Happy Birthday, Jerry Reed!

I've written at length about ol' Jerry Reed in this previous post. Back in the 70s and 80s, Jerry was my favourite male country music star, as he was such an entertaining and manic personality in addition to being an incredible guitar talent. I remember reading in an interview with Jerry that he never thought of himself as a great singer, but rather, he felt he was more of a stylist with a brash, mostly humourous approach to his songs. In fact, he compared himself to Phil Harris, the former bandleader and vocalist also known for his brash, breezy humour, and even recorded one of Phil's hit songs, The Darktown Poker Club, although with the slight title change, The Uptown Poker Club, to reflect Jerry's more uptempo beat.

Anytime I need to lift my mood, I put on one of my Jerry Reed CDs or original LP records, and that crazy rascal can always get me smiling. Jerry would have hit the age of 80 today if he were still around, and I sure do miss him. I'd like to dedicate this tribute post to Jerry's daughters, Seidina and Lottie, in the hopes that they know just how much their Dad was loved by his legion of fans.

Also, since the summer of 2017 will mark the 40th anniversary of the crowdpleaser, Smokey and the Bandit, here's Jerry (who played trucker, Cledus "Snowman" Snow) singing his hit song from that film, Eastbound and Down. Pick it, Son!

Happy Birthday, Phil Harris!

I've written about Phil Harris before, particularly in regard to his voiceover work for Disney, most notably as Baloo the Bear in The Jungle Book. I just watched him last week on an episode of Burke's Law from 1963, which prompted me to find out when his birthday was so I could celebrate him with a new caricature. Coincidentally, his birthday was fast approaching with June 24th, so I had just enough time to draw something up. Since he was a good buddy of Dean Martin's and I just wrote up a tribute to ol' Dino, here's a fun clip of these two rascals from The Dean Martin Variety Show that will show you what Phil looked like in the mid 1960s, the way I've depicted him in the caricature:



Phil Harris was one of those larger than life personalities that used to be quite common in the showbiz of yesteryear, but sadly is rather rare today. With his broad features, distinctive warm southern drawl, and a brash, yet affable manner, Phil was a memorable character. Though never really a leading man, he had a pretty good career playing variations of himself in a fair number of films. Mostly, however, he's remembered for two things: First, his radio career, initially as one of Jack Benny's regulars, then later alongside his wife, Alice Faye, in their own radio show. And secondly he's remembered as the warm, rumbly voice of Baloo in Disney's The Jungle Book (1967), followed by roles as Thomas O'Malley the alley cat in The Aristocats (1970), and as another bear, Little John in Robin Hood (1973). These Disney voiceovers guaranteed Phil a longlasting legacy with successive generations of kids, an audience quite the opposite to the adult crowds he was more used to entertaining on the Las Vegas strip in the hotels and nightclubs of that great era of the 50s and 60s.

Though I'll always love him best as Baloo, I'm also rather impressed with his role as O'Malley in The Aristocats. Whereas Baloo was purportedly modeled on that affable oaf, Wallace Beery, the popular character actor from the silent era through the early 1940s, Phil's portrayal of O'Malley has always seemed to me much more like an alley cat version of the 50s/60s breezy Frank Sinatra! O'Malley's a middle-aged Lothario, initially looking for an uncomplicated and noncommittal romance with Duchess, the Persian cat damsel in distress that he encounters in his aimless wandering. This in itself always seemed pretty interesting and different to me, since the average Disney hero was always hellbent on love and marriage with the heroine right from the get go, with the only other exception I can recall being Tramp (who puts me in mind of Gene Kelly, by the way). Additionally, I like the fact that O'Malley is obviously a more mature male, quite a bit older than the usual teenage hero of Disney animated features. This placed him more in the company of the type of actors I always liked best, such as Cary Grant, Gregory Peck, as well as the aforementioned Sinatra. I know the critics have never liked The Aristocats, but it remains a guilty pleasure of mine, mostly due to Phil Harris's vocal performance as the rakish O'Malley.

Here's the clip of "Ev'rybody Wants to be a Cat" from The Aristocats:



And here's a neat Youtube video of Phil Harris and Scatman Crothers, reminiscing about their roles as O'Malley and (the Louis Armstrong inspired) Scat Cat:

Do I Love "The Jungle Book"? You Better Believe It!

It seems that with the 40th Anniversary 2-disc DVD release of Walt Disney's "The Jungle Book" this past week, a lot of animation related bloggers are posting up their memories and thoughts on this animated classic. Check out Disney animator, Will Finn's post here. Since "The Jungle Book" remains my alltime favourite film of any kind since its debut in 1967, I reckon I need to add my reminiscences here too.

When "The Jungle Book" premiered on the big screen way back then, I was just a seven year old kid. I'd already been cartooning since I was about four, mostly from watching the likes of Popeye and Bugs Bunny cartoons on TV, but I'd seen several older Disney features in their periodic rereleases and had definitely developed a taste for Disney animation. But now I was getting to see Disney's latest release as it was appearing onscreen for audiences for the first time! I suspect that for many of us animated cartoon fans who came along at the tail end of the Baby Boom, "The Jungle Book" was the film that really did it for us. I know I was certainly at that impressionable age where this film was like a catalyst that started me toward wanting to be a cartoonist as my life's goal. Yes, I was focused on my future career at the tender age of seven, as frivolous and risky as it may seem, and nothing or nobody was going to take me back to a more practical job in the Man Village!

I think I'll write more on how I came to work as a cartoonist (and ultimately for Disney) in a future article, but today I want to discuss something others are writing about on their blogs that is certainly for me a big part of the film's appeal, namely the voice talents that were used in "The Jungle Book"...





The pages reproduced above are from a publication called "Persistence of Vision", which was started by my friend Paul F. Anderson back about 15 years ago. In the few years it was published, there was no better, more exhaustive journal on Disney history than this one, and I hope that Paul realizes just how many people owe him a big debt of thanks for his efforts in producing such a series of wonderful issues.

Anyway, this was an article I had written and illustrated for POV, detailing the way Disney's animators would often caricature the essential physical elements and mannerisms of the personalities who gave voice to the characters. Whereas it is quite an obvious ploy to use in a human character like, say, The Mad Hatter, basing his looks on that of comedian, Ed Wynn, it takes some clever doing to translate an actor's physical characteristics into that of an animal. I don't wish to repeat myself here, so please read the article to get a better idea of what I'm talking about. Hopefully, you can see from my caricatures how the Disney artists were similarly interpreting the actors' features into animal form.

Michael Sporn has written a very good article on his take regarding Disney using celebrity voices for the characters in "The Jungle Book". I certainly don't share his opinion of the film as a whole, but I certainly understand his criticisms of the voice talents. However, I'd like to share my own thoughts on why I believe that the situation was not quite the same in that film as it is in the rampant, celebrity-driven animated features of today.

Considering that "The Jungle Book" came out in 1967, I think it's fair to suggest that practically none of the principal voice actors employed were anywhere near their height of popularity when they recorded the soundtrack to the film. Phil Harris had been a popular radio personality on both his own show with wife Alice Faye, as well as previously playing the boozy, breezy buddy on Jack Benny's radio show. By the time "The Jungle Book" came his way, he'd been reduced to the occasional guest appearance on a variety or talk show and would have been virtually unknown to kids of the time. Likewise, Louis Prima was not a household name with kids either, having had his hit recording career about 10 years earlier, and even his Vegas show, which would have been geared more towards their parents, was also in its waning years by 1967. George Sanders was many years past his physical prime as a dashing leading man onscreen as either noble hero or nefarious cad, and was currently turning up as a character actor in mostly B pictures by then. Only Sebastian Cabot would have been a familiar voice to kids of that era, as he had just found fame on TV's "Family Affair" as the portly valet, Mr. French.

(Here's a taste of the wild antics of Louis Prima that led to the equally manic King Louie!)


These days, actors are hired for voicing animated characters based mostly on their recognition with contemporary audiences. So it is you get A list actors like Brad Pitt, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Michelle Pfeiffer all doing lead roles in Dreamworks "Sinbad", and Mel Gibson and Kevin Kline turning up as heroes in recent Disney features. Unfortunately, despite their considerable acting skills and marquee value, none of these actors, at least in my opinion, brought anything much to the roles in terms of vocal "personality". In other words, for all they brought to the performance, the studios could have saved themselves a lot of money and hired virtual unknowns who could give a reading at least as good as, if not better than the big name stars. Frankly, I much prefered the warm, delightful vocal performance of Jodi Benson in "The Little Mermaid", despite the fact she was a virtual unknown outside of her work on the Broadway stage.

I'd argue that all of the vocal talents used in "The Jungle Book" were hired more for the strength of their distinctive and charismatic vocal quality far more so than for marquee recognition. As a kid back then, I related to Baloo the bear because of the warm, rumbling voice of Phil Harris. To this seven year old kid, Harris brought a vocal quality and mannerisms to the role that resulted in pure cartoon magic when coupled with the equally appealing visuals provided by animators, Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas. I didn't know who most of the voices belonged to at that time, but all of these characters were brought to life for me in a way that made "The Jungle Book" my favourite film back then and continues to be to this day!

Dean Martin and Phil Harris

Just for fun, here's a neat video clip from the old Dean Martin Variety Show featuring Dean having "tea" with guest, Phil Harris. Both these guys had a reputation as boozehounds, though this was more of an act than reality. (Dean claimed the "booze" in his glass during Rat Pack Vegas performances was really apple juice.)

Phil Harris is famous to animation fans for being the voice of Baloo the bear in "The Jungle Book", of course, and the character had so much of his persona that the result was one of the most charismatic characters created during that era. Enjoy!