Catty Cornered

Not to be confused with Catty-Cornered or Kitty Kornered.

Catty Cornered
A still from Catty Cornered.
Directed by	I. Freleng
Story by	Warren Foster [1]
Produced by	Edward Selzer (uncredited)
Starring	Mel Blanc
Narrated by	Ralph James (uncredited)
Music by	Carl Stalling
Animation by	Arthur Davis Manuel Perez Ken Champin Virgil Ross
Layouts by	Hawley Pratt
Backgrounds by	Irv Wyner
Color process	Technicolor
Distributed by	Warner Bros. The Vitaphone Corporation
Release date	October 31, 1953 (1953-10-31)
Running time	7 minutes
Language	English

Catty Cornered is a 1953 Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies cartoon directed by Friz Freleng. ^[2] The short was released on October 31, 1953, and stars Tweety and Sylvester. ^[3] It features a forerunner of the Rocky and Mugsy duo. The title is a play on the phrase "kitty corner".

Plot

Tweety, who is a rare and valuable bird, has been captured and held for ransom by a duo of criminals: Rocky and his assistant Nick. Sylvester, who is interested only in finding food to eat, makes a number of attempts to steal Tweety:

• Sylvester climbs up the fire escape, then edges along a ledge to the apartment. Rocky sees him and places a banana peel on the ledge, causing Sylvester to slip and fall off.
• Sylvester climbs up the main stairs. Tweety escapes and meets Sylvester on the landing. Tweety refuses Sylvester's offer to use his mouth as a hiding place (the cat tried to eat him; "Not so hard!"). Sylvester instead hides Tweety under a can just as the criminals arrive. Nick takes Sylvester inside for searching, while Rocky removes Tweety from under the can and replaces the bird with a firecracker. Sylvester escapes with the can, unaware of the firecracker, and is injured when it explodes.
• Sylvester hoists himself up using a pulley on a building site. He grabs Tweety and escapes, but the steel plate on the end of the pulley falls back down and lands on him.

Sylvester then gains access using a dumbwaiter. At the same time, police surround the building. Nick hides Tweety in the dumbwaiter, unaware that Sylvester is in there. Rocky is arrested (and likely Nick too). Sylvester escapes from the apartment block with Tweety and is quickly hailed as a hero by the press, who are unaware that he was only interested in eating the bird. Sylvester is forced to attend a celebration in which the mayor requests Sylvester to kiss Tweety, but he eats him instead, only for the mayor to slap between Sylvester's back and neck, forcing Tweety to land back onstage. Tweety ended the cartoon with "Oooh, he's a bad putty tat!"

Note: One of the broadcast stations at the celebration was KFWB.

Cast

• Mel Blanc as Tweety, Sylvester, Rocky, Nick, Paperboy, News Reporter, Police Officer, Photographer and Mayor.
• Ralph James as Narrator.

Clip reusage

Part of this cartoon was edited into The Looney Looney Looney Bugs Bunny Movie (1981), with new animation showing Bugs Bunny giving Sylvester a badge.

References

1. Beck, Jerry (1991). I Tawt I Taw a Puddy Tat: Fifty Years of Sylvester and Tweety. New York: Henry Holt and Co. p. 117. ISBN   0-8050-1644-9.
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. 245. ISBN   0-8050-0894-2.
3. Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons . Checkmark Books. pp.  151-152. ISBN   0-8160-3831-7 . Retrieved June 6, 2020.

External links

• Catty Cornered at IMDb