Studio: Fleischer Studios
Distributor: Paramount Pictures
Produced by: Max Fleischer
Short Synopsis
An organ-grinder with a baby monkey stops outside Betty's house, and Betty, charmed, wants to buy the monkey. While she stands on the pavement haggling with the organ-grinder over the price, the monkey slips inside, where Pudgy is alone. What follows is a one-sided war: the monkey raids the kitchen, swings from the lights, empties drawers, rides Pudgy like a pony and hides where he cannot follow, and every attempt by the puppy to restore order makes the mess worse. By the time Betty closes the deal and comes in with her new pet, the house is wrecked and Pudgy is in a state. The monkey, by contrast, is innocence itself on Betty's shoulder.
Why It Matters
- It is a straightforward pet-wrecks-house cartoon, but the baby monkey is a good antagonist, quick and knowing where Pudgy is slow and earnest, and the Johnson-Endres unit gives the chase through the house a brisk pace; the haggling frame, with Betty outside and the chaos inside, is neatly cut between.
- It sits in the American public domain, its copyright never renewed. It belongs to the final season of the Betty Boop series, made in Miami with Margie Hines as the voice and Betty in her redesigned, more realistic form, and it is one of the last films to feature Pudgy as the central character.
Notes and Trivia
- Organ-grinders with monkeys were still a common New York street sight in 1939, though the city had begun licensing them out of existence.
- Lod Rossner and Harold Walker were among the young Miami hires who later moved to Famous Studios.
- See also: On with the New (1938), So Does an Automobile (1939), The Scared Crows (1939).
