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Tweetie Pie

For the animated character by the same name featured in this film, see Tweety.
Tweetie Pie
Blue Ribbon rerelease title card
Directed byI. Freleng
Story byTedd Pierce
Michael Maltese[citation needed][1]
StarringMel Blanc
Bea Benaderet[2]
Music byCarl Stalling
Animation byGerry Chiniquy
Manuel Perez
Ken Champin
Virgil Ross
Layouts byHawley Pratt
Backgrounds byTerry Lind
Color processTechnicolor
Production
company
Distributed byWarner Bros. Pictures
Release dates
  • May 3, 1947 (1947-05-03) (original)
  • June 25, 1955 (1955-06-25) (Blue Ribbon re-release)
Running time
7:02
LanguageEnglish

Tweetie Pie is a 1947 Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies cartoon directed by Friz Freleng.[3] The short was released on May 3, 1947, and stars Tweety with Sylvester, who is called "Thomas" in this cartoon.[4]

Tweetie Pie marks the first pairing of the characters Sylvester and Tweety, and it won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film in 1947,[5] breaking Tom and Jerry's streak of four consecutive wins in the category and winning Warner Bros. their first Academy Award.[6]

Plot

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Thomas the Cat persistently endeavors to capture Tweety, a canary he discovers outside seeking warmth from a smoldering cigar stub amidst wintry conditions. Thomas's unseen owner intervenes just in time to prevent Tweety from becoming his prey, reprimanding Thomas for his predatory instinct. Despite explicit instructions to leave Tweety undisturbed, Thomas repeatedly attempts to seize him from his cage, each endeavor culminating in calamitous failures that attract his owner's admonishment and physical chastisement.

Employing cunning stratagems, Tweety manipulates Thomas, feigning distress to provoke a response and later resorting to self-defense by pricking Thomas's palm with a pin, inducing him to relinquish his hold. Subsequent efforts by Thomas to reenter the domicile through the chimney and a basement window are thwarted by Tweety's resourcefulness, resulting in comedic misadventures and Thomas's successive humiliations.

Undeterred by setbacks, Thomas devises an elaborate contraption to ensnare Tweety, yet his scheme precipitates his own injury instead. In a final, ill-fated endeavor to capture Tweety, Thomas inadvertently triggers a catastrophic collapse of the attic ceiling, prompting a frenzied response in which he destroys his owner's broom in a futile attempt to evade retribution. Ultimately, Thomas finds himself on the receiving end of punishment, administered not by his owner, but by the diminutive Tweety, who disparagingly dubs him a "bad ol' putty tat."

Production

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In 1945, Bob Clampett, the original creator of Tweety, conceived the idea for a fourth cartoon he is paired with Friz Freleng's Sylvester the Cat. This proposed cartoon, tentatively titled Fat Rat and the Stupid Cat, aimed to be the first collaboration between Sylvester and Tweety.[7] However, Clampett's departure from Warner Bros. in May led to the cancellation of the project during pre-production. His final Tweety cartoon, A Gruesome Twosome, was released a month later. Meanwhile, Freleng took a liking to Clampett's bird character, but would redesign Tweety with a coat of yellow feathers, and smaller feet. The production of Tweetie Pie would begin in June 1945.[8]

According to the documentary Friz on Film, producer Edward Selzer initially rejected Freleng of using Tweety for his new short, as he felt that pairing him with Sylvester was impractical.[8] Instead he insisted that Freleng use the woodpecker from Peck Up Your Troubles, thinking he was it was a better adversary. Freleng's insistence on using Tweety led to a confrontation in which he threatened Selzer to make the cartoon himself before storming back home.[9] Selzer eventually relented later that night, allowing the collaboration. The resulting film earned Warner Bros. Cartoons its first Oscar, an accolade initially accepted by Selzer and later inherited by Freleng after Selzer's passing in 1970.[10]

This successful pairing cemented Tweety and Sylvester as a popular duo, ensuring their continued partnership in subsequent appearances due to their substantial star power. However, Sylvester also featured in numerous shorts without Tweety, notably in the Hippety Hopper series alongside Sylvester Jr., directed by Robert McKimson. Additionally, Sylvester appeared alongside Speedy Gonzales in cartoons supervised by both Freleng and McKimson, earning another Oscar in 1955 for their collaboration.

Home media

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Although the cartoon was re-released into the Blue Ribbon program in 1955, the cartoon's original titles are known to exist.[11] When re-released, like most Merrie Melodies at the time, the original ending bullet titles were kept. On the following sets, the Blue Ribbon re-release print is available. The original titles were found in 2011 and it is unknown if Warner Bros. is aware of their existence, since the Platinum Collection set released in 2012 still had the Blue Ribbon titles.

References

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  1. ^ Beck, Jerry (1991). I Tawt I Taw a Puddy Tat: Fifty Years of Sylvester and Tweety. New York: Henry Holt and Co. p. 90. ISBN 0-8050-1644-9.
  2. ^ Scott, Keith (2022). Cartoon Voices from the Golden Age, 1930-70. BearManor Media. pp. 68–69. ISBN 979-8-88771-010-5.
  3. ^ Beck, Jerry; Friedwald, Will (1989). Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies: A Complete Illustrated Guide to the Warner Bros. Cartoons. Henry Holt and Co. p. 174. ISBN 0-8050-0894-2.
  4. ^ Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. pp. 151–152. ISBN 0-8160-3831-7. Retrieved 6 June 2020.
  5. ^ Tweetie Pie, retrieved 2018-01-16
  6. ^ Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood Official Guide. Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. 2015. pp. 12–15.
  7. ^ "A116Animation". profilesinhistory.com. Retrieved 2020-03-21.
  8. ^ a b "Bob Clampett's "A Gruesome Twosome" (1945) |". cartoonresearch.com. Retrieved 2024-08-27.
  9. ^ Bittersweet Cartoon (2019-08-15). Friz Freleng - DOCUMENTARY Friz on Film. Retrieved 2024-08-27 – via YouTube.
  10. ^ Sperling, Millner, and Warner (1998), pp. 187–188.
  11. ^ "Tweety's lost titles". Cartoon Brew. Aug 24, 2011. Retrieved May 25, 2019.
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