcott footage, from the Looney Tunes Golden Collection, came as a surprise to people who thought they knew it. It is also an early credit for Ken Harris, later Chuck Jones's star animator.
Notes and Trivia
- The song came from the Warner film Varsity Show (1937).
- Woollcott objected to his caricature; he was then the host of the radio show The Town Crier.
- See also: Book Revue (1946), Porky's Railroad (1937), Hollywood Steps Out (1941).
