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I've Got to Sing a Torch Song

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I've Got to Sing a Torch Song
Directed byTom Palmer
Produced byLeon Schlesinger
StarringBernard B. Brown
Selmer Jackson
Noreen Gamill
Bud Duncan
The Rhythmettes[1]
Music byBernard Brown
Norman Spencer
Animation byJack King
Production
company
Distributed byWarner Bros.
The Vitaphone Corporation
Release date
  • September 23, 1933 (1933-09-23)
Running time
7 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

I've Got to Sing a Torch Song is a 1933 Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies animated short film, directed by Tom Palmer.[2] The short was released on September 23, 1933.[3]

The animation was supervised by Jack King and produced by Leon Schlesinger. The musical score was composed by Bernard B. Brown and Norman Spencer.[4] It premiered on September 23, 1933.

The cartoon features the song, "I've Got To Sing A Torch Song," written by Harry Warren and Al Dubin. "I've Got To Sing A Torch Song" had been recorded by many artists, including Bing Crosby, Rudy Vallée, and Al Bowlly.

Dick Powell sang the song "Gold Diggers of 1933" in the film.

Plot

The cartoon is a series of gags featuring characters all singing and dancing to the song "I've Got to Sing a Torch Song" and/or reacting to radio broadcasts. Some scenes are set in stereotypical portrayals of China, Africa, the Arctic, the Middle East and New York City. Some characters are caricatures of celebrities of the 1930s, including: Benito Mussolini, George Bernard Shaw, Leopold Stokowski, Ed Wynn (doing a running gag with 8:00AM), Bing Crosby (identified as Cros Bingsby on the door of his office), James Cagney and Joan Blondell, Ben Bernie, Guy Kibbee, Wheeler and Woolsey, the Boswell Sisters, Greta Garbo,[5] Zasu Pitts and Mae West.[6][7] In one gag, a sultan is shown listening to the Amos 'n' Andy radio show. Another gag features the Statue of Liberty singing the title track, while ending with the line "Ha-cha-cha-cha-cha-cha", in reference to Jimmy Durante. Garbo, Pitts, and West then play a short tune from The Girl I Left Behind Me. Then Ed Wynn returns to the microphone for one more running gag with a cannon, but it misfires and sends him flying back into his home through the sunroof and landing on a bed with a wife and children who are all wearing firemen's hats; they utter the catch phrase, "Sooo...", with Ed Wynn chortling as the sequence ends.

Garbo concludes the cartoon by saying That's all, folks!.

Sources

  1. ^ Scott, Keith (October 3, 2022). Cartoon Voices of the Golden Age, Vol. 2. BearManor Media. p. 15. Retrieved October 1, 2022.
  2. ^ Beck, Jerry; Friedwald, Will (1989). Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies: A Complete Illustrated Guide to the Warner Bros. Cartoons. Henry Holt and Co. p. 22. ISBN 0-8050-0894-2.
  3. ^ Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. pp. 104–106. ISBN 0-8160-3831-7. Retrieved June 6, 2020.
  4. ^ "I've Got to Sing a Torch Song (1933)". explore.bfi.org.uk. Archived from the original on January 30, 2016. Retrieved September 12, 2016.
  5. ^ "GarboForever - Garbo Cartoons". www.garboforever.com. Retrieved September 12, 2016.
  6. ^ Hartley, Steven (December 10, 2011). "Likely Looney, Mostly Merrie: 68. I've Got to Sing a Torch Song (1933)". likelylooneymostlymerrie.blogspot.be. Retrieved September 12, 2016.
  7. ^ "I've Got to Sing a Torch Song". Forgotten Films. January 16, 2012. Retrieved September 12, 2016.
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