Title - Eatin' on the Cuff or The Moth Who Came to Dinner
Director - Bob Clampett
Rleased - 1942
Interesting Fact -- This is one of only a VERY small handful of cartoons made in the early days to feature a combination of live-action & animation.
Reason for Placement --
This is a cartoon that few people have ever seen, it was rarely played on TV and wasn't particularly memorable. The story, which jumps between a live-action piano player and our animated scenerio, shows a moth getting ready to marry a honey bee, only to find himself targeted by a man-hungry spider (notice that I said man-hungry, not man-eating!).
So, like I said before, this is a cartoon that never really got a lot of airtime, it was shot in black & white, some of the jokes were cut for being racially insensitive, and none of the characters would go on to bigger animated shorts. So why am I putting it on the countdown? Simple: when I was a kid, I saw this cartoon once (and ONLY once) while watching my daily dose of Looney Tunes, and for some bizarre reason, I was never able to get it out of my head. I honestly have no idea why this toon would stay in my head for over 10 years, but it did, and for that, I think it deserves a place in the countdown.
A lot of these cartoons are available on the Golden Collection DVD's. I have all 6 volumes. Each volume has 4 disc's. I purchased them within the last several years as their prices have went down. This cartoon is one on of the collections. The piano player is lip-syncing to Mel Blanc's voice. In another live action meets animation release titled "You Ought to Be in Pictures", Mel Blanc's voice is heard as the live action security guard. The security guard was played by cartoon writer Mike Maltese.
ReplyDeleteOnly saw this once. I thought "You Ought to Be in Pictures" was better, if not more conservative.
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