Studio: Leon Schlesinger Productions
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures
Produced by: Leon Schlesinger
Short Synopsis
An old man listening to a radio broadcast of "The Courtship of Miles Standish" grumbles that it isn't what really happened, and tells his grandson the true story. In Plymouth in 1621, Captain Miles Standish and Priscilla Mullins, drawn as caricatures of the film comedians Hugh Herbert and Edna May Oliver, are clearly in love but too shy to meet, although they live next door to each other. Miles writes a love letter, then decides to send a singing telegram instead. The messenger is John Alden, played by Elmer Fudd, who delivers it by singing "You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby", including every word of the telegram, and Priscilla is charmed. Suddenly Native Americans attack the house. Priscilla rushes to save her laundry from the arrows, and John grabs a gun and drives off the attackers, who leave after breaking a window. Priscilla falls for John, to his dismay. When the grandson doubts the story, the old man swears he'll be struck by lightning if he is lying, and he is. He quickly admits it's just how he heard it.
Why It Matters
- Elmer Fudd as John Alden, crooning a pop hit word-for-word from a telegram, is the comic centre. The film turns Longfellow's famous poem into a radio-age farce, with Hollywood caricatures playing the Pilgrims, a style of historical parody Warner's cartoons would use often.
- It is the eleventh cartoon featuring Elmer Fudd, made in the year he was settling into his role as Bugs Bunny's foil. It also reflects its time: the attack sequence relies on stereotyped Native American characters, typical of the period's cartoons and a reason the film is seldom shown today.
Notes and Trivia
- The title is a pun on Longfellow's narrative poem The Courtship of Miles Standish (1858).
- "You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby" was a 1938 song from the Warner Bros. film Hard to Get, part of the studio's catalogue.
- See also: A Wild Hare (1940).