# Betty Boop - Surrealist Masterpieces? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 5, 2014, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765 "2014-11-05T15:38:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2014, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/41 "2014-11-06T19:07:38Z")
It’s a crying shame that so many films of the early 20th century are now lost forever. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2014, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/42 "2014-11-06T19:14:32Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > But Mae was the most common of the Bettys. She also had a long film career afterwards. I recall seeing her in flicks in the 1970s and 1980s (And she was in commercials, too. She was “Aunt Bluebell” in ads for Scott Paper Towels.) > I admit I can’t tell the different Betty voices apart. It’s different with the Popeye voices – there were at least three of them during Fleischer’s heyday, and they all sound different. Including Mae Questrel herself, voicing Olive AND Popeye in at least one of the Fleischer cartoons. Did a good job of it, too. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2014, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/43 "2014-11-06T19:19:18Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Actually, although Cabarga talks about the demise of the studio, I got the details of Paramount’s role from Richard Fleischer’s autobiography. Richard was Max’s son, who went on to become a noted director. (Among other things, he directed _20,000 Leagues Under the Sea_, for Disney, ironically.) I’ll put that on my reading list too, thanks. I read _ **Walt Disney: Hollywood’s Dark Prince** _ three or four years ago at around this time too. It somewhat altered the view I had of him from the earlier biographies I had read, but certainly not my appreciation for his works. A really good brief history of the film industry in the early 20th century can be found early on in Steven Bach’s _ **Final Cut** _, about the _ **Heaven’s Gate** _ debacle in 1980. (I see on Wiki that he wrote other books on early cinema as well.) Bach’s history was in turn based on another book about the founding of United Artists, the title of which I don’t recall right offhand. (Something like _ **The Company That Was Built by the Stars** _.) Hope the above is not too off-topic. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2014, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/44 "2014-11-06T21:08:38Z")
I’ve posted a link to this one recently, but here it is again. An early Japanese cartoon maker surely saw Fleischer cartoons and liked them. The Fleischer style is paid homage to in this weird and wonderful [Japanese entry](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyGvGMa2RFg) from 1933. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2014, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/45 "2014-11-06T22:20:01Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > Hope the above is not too off-topic. 🙂 Not as far as I’m concerned. 🙂 It would also be interesting to speculate on exactly how Betty Boop became such a prevelent merchandising icon - in an era when the cartoons featuring her are actually pretty obscure (until now, I’d never seen any). ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2014, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/46 "2014-11-06T23:56:24Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Not as far as I’m concerned. 🙂 > > It would also be interesting to speculate on exactly how Betty Boop became such a prevelent merchandising icon - in an era when the cartoons featuring her are actually pretty obscure (until now, I’d never seen any). I’ m sure it’s because: a.) Older folks like me remember her. Her cartoons played constantly during the 1960s (and, I think 1970s). There were Betty Boop cartoon marathons at art movie houses (now almost all gone) and at museums, like Dryden Theater at George Eastman House. b.) Betty Boop is still a licensed commodity, and the folks who own her try to keep her in the limelight. There was a revived Betty Boop/Felix the Cat comic strip syndicated in newspapers in the 1980s. She’s on greeting cards and curios. An antique store in Salem not far from me still has Betty Boop paraphernalia in the windows, and has for the past twenty years. ---
**Author:** ![Jeff\_Lichtman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jeff_lichtman/32/1531_2.png) [@Jeff\_Lichtman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jeff_Lichtman)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/47 "2014-11-07T00:42:32Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Not as far as I’m concerned. 🙂 > > It would also be interesting to speculate on exactly how Betty Boop became such a prevalent merchandising icon - in an era when the cartoons featuring her are actually pretty obscure (until now, I’d never seen any). One reason is that she’s cute and sexy. Even the toned-down version of Betty Boop had sex appeal, and the Hays Code didn’t eliminate the cuteness. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/48 "2014-11-07T03:30:01Z")
re- Steamboat Willy According to the documentary I mentioned, the first sound cartoon was actually made by Fleisher ---
**Author:** ![Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/son_of_a_rich/32/5439_2.png) [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Son_of_a_Rich)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/49 "2014-11-07T03:46:44Z")
[Betty Boop in “Poor Cinderella”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIC-jncQbKk). The singing and dancing at 3:50 is _sick._ ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/50 "2014-11-07T12:40:39Z")
> [@DocCathode](#): > > re- Steamboat Willy > > According to the documentary I mentioned, the first sound cartoon was actually made by Fleisher According to Cabarga, in _The Fleischer Story_, it wasn’t made by Disney or Fleischer, but was _Sound your “A”_ from 1919. This one, I assume: [http://www.bcdb.com/cartoon-characters/24482-Sound\_Your\_A](http://www.bcdb.com/cartoon-characters/24482-Sound_Your_A) Cabarga includes a still from it in his book. It still exists. The Fleischer cartoon claimed as the first sound cartoon is _My Old Kentucky Home_ from 1926. Disney’s _Steamboat Willie_ dates from 1928 ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/51 "2014-11-07T12:43:49Z")
> [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](#): > > [Betty Boop in “Poor Cinderella”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIC-jncQbKk). The singing and dancing at 3:50 is _sick._ I [Ilike\* “Poor Cinderella”. The weird color is because Fleischer had to use the Cinecolor process, which at that time (according to cartoon historian Joe Adamson) could give you orange and green and all variations therein – dark orange, light green. It was the perfect medium to use for a pumpkin (which might have influenced their choice of subject). It’s notable for giving Betty red – well, orange – hair in place of her usual black. The guy singing through the megaphone at the ball is a caricature of Rudy Vallee, who act included just that. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/52 "2014-11-07T13:02:33Z")
I neglected to add _why_ it was that Fkleischer had to make their cartoon in orange-and-green Cinecolor. It was because Disney had bought the exclusive rights to Technicolor for cartoons, so _Flowers and Trees_ could include real reds, blues, and yellows. I don’t know how long that monopoly lasted, but Fleischer eventually got to use it, for instance in the Popeye two-reelers. Flowers and Trees was 1932. Poor Cinderella was 1934, Popeye Meets Sinbad was 1938. Cinecolor eventually got better, too. Their later films (like Abbott and Costello’s _Jack and the Beanstalk_) displayed a full range of colors. Then they folded. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/53 "2014-11-07T14:01:17Z")
From a recommendation upthread - this one is, if possible, even more bizzare and horrific than _Bimbo’s Initiation_ - gaze upon the terror that is _Swing you sinners!_, in which poor Bimbo discovers the hard way that the universe he inhabits truly lacks a loving and forgiving God. ☹ [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/8b8isnhYMjg/hqdefault.jpg "Swing You Sinners! (Fleischer Studios)") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8b8isnhYMjg) ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/54 "2014-11-07T14:10:41Z")
[quote=“Malthus, post:53, topic:703765”] From a recommendation upthread - this one is, if possible, even more bizzare and horrific than _Bimbo’s Initiation_ - gaze upon the terror that is _Swing you sinners!_, in which poor Bimbo discovers the hard way that the universe he inhabits truly lacks a loving and forgiving God. ☹ [/QUOTE] ?? **NDP** suggested this above, and you already acknowledged it in post #28. Individual tastes vary, and while I find this one touchingly weird, I still think Bimbo’s Initiation more surreal. Have a look at **Cobweb Hotel** – IN COLOR! [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/OZJ7T48APNE/hqdefault.jpg "The Cobweb Hotel (1936)") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZJ7T48APNE) And, just to prove this isn’t limited to Fleischer, have a look at Ub Iwerks’ **Balloon Land** : [![]( " - YouTube") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1reePLY4lPQ) Iwerks isn’t as appreciated by the public as he should be. He’s reportedly thje REAL inventor of Mickey Mouse. He invented the Multiplane camera that was used in so many Disney cartoons to wonderful effect (he’s credited for it as “Special Processes” in _Peter Pan_ and other cartoons), and we was a superb animator and director. For a while in the 1930s he struck out on his own to make cartoons like Balloonland and the “Flip the Frog” series, but he returned to Disney later. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/55 "2014-11-07T15:42:32Z")
When I was a kid, local channels showed all sorts of old cartoons during kiddie hours. So I was introduced to Betty early on. Yes, I could tell she was “different” from the California 'toons. The Animaniacs visited her world in “The Girl With The Googily Goop.” (Licensing prevented them from using the real character–but it was obvious!) Our characters were spooked by the animated scenery but managed to help Googy fight the evil Will Hayes. Thanks for the information! ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/56 "2014-11-07T16:01:40Z")
> [@Bridget\_Burke](#): > > The Animaniacs visited her world in “The Girl With The Googily Goop.” (Licensing prevented them from using the real character–but it was obvious!) Our characters were spooked by the animated scenery but managed to help Googy fight the evil Will Hayes. I must’ve missed that one. Off to YouTube when I have time. ---
**Author:** ![Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/son_of_a_rich/32/5439_2.png) [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Son_of_a_Rich)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/57 "2014-11-07T16:10:21Z")
Whosoever enjoys the cartoons listed in this thread should get a kick out of this recent homage by the [Squirrel Nut Zippers.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJzWGkgFcTU) ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/58 "2014-11-07T16:49:53Z")
**Cal Meacham** I admit my error and sit corrected. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/59 "2014-11-07T17:00:02Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Have a look at **Cobweb Hotel** – IN COLOR! > > [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZJ7T48APNE](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZJ7T48APNE) Fleischer always got such wonderful depth in his cartoons, and the establishing shot of \*\*\*Cobweb Hotel \*\*\*may be the best he ever did. > [@](#): > > Iwerks isn’t as appreciated by the public as he should be. He’s reportedly thje REAL inventor of Mickey Mouse. He invented the Multiplane camera that was used in so many Disney cartoons to wonderful effect (he’s credited for it as “Special Processes” in _Peter Pan_ and other cartoons), and we was a superb animator and director. For a while in the 1930s he struck out on his own to make cartoons like Balloonland and the “Flip the Frog” series, but he returned to Disney later. There’s a great _ **Drunk History** _ [version of Ub’s story](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XAoAn7GDLE) (from the Hollywood episode). ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765/60 "2014-11-07T18:08:41Z")
> [@bup](#): > > Fleischer always got such wonderful depth in his cartoons, and the establishing shot of \*\*\*Cobweb Hotel \*\*\*may be the best he ever did. > > There’s a great _ **Drunk History** _ [version of Ub’s story](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XAoAn7GDLE) (from the Hollywood episode). The Fleischers got that depth by another of their patented processes – they’d build a detailed 3D model on a rotating stand, and put a frame to hold the animation cels in front of it. If you look at the opening credits of cartoons that use this, they give the patent number. They used it in the Popeye color two-reelers and in a lot of the later cartoons. It was a lot of work, but the effect is, as you say, amazing. You can watch the shadows in the background change as the model moves. Ub Iwerks’ Multiplane system was similar in some ways. It placed the animation cels in front of a moving background, but Iwerks’ device used a series of flat background paintings on cels, rather than a single 3D model. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/betty-boop-surrealist-masterpieces/703765.md?page=4)