{"id":24165,"date":"2017-02-10T08:37:27","date_gmt":"2017-02-10T13:37:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=24165"},"modified":"2017-12-09T18:22:03","modified_gmt":"2017-12-09T23:22:03","slug":"the-bootleg-files-a-day-at-the-horse-opera","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2017\/02\/10\/the-bootleg-files-a-day-at-the-horse-opera\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bootleg Files: A Day at the Horse Opera"},"content":{"rendered":"

BOOTLEG FILES 576:<\/strong> \u201cA Day at the Horse Opera\u201d (1966 animated short inspired by the Marx Brothers).<\/p>\n

LAST SEEN:<\/strong> An unauthorized video dupe is floating around Facebook.<\/p>\n

AMERICAN HOME VIDEO:<\/strong> None.<\/p>\n

REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS:<\/strong> A possible problem with rights clearance.<\/p>\n

CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE:<\/strong> Not likely at this time.<\/p>\n

On February 14, 1966, the trade publication Broadcasting Magazine carried an advertisement from Filmation Associates for a proposed series titled \u201cThe New Marx Brothers Show.\u201d The series was to consist of 156 animated shorts featuring characters inspired by Groucho, Harpo and Chico Marx. (Yeah, no love for Zeppo, again!)<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

This endeavor seemed to have been inspired by the commercial success of Cambria Studios\u2019 syndicated cartoon show \u201cThe New Three Stooges,\u201d which created new animated adventures for Moe, Larry and Curly-Joe. That program debuted in 1965 and obviously inspired another animation company, Hanna-Barbera, to create syndicated cartoon series based on two other classic comedy teams, Abbott and Costello and Laurel and Hardy.<\/p>\n

But \u201cThe New Marx Brothers Show\u201d never occurred. Only a single pilot episode was created, and it remained unseen for 46 years.<\/p>\n

Lou Scheimer, the co-founder of Filmation, recalled in his 2012 autobiography that Groucho was signed as a technical adviser for the project, but the 77-year-old was not up to the task of doing the voice performance for his character. Comic actor Pat Harrington was hired and he did a spot-on imitation that perfectly captured the sedate, \u201cYou Bet Your Life\u201d-era comic\u2019s vocal style. Ted Knight, who was then an under-the-radar character actor, voiced Chico and most of the other male characters in the short, while veteran funnyman Joe Besser was tapped to bring his highly distinctive voice for a single role. Comedy writers Jay Burton and Mort Goode teamed with Termite Terrace icon Michael Maltese on the script, while Filmation co-founder and former Disney artist Hal Sutherland directed the pilot.<\/p>\n

The resulting work, titled \u201cA Day at the Horse Opera,\u201d didn\u2019t capture the brilliant anarchy of the Marx Brothers classics. But despite the limits of Filmation\u2019s flat animation, the short was a charming effort that offered some amusing moments.<\/p>\n

Groucho\u2019s opening narration informs the viewer that the short takes place \u201c100 years ago BC \u2013 that\u2019s before credit cards\u201d while Harpo happily swings on a statue of Horace Greeley pointing westward. Greeley\u2019s celebrated advice to \u201cgo west, young man\u201d is accentuated when the giant statue unexpectedly kicks Harpo into the air towards the Wild West. Alas, a hostile tribe of Indians has driven the U.S. Cavalry from their fort. This creates chaos in Washington, where a meeting of generals and senators decide to send a peace emissary to mollify the Indians. But the Indian chief (voiced by Joe Besser, packing in his sublime whiny intensity) refuses to consider a peace treaty until his daughter Minnie Ho-Ho marries a man that resembles a rock formation called The Great Stoneface. And, no, the formation looks nothing like Buster Keaton \u2013 but it is the spitting image of Groucho.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Groucho (brandishing his trademark cigar \u2013 remember, you could still smoke in cartoons in the 1960s) and his brothers are running a shady medicine show when an irate customer complains that the hair tonic he purchased from them grew dandelions on his scalp. \u201cWhy don\u2019t you rub some on your chest and become your own lawn?\u201d Groucho asks before the Marxes beat a hasty exit and wind up at the Indians\u2019 camp. The Washington emissary becomes ecstatic when he sees Groucho, for he believes that his resemblance to The Great Stoneface will result in the marriage needed to secure peace.<\/p>\n

\u201cI must get to the White House immediately,\u201d the emissary says. Groucho pauses, looks at the camera and deadpans, \u201cSpoken like a true Republican. But I don\u2019t think he\u2019ll make it either.\u201d Groucho then sees The Great Stoneface formation and quips, \u201cI must have posed for that when I was stoned.\u201d But when Minnie Ho-Ho appears and is revealed to be a giggling behemoth, Groucho remarks, \u201cFor a minute I thought it was King Kong in a nightgown.\u201d<\/p>\n

Groucho and his brothers escape to the abandoned fort to fend off the unwanted marriage ceremony. The chief has his secretary \u2013 a pretty young woman sitting a desk with a typewriter that sends off smoke signals \u2013 summon all warriors. The Marx Brothers fight off the Indians by themselves \u2013 Harpo uses his harp as an oversized bow to send multiple arrows at once, while his top hat has a mechanized device that shoots off a revolver and lights a match to fire a cannon. The chief fires a rocket into the fort and it lands in the ground without exploding, although a ticking noise is heard. \u201cIt can\u2019t be a time bomb because they haven\u2019t been invented yet,\u201d Groucho exclaims.<\/p>\n

In the end, Groucho forces the peace emissary into a Groucho disguise and throws him at the chief, who throws him at the elated Minnie Ho-Ho. The emissary looks sadly at the camera and riffs on a classic \u201cMy Fair Lady\u201d tune by sighing, \u201cI\u2019ll never grow accustomed to her face.\u201d<\/p>\n

For a short running less than seven minutes, \u201cA Day at the Horse Opera\u201d packs a lot sight gags and a surprising amount of topical humor, including references to Jack Benny, Dr. Spock and the perennial struggles of baseball\u2019s Washington Senators. There is even a tribute to \u201cYou Bet Your Life,\u201d with a descending stuffed duck arriving (on Groucho\u2019s head) at the utterance of the secret word. Mercifully, the comic depiction of American Indians was not racially offensive \u2013 and how can anyone be upset over the concept of Joe Besser as a tribal warrior?<\/p>\n

Alas, \u201cA Day at the Horse Opera\u201d was met with disinterest and no offers were put forth to bring \u201cThe New Marx Brothers Show\u201d to life. Filmation found its groove later in 1966 with a series based on the Superman comic strip, and in 1968 it produced \u201cThe Archie Show\u201d \u2013 which, as every Saturday morning television fan knows, was the source for the pop music classic \u201cSugar, Sugar.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is no record that \u201cA Day at the Horse Opera\u201d was ever telecast, and the short was filed away and forgotten. A 2009 posting on Jerry Beck\u2019s influential Cartoon Brew website presented a copy of the Broadcasting Magazine advertisement, and in 2012 Lou Scheimer screened the short for an astonished audience at the San Diego Comic-Con. An audience member shot a video of the screening on his cell phone, and for a while this was the only way people could see \u201cA Day at the Horse Opera.\u201d<\/p>\n

Today, a collector-to-collector operation specializing in grey market material is offering a none-too-pristine copy of \u201cA Day at the Horse Opera\u201d along with other Filmation pilots that never sold. A video of this short<\/a> is circulating on Facebook among animation aficionados, and it may eventually turn up on other video sites. Getting a proper home entertainment release would involve clearing the rights to the Marx Brothers\u2019 estate to use their characters, and the commercial viability of this effort is, at best, somewhat minimal.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, \u201cA Day at the Horse Opera\u201d is a pleasant surprise and it is easy to wonder how Filmation could have followed this with another 155 cartoons featuring the Marx Brothers characters. And speaking of long-running series, this marks the return from a two-year break of The Bootleg Files, which ran for 12 years and 575 columns at another site<\/a>. (You can check out those older columns here.) Many of the titles featured in this column are based on suggestions from readers \u2013 this week\u2019s offering was brought to my attention by animation expert Chris Sobieniak \u2013 and if you have any suggestions for future columns, please leave your comments at the bottom of this page.<\/p>\n

Yes, it\u2019s great to be back. See you next Friday with more bootleg fun!<\/p>\n

IMPORTANT NOTICE: While this weekly column acknowledges the presence of rare film and television productions through the so-called collector-to-collector market, this should not be seen as encouraging or condoning the unauthorized duplication and distribution of copyright-protected material, either through DVDs or Blu-ray discs or through postings on Internet video sites.<\/em><\/p>\n

Listen to Phil Hall’s weekly SoundCloud podcast “The Online Movie Show<\/a>,” with a new episode every Monday.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BOOTLEG FILES 576: \u201cA Day at the Horse Opera\u201d (1966 animated short inspired by the Marx Brothers). LAST SEEN: An unauthorized video dupe is floating around Facebook. AMERICAN HOME VIDEO: None. REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS: A possible problem with rights clearance. CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE: Not likely at this time. On February […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":24166,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1513],"tags":[1564,99,1563,636,771,1566,1565],"class_list":["post-24165","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bootleg-files","tag-a-day-at-the-horse-opera","tag-animation","tag-filmation","tag-marx-brothers","tag-phil-hall","tag-the-bootleg-files","tag-tv-pilot"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24165","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24165"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24165\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27118,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24165\/revisions\/27118"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24166"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24165"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24165"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24165"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}