You're Not Built That Way
You're Not Built That Way 1936

You're Not Built That Way

Released
17 Jul 1936
Running time
00:06:00
Directed by
Dave Fleischer

Pudgy, out for a walk, meets a bulldog, scarred, swaggering and mean, and is dazzled. He copies the bulldog's roll, his growl and his habit of knocking over whatever is in his way. Betty sees the performance and sings him the title song: he is a small, soft dog and is not built to be a tough one.

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About the cartoon

Studio: Fleischer Studios
Distributor: Paramount Pictures
Produced by: Max Fleischer

Short Synopsis

Pudgy, out for a walk, meets a bulldog, scarred, swaggering and mean, and is dazzled. He copies the bulldog's roll, his growl and his habit of knocking over whatever is in his way. Betty sees the performance and sings him the title song: he is a small, soft dog and is not built to be a tough one. Pudgy ignores her and tags after his hero. The bulldog's way of life does not suit him: he tries to bully a cat and is clawed, tries to swagger and trips, and when he follows the bulldog's lead in stealing a string of sausages from the butcher's he is nearly skewered on a meat fork. He flees home at full speed to Betty, who takes him in without a word of reproach.

Why It Matters

  • The puppy who wants to be a tough guy is a stock plot, but the bulldog is a good villain, animated with real menace, and the song, a gentle lecture set to a bouncing tune, is one of the better Betty numbers of the late series; the butcher's shop climax is sharply timed.
  • Like most of the late Betty Boops, its US copyright lapsed and it is freely available. It is representative of the Pudgy cartoons animated by Myron Waldman and Hicks Lokey, which gave the Betty Boop series its last distinctive style, soft-edged and sentimental, in contrast to the hard-edged surrealism of 1932.

Notes and Trivia

  • Lillian Friedman, uncredited, animated Pudgy in several of these films.
  • The bulldog-and-pup pairing recurs in Warner Bros.' Chuck Jones cartoons of the 1940s.
  • See also: Little Nobody (1935), Training Pigeons (1936), Making Friends (1936).

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