Chilly Willy

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This article is about the cartoon character. For the wrestler, see William Jones (wrestler).

Chilly Willy is a cartoon character, a diminutive anthropomorphic penguin living in Fairbanks, Alaska, although the species is native only to the southern hemisphere. He was created by Paul J. Smith for the Walter Lantz studio in 1953. The character soon became the second most popular Lantz/Universal character, behind Woody Woodpecker. His name, though nothing else about him, was probably inspired by film actor Chill Wills.

Chilly Willy was inspired, according to Scott MacGillivray's book "Castle Films: A Hobbyist's Guide," by mystery writer Stuart Palmer. Palmer used the Lantz studio as a background for his novel "Cold Poison," in which the cartoon star was a penguin character, and Lantz adopted the penguin idea for the screen. Chilly's diminutive figure was inspired by an image of Herbert Lee McCormick Jr., a small boy from Fairbanks. Chilly Willy appeared in 50 theatrical short subjects produced by Lantz from 1953 to 1972, most of which involve his attempts to find food or stay warm, and always meeting opposition from a dog named Smedley (voiced by Daws Butler in his "Huckleberry Hound" voice).

There were times, however, when Chilly and Smedley got along, as they did in Vicious Viking and Fractured Friendship. Ironically, Chilly never referred to Smedley by name. Most times that Chilly was in opposition with Smedley, it wound up with the two of them being friends at the end. Chilly was more of a nuisance to Smedley than an enemy, often showing up where Smedley is working, usually for some mean employer.

Two of Chilly's friends, in the later seasons of the show were Maxie the Polar Bear, and Gooney the Albatross (otherwise known as a "Gooney Bird", hence his name). Maxie has appeared with Chilly more than Gooney has. There has been only one cartoon in which all three characters, Gooney, Maxie, and Smedley. have appeared together with Chilly: Airlift a la Carte. Chilly, Maxie, and Gooney, looking for food, go to the store owned by Smedley.

Paul J. Smith directed the first Chilly Willy cartoon, simply titled Chilly Willy, in 1953. Tex Avery revived the character for two of his most notable shorts, I'm Cold (1955) and the Academy Award nominated The Legend of Rockabye Point (1955). After Avery left the studio, the Chilly cartoons were directed by Smith and Alex Lovy, with some 1960's cartoons directed by Jack Hannah and Sid Marcus.

Chilly was mute in most of his 1950s and early 1960s cartoons, although later entries featured Daws Butler providing Chilly's voice, in a style similar to his Elroy Jetson characterization. The character always speaks in the comic book stories based on the character.

When the Lantz cartoons were packaged for television in 1957 as The Woody Woodpecker Show, Chilly Willy was a featured attraction on the show, and has remained such in all later versions of the Woody Woodpecker Show package. He appeared in newly produced animation for the first time in twenty-seven years with FOX Kids' The New Woody Woodpecker Show in 1999. During this time, he had a cameo (although only mentioned) with a few other Lantz studio characters in Who Framed Roger Rabbit? in 1988.

In pop culture, "Chilly Willy" is also the name or subject of a riddle game more commonly known as "What's Behind the Green Glass Door?", usually played by repeating the pattern to people who don't know what the pattern is, in order to see if they can guess it. The simple pattern is: "Chilly Willy loves(hates) X, but he hates(loves) Y," where the thing he loves has at least two repeating letters, and the thing he hates doesn't. For example, "Chilly Willy loves college but he hates learning," or, "Chilly Willy hates alcohol but he loves beer." Obviously, the things that he loves or hates can be nearly identical making the riddle at first seem like total nonsense.

In 1990, a 30 foot (9.1 m) tall Chilly Willy helium-filled parade balloon escaped from its moorings on the morning of the Detroit Thanksgiving Day Parade. It floated 25 miles (40 km) away into Lake St. Clair was recovered by the United States Coast Guard that afternoon near Walpole Island. Later that year the balloon knocked a former parade official off a car dealership roof during a promotional engagement.^[1]

Chilly Willy was mockingly mentioned as one of Eddie Valiant's supposed clients in Who Framed Roger Rabbit.