The Old Man of the Mountain is a 1933 animated short in the Betty Boop series, produced by Fleischer Studios. Featuring special guests Cab Calloway and His Orchestra, the short was originally released to theaters on August 4, 1933 by Paramount Productions. Calloway voices all of the characters in the cartoon save for Betty herself (talking voice provided by Bonnie Poe and singing voice provided by Mae Questel). Calloway, along with his orchestra, also perform all of the music in the cartoon, including two songs Calloway co-wrote.
Controversy
According to film historian Christopher Lehman, the sexually suggestive nature of this film caused “some Americans at the time, especially Catholics,” to complain to exhibitors who then pressured Paramount Studios (distributor of the Betty Boop series) to tone down the Betty Boop character, which subsequently pressured Fleischer Studios to do the same thing. This can be seen when an old man sees Betty and acts crazy, a fish starts to follow her before getting hit by his wife, and Betty’s dress even is removed in one scene. According to Lehman, “In dispensing with the African-American entertainers and their music after limiting the ‘Betty Boop’ series’ sexual references, [Max] Fleischer thus acknowledged the widely assumed connection between raciness and blackness.” After 1934, African-American jazz music would no longer appear in Betty Boop cartoons, and she metamorphosized into a more conservative, mature, domestic character who often played only a supporting role.
The Old Man of the Mountain
Betty Boop series
Directed by Dave Fleischer
Produced by Max Fleischer
Voices by
Mae Questel (Betty Boop-singing voice)
Cab Calloway (Old Man & All Other)
Bonnie Poe (Betty Boop-talking voice)
Music by Cab Calloway and his orchestra
Animation by
Bernard Wolf
Thomas Johnson
Studio Fleischer Studios
Distributed by Paramount Productions
Release date(s) August 4, 1933
Color process Black-and-white
Notes
The Old Man of the Mountain was the third and last of the Fleischer cartoons pairing Betty Boop and Cab Calloway; the others are Minnie the Moocher and Snow-White. As in the other two cartoons, film footage of Cab Calloway was rotoscoped, or traced into animation, to provide the dance steps for the Old Man during the duet of “You Gotta Ho-De-Ho (To Get Along with Me)”. As with many other Boop shorts, The Old Man of the Mountain is now in the public domain.
The dialogue between Betty and the Old Man (“Whatcha gonna do now?” “Gonna do the best I can!”) is mirrored almost exactly in a scene between Santa Claus and Oogie Boogie in the 1993 film The Nightmare Before Christmas. The scene also features music very similar to Calloway’s “Minnie the Moocher” and dance steps close to Calloway’s own.
