It
was truly a humbling sight to behold at B-Fest
2004. Despite the presence of films
like Spawn
of the Slithis,
The Beatniks, and a hardcore porn
version of Alice
in Wonderland,
it was a short, Monkey
Business,
featuring a gaggle of singing monkeys,
that broke the back of many a B-Fester
that year. Of course those singing monkeys
were wearing diapers -- and quite a few of
those monkeys had -- very obviously,
soiled themselves. Wow.
Of
course, those monkeys weren't really
talking and singing. They were real
monkeys, whose mouths were animated over
to match the dialogue and songs; poked and
prodded into action by unseen hands -- or
cattle prods, from off screen.
Well,
guess what? I've manage to unearth another
one. This time a full-blown wild western
melodrama complete with a dastardly
villain, a damsel in distress, and valiant
masked hero. All of them monkeys. Hee-hee.
Monkeys in funny hats, that is.
Our
short opens at the farm of Little Orphan
Fanny (--
a monkey in a bonnet and curls),
who is about to lose the farm to Dirty
Dawson (-- another monkey in a
black coat and hat, complete with a long
black Snidely Whiplash mustache).
And Dawson intends to foreclose on the
mortgage at six o'clock that very night
unless she can come up with the money.
After Dawson slinks off, Fanny cries,
loudly, not knowing what to do. Luckily,
her sobs are so loud
they attract the attention of The Lone
Stranger (-- yet another monkey
with a hat, badge and domino mask).
Putting
the spurs to his faithful horse, Plastic (--
a Great Dane), because he's always
ready, willing and able to help out a
pretty girl (-- it's the code of
the west and all that, and if you don't
know what that is, go watch Rustler's
Rhapsody),
the Stranger confronts Dawson at his
office. And after a quick exchange of
insults, they fight.
Alas,
they must have started to fling their own
poop at each other because the censor steps
in, denying us the privilege of watching
two monkeys dressed as cowboys beating the
snot out of each other ... Even though we
didn't get to see it, Dawson
gets his comeuppance, but the mortgage
still has to be paid. The Stranger tries
to raise some money, but all of his
ventures -- a lemonade stand, a paper
route and selling Fuller Brushes door to
door -- net him not one red cent. Discouraged,
the Stranger heads to the old Rot Gut
Saloon for a sarsaparilla to drown his
sorrows, where the saloon girl (--
another monkey), belts out a
divaesque tune, much to the audience's
delight. Especially the Stranger, who
flips so bad for her he winds up in the
rafters.
Meanwhile,
as the clock ticks closer to six, when
Fanny wonders what's become of her hero, the
narrator rats him out, telling her he's at
the saloon making googley-eyes at the
saloon girl ... Well,
he was making eyes at her, but now he's
more interested in the money being thrown
at her in appreciation of her musical
talents. Taking up a guitar, the Stranger
cranks out an old folk number about the
weariness of women. It brings tears from
the audience but very little money. But
when Fanny tells him to kick up a notch,
the Stranger is magically joined by a
crazed drummer and a possessed piano
player, and laying down a crazy meringue
beat, this proves more to the audiences
liking and the money flows in, more than
enough to cover the mortgage payment.
The
farm is saved!
(Whew.) And Dirty Dawson is
foiled, who admits they've made a jack-ass
out him. (And we'll just let you
envision that last visual joke.)
The
End
And
here you thought The
Terror of Tiny Town
would be the most [expletive deleted]-up
western you'd ever see.
Back
in the day, I remember watching an
interview with one of the stars of Battlestar
Galactica,
I think it was Dirk Benedict, who talked
about the chimpanzee that inhabited the
costume for Muffit: the robot dog.
Apparently, the chimp was pretty
temperamental, and when it wouldn't
cooperate, the trainer would take him back
stage for a little "persuasion"
session, after which shooting would
commence.
And
when I say "persuasion" I don't
mean giving him a banana.
It's
stories like that one that can make you
cringe a little while watching shorts like
this one. Who knows what kind of
persuasive training is involved to get the
monkeys to do what they do. It
all seems harmless enough, though, in this
instance. (Except
for the very visible string tying the
Strangers hand to his guitar. Yikes.)
The
film was directed by Lou Lilly, who had
another talking animal short, Down
on the Farm.
Lilly was a gag-man for Leon Schlesinger's
Looney Tunes, making him one of the
denizens of the famed Termite Terrace.
Lilly had a hand in several of Bob
Clampett's surreal shorts, most of them
turned out as propaganda pieces during
World War II. The two most recognizable
are Russian
Rhapsody,
featuring the singing "Gremlins
from the Kremlin" who torment Hitler
on a flight to bomb Moscow (--
and if you look closely, most of those
gremlins are caricatures of Schlesinger's
staff.) The second was Draftee
Daffy,
where no matter where he goes or what he
does, Daffy can't get away from his draft
board representative
(-- who resembles a bowling pin).
Lilly also had a hand in the truly bizarre Hare
Ribbin',
but his biggest contribution was the
co-creation of the Red-Hot Ryder character
for Buckaroo
Bugs.
Ryder would morph slighty for the
following year's Hare
Trigger
short, but you probably know him better
now as Yosemite Sam.
Lilly
co-wrote this piece with Charles Shows,
who would go on to work on the
Hanna-Barbera staples, Yogi
Bear, Huckleberry
Hound
and Pixie
and Dixie.
There's some familiar voices, but I'm not
sure if Fanny was Julie Bennet, June Foray
or Bea Benederat. Anna Osborn headed up
the animation for the project, and the
whole thing fell under the UM&M TV
Corp banner. But, of course, the stars of
the project were Tippy and Cobina, the
feature attractions of Manuel Vierra's
Musical Pets Revue.
Lilly
might have had a hand in more of those old
cartoons, but we'll never know for sure
because the credits weren't all inclusive
until right before he left the studio to
form his own advertising company. His
experience with Clampett and Chuck Jones,
and their signature influence, sure shows
up in The
Lonesome Stranger,
though. And that's why The
Lonesome Stranger
isn't quite as traumatizing an experience
as Monkey
Business.
(And
in retrospect, Monkey
Business
wasn't all that bad, a lot of us had just
been up way too long at the time we saw
it.) There are some really funny
gags to be had -- if you can keep your
eyes open during all the groan inducing
bits.
|