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The Dover Boys at Pimento University; or, The Rivals of Roquefort Hall

December 31, 2022

The Dover Boys at Pimento University; or, The Rivals of Roquefort Hall (also known as The Dover Boys) is a 1942 Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies cartoon directed by Chuck Jones.[1] The short was released on September 19, 1942.[2] The cartoon is a parody of the Rover Boys, a popular juvenile fiction book series of the early 20th century.[3]

"The Dover Boys at Pimento University"; or, "The Rivals of Roquefort Hall"
Directed byCharles M. Jones
Story byTed Pierce
Produced byLeon Schlesinger
Music byCarl W. Stalling
Animation byRobert Cannon
Color processTechnicolor
Production
company
Distributed byWarner Bros. Pictures
The Vitaphone Corporation
Release date
  • September 19, 1942 (1942-09-19)
Running time
8:56
LanguageEnglish

It is one of the first cartoons to make extensive use of limited animation, as well as other techniques that would only be more broadly popularized in the 1950s. Animation historian Michael Barrier writes: "Is The Dover Boys the first 'modern' cartoon? …Chuck Jones stylized the animation in this cartoon in a way that anticipated what several consciously modern studios like UPA would be doing a decade later."[4]

In 1994, the cartoon was voted No. 49 of The 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field.[5]

Plot

PLAY The Dover Boys at Pimento University or The Rivals of Roquefort Hall (1942); runtime 00:08:56.

The scene descends upon Pimento University ("good old P.U."), and the school anthem is sung in a 1910s barbershop style.

The narrator then introduces the three inseparable Dover brothers: athletic oldest brother Tom (on a tandem bicycle with a perpetual wheelie), middle child Dick (on a self-propelled penny-farthing whose pedals are too far away for Dick to reach), and portly, curly-haired youngest brother Larry (on a tricycle). "A gay outing at the park has been planned by the merry trio, and they are off to fetch 'their' fiancée, dainty Dora Standpipe, at Miss Cheddar's Female Academy, close by."

The Boys are called upon to rescue Dora when she is kidnapped by the nefarious stock villain Dan Backslide. "The former sneak of Roquefort Hall, coward, bully, cad, and thief, and arch-enemy of the Dover Boys," his feelings for Dora are summed up in his comment, "How I love her! … (father's money!)" Backslide then steals a conveniently placed, unoccupied runabout (after loudly declaring his intention to do so, claiming that "No one will ever know!"), which he uses to kidnap an oblivious Dora while she and the Dover Boys are playing hide-and-seek, spiriting her away to a remote mountain lodge. But Backslide soon discovers that, despite appearances, Dora is anything but dainty; she proceeds to administer a sound thrashing to the villain, all the while acting the damsel in distress—crying for help and pounding on the door (with the locks on her side) and on Backslide—until he is himself crying out for help from Tom, Dick, and Larry.

Although the boys had heard Dora's cries for help, it is not until "an alert young scout" witnesses Dora's captivity, then sends a distress signal via semaphore, then via telegram, to the boys that they respond by breaking the messenger's tandem bike into three unicycles and race to the scene. When the Dover Boys finally arrive, they lay a few punches on the by-now barely conscious Backslide before managing to knock each other out in unison as Backslide collapses to the floor safely beneath their swinging fists. Dora is then escorted away by an odd grey-bearded man in a nineteenth-century bathing suit and sailor's cap who was a running gag throughout the cartoon, appearing periodically to interrupt the story by shuffling across the screen to the tune of Ed Haley's "While Strolling Through the Park One Day". He and Dora proceed to shuffle off into the sunset as the cartoon concludes with a Silent-Film era iris out.

Production

 
The cartoon was a parody of 1910s book series The Rover Boys; above is an illustration from the book. The cartoon's background art may be inspired by the book's illustrations.

According to Jones, Schlesinger and the Warner Bros. studio executives were less than pleased when they screened The Dover Boys because of the extensive use of limited animation and drybrush smears, and the executives went through the process of attempting to fire him despite the fact that the studio wanted him to abandon his Disney-like animation.[6][7] A replacement for Jones could not be easily found due to labor shortages stemming from World War II, so he was kept aboard.

From time to time throughout the cartoon, the Boys lapse into various renditions of their alma mater, bearing resemblance to "The Rose of No Man's Land" and George Cooper and Henry Tucker's "Sweet Genevieve": "Pimento U, Oh sweet P.U., thy fragrant odor scents the air" etc.

The entire cartoon is filled with puns on the Rover Boys series: The occurrences of the names Pimento, Cheddar, and Roquefort reflect the Rover Boys' old school of Colby Hall; Tom, Dick and Larry borrow their names from Tom, Sam and Dick Rover (as well as the generic names Tom, Dick and Harry), Dora Standpipe is named after Tom Rover's fiancée Dora Stanhope, and Dan Backslide is named after Rover Boys villain Dan Baxter.

Although voice credits from Warner Bros. cartoons are not easy to find beyond Mel Blanc (who, using more or less his normal voice, portrays Dan Backslide), it is assumed that John McLeish voiced the part of the narrator (he performed a similar role as the stately, unctuous narrator on several Goofy shorts for the Disney studio).[8] The voice of Tom Dover was performed by long-time Termite Terrace writer Tedd Pierce, who also provided the story. Vocal harmonies were provided by The Sportsmen Quartet, from Jack Benny's radio program. Dora was voiced by Bea Benaderet. Dan Backslide's character design was a caricature of Jones' animator Ken Harris.[9] McLeish also narrated the cartoon The Rocky Road to Ruin of Color Rhapsody from Columbia Pictures and Screen Gems, adding to the similarity between it and The Dover Boys on top of similar character design and what was then called the "modern" visual style of cartoons, which evolved into the UPA style.[10]

Legacy

The characters Tom, Dick, and Larry later made cameo appearances (voiced respectively by Jon Bauman, Jeff Bennett and Rob Paulsen) on the 1990s Fox and WB network series Animaniacs, alongside Slappy Squirrel in "Frontier Slappy", while singing discrediting lyrics about Daniel Boone (voiced by Jim Cummings) until they get fired by him,[11] the Warners in "Magic Time", and in Wakko's Wish. A short clip of this cartoon is featured in the opening credits of "Less Than Hero", an episode of another Fox TV show, Futurama. They also appeared cheering in the stands late in the 1996 animation/live-action movie Space Jam. A segment of the cartoon is featured briefly in an episode of Agent Carter where it is used as part of a subliminal messaging tool of the Black Widow program.

With the advent of the Internet, the short gained newfound attention from younger generations, in part because it is one of the few Warner Bros. shorts from that era that fell into the public domain, although it has seen releases from MGM/UA Home Video and Warner Home Video.[12][13][14] The younger generation were drawn to the animation style, absurd and non sequitur humor, and the satire of the 1910s. The cartoon has led to many internet memes as a result, one being Dan's quote "A runabout? I'll steal it! No one will ever know!".

In 2018, to mark the short's 76th anniversary, a collaborative effort of over 90 independent animators recreated the short scene for scene with each animator drawing in their own style.[15] The reanimated collaboration, titled “The Dover Boys Reanimated Collab!”, was curated by animator Josh 'Zeurel' Palmer and was released on August 27, 2018, on YouTube, receiving nearly three million views.[16][17][18]

See also

References

  1. ^ Beck, Jerry; Friedwald, Will (1989). Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies: A Complete Illustrated Guide to the Warner Bros. Cartoons. Henry Holt and Co By. Mr. A. p. 133. ISBN 0-8050-0894-2.
  2. ^ Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. pp. 104–106. ISBN 0-8160-3831-7. Retrieved June 6, 2020.
  3. ^ Maltin, Leonard (1987). Of Mice And Magic: A History Of American Animated Cartoons (Revised ed.). New York, NY: Plume. p. 427. ISBN 978-0-452-25993-5.
  4. ^ Beck, Jerry, ed. (2020). The 100 Greatest Looney Tunes Cartoons. Insight Editions. p. 53. ISBN 978-1-64722-137-9.
  5. ^ Beck, Jerry (1994). The 50 Greatest Cartoons: As Selected by 1,000 Animation Professionals. Turner Publishing. ISBN 978-1878685490.
  6. ^ Beck, Jerry (editor) (1994). Jones did so, going to extremes. Whereas Disney was renowned for its painstaking quality and detail, Jones deliberately set out to animate the story as crudely as possible, for humorous effect. The 50 Greatest Cartoons. Atlanta: Turner Publishing. Pg. 182.
  7. ^ Chuck Jones: Extremes and In-betweens - A Life in Animation (PBS 2000)
  8. ^ Barrier, Michael. "Interviews: John McGrew". from the original on September 28, 2010. Retrieved January 29, 2010.
  9. ^ Canemaker, John (March 1980). "Chuck Jones". Cartoonists PROfiles (45): 14–19. from the original on May 25, 2012. Retrieved January 29, 2010.
  10. ^ Adam Abraham (2012). When Magoo Flew: The Rise and Fall of Animation Studio UPA. Wesleyan University Press. pp. 38–40.
  11. ^ "The Dover Boys on Animaniacs". from the original on August 28, 2018. Retrieved September 8, 2018 – via www.youtube.com.
  12. ^ "Night Flight 60s Episode NBC WOC 1991 10" – via Internet Archive.
  13. ^ "The Dover Boys (1942)". from the original on November 6, 2019. Retrieved September 7, 2018 – via www.youtube.com.
  14. ^ Weinman, Jaime (June 17, 2016). "We're looney for 'The Dover Boys'". Macleans.ca. Retrieved June 29, 2022.
  15. ^ Amidi, Amid (September 3, 2018). "Over 90 Animators Worked Together To Re-Animate The Classic Cartoon 'Dover Boys'". Cartoon Brew. from the original on October 9, 2018. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
  16. ^ Martín, Rafa. "Más de 90 animadores homenajean un clásico: The Dover Boys". Las Horas Perdidas (in European Spanish). Retrieved June 29, 2022.
  17. ^ The Dover Boys ReAnimated Collab!, retrieved June 29, 2022
  18. ^ "#JusticeForSpongebob: What Is Spongebob Movie Rehydrated?". ScreenRant. May 3, 2022. Retrieved June 29, 2022.

External links

  • The Dover Boys at Pimento University or The Rivals of Roquefort Hall at IMDb
  • The Dover Boys at Pimento University or The Rivals of Roquefort Hall at The Big Cartoon DataBase
  • The Dover Boys on YouTube

December 31, 2022
dover, boys, pimento, university, rivals, roquefort, hall, also, known, dover, boys, 1942, warner, bros, merrie, melodies, cartoon, directed, chuck, jones, short, released, september, 1942, cartoon, parody, rover, boys, popular, juvenile, fiction, book, series. The Dover Boys at Pimento University or The Rivals of Roquefort Hall also known as The Dover Boys is a 1942 Warner Bros Merrie Melodies cartoon directed by Chuck Jones 1 The short was released on September 19 1942 2 The cartoon is a parody of the Rover Boys a popular juvenile fiction book series of the early 20th century 3 The Dover Boys at Pimento University or The Rivals of Roquefort Hall Directed byCharles M JonesStory byTed PierceProduced byLeon SchlesingerMusic byCarl W StallingAnimation byRobert CannonColor processTechnicolorProductioncompanyLeon Schlesinger ProductionsDistributed byWarner Bros PicturesThe Vitaphone CorporationRelease dateSeptember 19 1942 1942 09 19 Running time8 56LanguageEnglishIt is one of the first cartoons to make extensive use of limited animation as well as other techniques that would only be more broadly popularized in the 1950s Animation historian Michael Barrier writes Is The Dover Boys the first modern cartoon Chuck Jones stylized the animation in this cartoon in a way that anticipated what several consciously modern studios like UPA would be doing a decade later 4 In 1994 the cartoon was voted No 49 of The 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field 5 Contents 1 Plot 2 Production 3 Legacy 4 See also 5 References 6 External linksPlot Edit source source source source source source source source source source source source source source track PLAY The Dover Boys at Pimento University or The Rivals of Roquefort Hall 1942 runtime 00 08 56 The scene descends upon Pimento University good old P U and the school anthem is sung in a 1910s barbershop style The narrator then introduces the three inseparable Dover brothers athletic oldest brother Tom on a tandem bicycle with a perpetual wheelie middle child Dick on a self propelled penny farthing whose pedals are too far away for Dick to reach and portly curly haired youngest brother Larry on a tricycle A gay outing at the park has been planned by the merry trio and they are off to fetch their fiancee dainty Dora Standpipe at Miss Cheddar s Female Academy close by The Boys are called upon to rescue Dora when she is kidnapped by the nefarious stock villain Dan Backslide The former sneak of Roquefort Hall coward bully cad and thief and arch enemy of the Dover Boys his feelings for Dora are summed up in his comment How I love her father s money Backslide then steals a conveniently placed unoccupied runabout after loudly declaring his intention to do so claiming that No one will ever know which he uses to kidnap an oblivious Dora while she and the Dover Boys are playing hide and seek spiriting her away to a remote mountain lodge But Backslide soon discovers that despite appearances Dora is anything but dainty she proceeds to administer a sound thrashing to the villain all the while acting the damsel in distress crying for help and pounding on the door with the locks on her side and on Backslide until he is himself crying out for help from Tom Dick and Larry Although the boys had heard Dora s cries for help it is not until an alert young scout witnesses Dora s captivity then sends a distress signal via semaphore then via telegram to the boys that they respond by breaking the messenger s tandem bike into three unicycles and race to the scene When the Dover Boys finally arrive they lay a few punches on the by now barely conscious Backslide before managing to knock each other out in unison as Backslide collapses to the floor safely beneath their swinging fists Dora is then escorted away by an odd grey bearded man in a nineteenth century bathing suit and sailor s cap who was a running gag throughout the cartoon appearing periodically to interrupt the story by shuffling across the screen to the tune of Ed Haley s While Strolling Through the Park One Day He and Dora proceed to shuffle off into the sunset as the cartoon concludes with a Silent Film era iris out Production Edit The cartoon was a parody of 1910s book series The Rover Boys above is an illustration from the book The cartoon s background art may be inspired by the book s illustrations According to Jones Schlesinger and the Warner Bros studio executives were less than pleased when they screened The Dover Boys because of the extensive use of limited animation and drybrush smears and the executives went through the process of attempting to fire him despite the fact that the studio wanted him to abandon his Disney like animation 6 7 A replacement for Jones could not be easily found due to labor shortages stemming from World War II so he was kept aboard From time to time throughout the cartoon the Boys lapse into various renditions of their alma mater bearing resemblance to The Rose of No Man s Land and George Cooper and Henry Tucker s Sweet Genevieve Pimento U Oh sweet P U thy fragrant odor scents the air etc The entire cartoon is filled with puns on the Rover Boys series The occurrences of the names Pimento Cheddar and Roquefort reflect the Rover Boys old school of Colby Hall Tom Dick and Larry borrow their names from Tom Sam and Dick Rover as well as the generic names Tom Dick and Harry Dora Standpipe is named after Tom Rover s fiancee Dora Stanhope and Dan Backslide is named after Rover Boys villain Dan Baxter Although voice credits from Warner Bros cartoons are not easy to find beyond Mel Blanc who using more or less his normal voice portrays Dan Backslide it is assumed that John McLeish voiced the part of the narrator he performed a similar role as the stately unctuous narrator on several Goofy shorts for the Disney studio 8 The voice of Tom Dover was performed by long time Termite Terrace writer Tedd Pierce who also provided the story Vocal harmonies were provided by The Sportsmen Quartet from Jack Benny s radio program Dora was voiced by Bea Benaderet Dan Backslide s character design was a caricature of Jones animator Ken Harris 9 McLeish also narrated the cartoon The Rocky Road to Ruin of Color Rhapsody from Columbia Pictures and Screen Gems adding to the similarity between it and The Dover Boys on top of similar character design and what was then called the modern visual style of cartoons which evolved into the UPA style 10 Legacy EditThe characters Tom Dick and Larry later made cameo appearances voiced respectively by Jon Bauman Jeff Bennett and Rob Paulsen on the 1990s Fox and WB network series Animaniacs alongside Slappy Squirrel in Frontier Slappy while singing discrediting lyrics about Daniel Boone voiced by Jim Cummings until they get fired by him 11 the Warners in Magic Time and in Wakko s Wish A short clip of this cartoon is featured in the opening credits of Less Than Hero an episode of another Fox TV show Futurama They also appeared cheering in the stands late in the 1996 animation live action movie Space Jam A segment of the cartoon is featured briefly in an episode of Agent Carter where it is used as part of a subliminal messaging tool of the Black Widow program With the advent of the Internet the short gained newfound attention from younger generations in part because it is one of the few Warner Bros shorts from that era that fell into the public domain although it has seen releases from MGM UA Home Video and Warner Home Video 12 13 14 The younger generation were drawn to the animation style absurd and non sequitur humor and the satire of the 1910s The cartoon has led to many internet memes as a result one being Dan s quote A runabout I ll steal it No one will ever know In 2018 to mark the short s 76th anniversary a collaborative effort of over 90 independent animators recreated the short scene for scene with each animator drawing in their own style 15 The reanimated collaboration titled The Dover Boys Reanimated Collab was curated by animator Josh Zeurel Palmer and was released on August 27 2018 on YouTube receiving nearly three million views 16 17 18 See also EditLooney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography 1940 1949 List of animated films in the public domain in the United StatesReferences Edit Beck Jerry Friedwald Will 1989 Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies A Complete Illustrated Guide to the Warner Bros Cartoons Henry Holt and Co By Mr A p 133 ISBN 0 8050 0894 2 Lenburg Jeff 1999 The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons Checkmark Books pp 104 106 ISBN 0 8160 3831 7 Retrieved June 6 2020 Maltin Leonard 1987 Of Mice And Magic A History Of American Animated Cartoons Revised ed New York NY Plume p 427 ISBN 978 0 452 25993 5 Beck Jerry ed 2020 The 100 Greatest Looney Tunes Cartoons Insight Editions p 53 ISBN 978 1 64722 137 9 Beck Jerry 1994 The 50 Greatest Cartoons As Selected by 1 000 Animation Professionals Turner Publishing ISBN 978 1878685490 Beck Jerry editor 1994 Jones did so going to extremes Whereas Disney was renowned for its painstaking quality and detail Jones deliberately set out to animate the story as crudely as possible for humorous effect The 50 Greatest Cartoons Atlanta Turner Publishing Pg 182 Chuck Jones Extremes and In betweens A Life in Animation PBS 2000 Barrier Michael Interviews John McGrew Archived from the original on September 28 2010 Retrieved January 29 2010 Canemaker John March 1980 Chuck Jones Cartoonists PROfiles 45 14 19 Archived from the original on May 25 2012 Retrieved January 29 2010 Adam Abraham 2012 When Magoo Flew The Rise and Fall of Animation Studio UPA Wesleyan University Press pp 38 40 The Dover Boys on Animaniacs Archived from the original on August 28 2018 Retrieved September 8 2018 via www youtube com Night Flight 60s Episode NBC WOC 1991 10 via Internet Archive The Dover Boys 1942 Archived from the original on November 6 2019 Retrieved September 7 2018 via www youtube com Weinman Jaime June 17 2016 We re looney for The Dover Boys Macleans ca Retrieved June 29 2022 Amidi Amid September 3 2018 Over 90 Animators Worked Together To Re Animate The Classic Cartoon Dover Boys Cartoon Brew Archived from the original on October 9 2018 Retrieved September 3 2018 Martin Rafa Mas de 90 animadores homenajean un clasico The Dover Boys Las Horas Perdidas in European Spanish Retrieved June 29 2022 The Dover Boys ReAnimated Collab retrieved June 29 2022 JusticeForSpongebob What Is Spongebob Movie Rehydrated ScreenRant May 3 2022 Retrieved June 29 2022 External links EditThe Dover Boys at Pimento University or The Rivals of Roquefort Hall at IMDb The Dover Boys at Pimento University or The Rivals of Roquefort Hall at The Big Cartoon DataBase The Dover Boys on YouTube Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title The Dover Boys at Pimento University or The Rivals of Roquefort Hall amp oldid 1124220295, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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