Popeye Show 12-22-2002

[Pilmedium]

Dizzy Divers (Fleischer, 1935)
A Date to Skate (Fleischer, 1938)
Assault and Flattery (Famous Studios, 1956)

[J Lee]

One error in last night's show -- Jack Mercer did do the voice of Popeye on "The Spinach Ovature" and "A Clean Shaven Man," not Willliam Costello. His last Popeye was the cartoon released after "Dizzy Divers" in the series, "You've Got to Be a Football Hero." (Mr. Costello's final line as the sailor man before getting the heave-ho: "Boop-a-doop-a-doop-a-doop-boop-boop-a-doop" as Dave Fleischer and Willard Bowsky switched end tag lines on the audience. AFAIK, Betty Boop never ended one of her cartoons singing "I'm strong to the finich, cause I eats me spinach..." though it probbly would have improved some of those Pudgy cartoons).

Also, staying on voices and Ms. Boop, Margie Hines may have gotten a tryout as the studio's new female voice even before the move to Miami. "Plumbing is a Pipe" and "The Jeep" -- two 1938 cartoons released before "A Date to Skate" -- have somone else besides Mae Questel doing Olive's voice, while Margie can definitely be heard as Betty on "Sally Swing" and "Pudgy the Watchman" which were also released too early in 1938 to have been made it Miami (at least according to the October '38 move-in date from Mike Barrier's book).

[Geezil]

As Mrs. Geezil and I were watching "Dizzy Divers," she mentioned having always thought of Costello's voice as closest to what the "real" Popeye might be (sandpaper rough and all). Now, we don't disagree on very many things, but in this case, I say, make mine Mercer. IMO, what was lost in gruffness (maybe Costello had paid closer attention to Segar's published recollection of his real-life "model" for Popeye, whose name I've temporarily forgotten) was more than made up for by the wide variety of Mercer's ad libs. And I'm certainly not the only one still finding unheard gems on those Mercer soundtracks, even decades later...! :D

[oldgreypole]

Has anyone notice a certain gag during "A Date to Skate" [1938]? It appears very briefly after two cars collide with each other.

[J Lee]

Has anyone notice a blackface gag during "A Date to Skate" (1938)? It appears very briefly after two cars collide with each other.

It's blackface, but there's no sterotypical black dialect to go with it and the guy is coming out of a head-on collision, so the racial effect isn't there as it is in other blackface cartoon scenes.

As for Costello, he did do ad-libs, the only problem was none of them were very funny -- the one in "Dizzy Divers" where he says "I never liked oysters on the half-shell" was about as close as he ever got to a good gag line. Most of his other mumblings were either just straight comments on the action or bragging about his own (Popeye's) abilities, which may in part have been linked to his own over-inflated ego over the series' success that ended up getting him fired.

Mercer's mumblings were both funny and at times included self-depreciating humor, which took away some of the gruffness (as did the smoother voice), but made the character more likeable and lightened up the humor. Dave Fleischer and the others picked up on it almost immediately -- the end scene in "The Spinach Ovature" where Popeye stops walloping Bluto just long enough to conduct with his finger and hum along with the music would never have worked with Costello doing the vocals, and that was just the third Mercer-voiced cartoon in the series.

[Argus Sventon]

"A Date to Skate" appeared with the 1939-1943 Paramount toon logo.

[J Lee]

"A Date to Skate" appeared with the 1939-1943 Paramount toon logo.

Bozo and crew did that with another late '38 cartoon, "Cops is Always Right" during the show's first season, and it may not be wrong; the Fleischers changed the opening title card for the cartoons in the Betty Boop series and on the Color Classics in mid-1938, while the studio was still in New York. The Popeye cards didn't change until the move to Miami, but the new Paramount logo could have been introduced when the change was made on les openings de Mme. Boop and the Color Classics (which got a different logo -- in color -- of course).

Finding an original late-38 opening title would be the only way to determine for sure when the change was made (and the stereoptical patent notice may have still be in use on the title card at that time, though the Fleischers pretty much phased out the use of 3-D backgrounds in the Popeye series by mid-1938).

[Bobby B]

Originally posted by J Lee
One error in last night's show -- Jack Mercer did do the voice of Popeye on "The Spinach Ovature" and "A Clean Shaven Man," not Willliam Costello. His last Popeye was the cartoon released after "Dizzy Divers" in the series, "You've Got to Be a Football Hero." (Mr. Costello's final line as the sailor man before getting the heave-ho: "Boop-a-doop-a-doop-a-doop-boop-boop-a-doop" as Dave Fleischer and Willard Bowsky switched end tag lines on the audience. AFAIK, Betty Boop never ended one of her cartoons singing "I'm strong to the finich, cause I eats me spinach..." though it probbly would have improved some of those Pudgy cartoons).


OPINION OPINION OPINION OPINION OPINION OPINION OPINION


My belief is that Costello's last cartoon was "Beware of Barnacle Bill", Candy Candido did "Be Kind to Aminals", and Mercer took over with "Pleased To Meet Cha", experimenting until he came up with the Popeye we all know and love in "King of the Mardi Gras". Evidence? In "Pleased To Meet Cha" and "Choose Your Weppins", the "Izzat so?" Popeye mutters under his breath sounds like Mercer. Also in "Choose Your Weppins" Wimpy sounds just like Mercer's Wimpy voice from the 1960-61 TV Popeyes. And in "Let's All Sing With Popeye", the bridging "Sing along with me everybody!" sounds like Mercer still fine-tuning.


OPINION OPINION OPINION OPINION OPINION OPINION OPINION


Also on the subject of voices, here's an interesting tidbit courtesy of Mike Brooks, President of the Official Popeye Fanclub: the voice of the man at the skate rental counter in "A Date to Skate" is Jack Mercer's real voice.

[Bobby B]

Originally posted by Geezil
(maybe Costello had paid closer attention to Segar's published recollection of his real-life "model" for Popeye, whose name I've temporarily forgotten)



Frank "Rocky" Feigle

[bozo]

On the Paramount logo - I had a handful of titles as a referance while I was (am) working on this project and Cops is Always Right was one of them. The logo at the top of the cartoon looked pre '39 but different, it looked like there was extra snow at the peak of the mountain, but the contrast was also very blown out so it was hard to tell if it really did or if it just looked like that (the shape it was in was too hard to clean up). The end logo was however was a '39 - '43, so I used that one on the cartoon. I had some reasoning at the time for doing the same to A Date to Skate but I can't remember what it was now.

[J Lee]

My belief is that Costello's last cartoon was "Beware of Barnacle Bill", Candy Candido did "Be Kind to Aminals", and Mercer took over with "Pleased To Meet Cha", experimenting until he came up with the Popeye we all know and love in "King of the Mardi Gras". Evidence? In "Pleased To Meet Cha" and "Choose Your Weppins", the "Izzat so?" Popeye mutters under his breath sounds like Mercer. Also in "Choose Your Weppins" Wimpy sounds just like Mercer's Wimpy voice from the 1960-61 TV Popeyes.

I think you're wrong here. Costello's Popeye voice is more gravilier than Mercer's, and that's noticable in both cartoons. Also, Costello did mumble in a number of his later 1934-35 Popeyes, but as I said in another thread, the difference was his ad libs just weren't very funny compared with what Mercer did, and tended more towards either commenting on the on-screen action ("Oh boy what a good time we're going to have!" after the treasure chest is broken open in "Dizzy Divers") or bragging about Popeye's abilities ("Old Popeye ain't afraid. I ain't afraid of nothin' " is an example from near the end of "A Dream Walking")

In his first three cartoons -- "King of the Mardi Gras," "Adventures of Popeye" and "The Spinach Overture," Mercer made his voice deeper and talked slower to sound as much as possible like Costello. The first time he 'lightened up' his tones was while "la-laing along" to the William Tell Overture during fight scene at the end of "The Spinach Overture." In the ensuing cartoons in late 1935 and early 1936 he continued to lighten up his voice while the cartoons picked up their pace, until the "Classic Popeye" pretty much came into vocal focus by the middle of 1936.

And, yes, the Wimpy voice from "Choose Your Weppins" does sound exactly like the voice used in the KFS Popeye series, but I think that's for another reason -- the voice wasn't done by Mercer, but was instead done by Mae Questel, who already was around at the time the first cartoon was made, and of course handled Olive's voice in all the KFS Popeyes (as well as Swee Pea and the Sea Hag, as was noted in one of the Season 3 episodes of The Popeye Show).