Gerald McBoing-Boing
Gerald McBoing-Boing | |
---|---|
United Productions of America | |
Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
Release date | November 2, 1950 (renewed in 1978) |
Running time | 7 min |
Language | English |
Related | 2005 TV series |
Gerald McBoing-Boing is an animated short film about a little boy who speaks through
Gerald McBoing-Boing won the 1950 Oscar for Best Animated Short.[1] In 1994, it was voted #9 of The 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field, making it the highest ranked UPA cartoon on the list.[2] In 1995, it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".[3][4]
Original recording, UPA film and sequels
Dr. Seuss's story had originally appeared on a children's
This film was the first successful theatrical cartoon produced by UPA after their initial experiments with a short series of cartoons featuring Columbia Pictures stalwarts The Fox and the Crow. It was an artistic attempt to break away from the strict realism in animation that had been developed and perfected by Walt Disney. Cartoons did not have to obey the rules of the real world (as the short films of Tex Avery and their cartoon physics proved), and so UPA experimented with a non-realistic style that depicted caricatures rather than lifelike representations.
This was a major step in the development of limited animation, which had the added advantage of being much less expensive to produce.
The story describes Gerald McCloy, a two-year-old boy who begins "talking" in the form of sound effects, his first word being the titular "boing boing". Panicked, his father calls the doctor, who informs him that there is nothing he can do about it. As the boy grows up, he picks up more sounds and is able to make communicative gestures, but is still unable to utter a single word of the
UPA produced three follow-up shorts: Gerald McBoing Boing's Symphony (1953), How Now Boing Boing (1954), and Gerald McBoing! Boing! on Planet Moo (1956), an Academy Award nominee. The second and third films maintained the Dr. Seuss-style rhyming narration, but were not based on his work. The final film abandoned this approach.
All four Gerald McBoing Boing shorts were released in 1980 on home video under the title Columbia Pictures Presents Cartoon Adventures Starring Gerald McBoing Boing. The shorts were presented in sub-par quality, especially Planet Moo, which was squeezed to fit the CinemaScope frame to standard TV screen size. It was reissued in 1985 as part of RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video's "Magic Window" series of children's videotapes and went out of print in 1995.
The second short was included as a special feature on Sony's 2001 DVD release of
A character rather similar to Gerald McBoing Boing appears as Tiny Tim in the 1962 NBC television special Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol, now as a speaking character. On the 2001 DVD release, an animated short was included that features Mr. Magoo, also a UPA character, babysitting McBoing Boing. The short is titled "Magoo Meets McBoing-Boing".
Television
UPA
The Gerald McBoing-Boing Show (1956–57)
In 1956, CBS created a half-hour Gerald McBoing-Boing Show, with well-known radio announcer Bill Goodwin narrating.[6] Broadcast at 5:30 p.m. on Sunday evenings, it was a showcase for UPA's cartoons, including Dusty of the Circus, The Twirlinger Twins, and Punch and Judy. The program proved too expensive to continue and lasted only three months.[7]
The episodes were repeated on Friday nights in the summer of 1957. Thus, The Gerald McBoing-Boing Show apparently became the first cartoon series broadcast regularly during prime time, preceding The Flintstones by two seasons.
TV specials
A character similar to Gerald McBoing-Boing appeared as Tiny Tim in the 1962 TV special
Gerald McBoing-Boing (2005–2007)
A series based on the original cartoon started airing on
Gerald still only makes sounds (but is praised for it instead), but now has two speaking friends, Janine and Jacob, as well as a dog named Burp, who only burps. Gerald's parents (names unknown) complete the regular cast, although his mother has black hair in this series instead of blonde. The series was produced in Canada by
References
- ISBN 9781580462457.
- ISBN 978-1878685490.
- ^ "Complete National Film Registry Listing". Library of Congress. Retrieved 2020-10-05.
- ^ "The 25 Films for '95 (February 5, 1996) - Library of Congress Information Bulletin". www.loc.gov. Retrieved 2020-10-05.
- ^ "Gerald McBoingBoing artwork". Archived from the original on 2016-10-06. Retrieved 2016-04-11.
- ISBN 978-1476665993.
- ISBN 978-1538103739.
Further reading
- Lackmabb, Ron (2003). The Encyclopedia of 20th-Century American Television. Checkmark Books. p. 132. ISBN 0-8160-4555-0.
External links
- Gerald McBoing-Boing at IMDb
- Gerald McBoing-Boing at Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Archived from the original on August 24, 2016.
- The Big Cartoon DataBase
- Gerald McBoing-Boing essay by Daniel Eagan in America's Film Legacy: The Authoritative Guide to the Landmark Movies in the National Film Registry, A&C Black, 2010 ISBN 0826429777, pages 442-443 [1]