The Fella with the Fiddle

The Fella with the Fiddle
Merrie Melodies series
Directed by I. Freleng
Produced by Leon Schlesinger
Voices by Mel Blanc
Billy Bletcher
Bernice Hansen
Music by Carl Stalling
Animation by Cal Dalton
Cal Howard
Distributed by Warner Bros.
Vitaphone
Release date(s) March 27, 1937 (US)
Color process Technicolor
Running time 7:22 (one reel)
Language English

The Fella with the Fiddle, reissued as 'The Fella with a Fiddle'. is a 1937 Merrie Melodies cartoon directed by Friz Freleng.

Title

The title is derived from the cartoon's theme song, written by Charlie Abbott.

Plot

When the kids fight over a coin for ice cream, J. Field Mouse tells his grandchildren the story of a mouse whose greed and dishonesty became his undoing. Feigning blindness and playing the fiddle, he collects enough money to live an opulent lifestyle. His home, marked by a shabby exterior, turns out to be a mansion where he lives it up with his riches. All the fiddler's luxury is in jeopardy when the tax assessor knocks on the door. The fiddler hurriedly presses a series of buttons to hide his opulence and make his home look like a hovel. He succeeds in confusing the tax assessor to the point that he flees in frustration, but an eavesdropping cat plays on the fiddler's greed and lures him into his jaws by placing a gold coin there. And that, says J. Field Mouse to his grandchildren, was the end of the greedy mouse. One of the grandchildren asked if the greedy mouse got eaten. The grandfather said, "Yes, he ate him all up,". But one of his grandchildren notices a gold (cat's?) tooth hanging on display and realizes that things weren't quite what they seem.

Availability

Notes/Goofs

  • This cartoon was re-released into the Blue Ribbon Merrie Melodies program on January 6, 1945. Because the cartoon credits Schlesinger on re-release, the original closing title card was kept. This Blue Ribbon reissue was the final to credit Leon Schlesinger. This meant that cartoons originally released between 1936 and 1944 that were re-released after 1945 also had their original ending titles scrapped out.
  • This short is the first Merrie Melodies short with Mel Blanc voicing characters.
  • The original ending titles have been found on a 8mm VHS.[1]

References

  1. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMVoQZepQQo
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