Flip the Frog

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Flip the Frog is an animated cartoon character created by American cartoonist, Ub Iwerks. He starred in a series of cartoons produced by Celebrity Pictures and distributed through Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer from 1930 to 1933. Aside from Flip, the series also had many recurring characters including Flip's dog, the mule Orace, and a dizzy neighborhood spinster.

Contents 1 History 2 Filmography 2.1 1930 2.2 1931 2.3 1932 2.4 1933 3 References 4 See also

[edit] History

Flip's origins are said to have been rooted in the Silly Symphony cartoon, Night. The short was animated by Ub Iwerks while working for his colleague and friend Walt Disney in 1930. After a series of disputes between the two, Iwerks left Disney and went on to accept an offer from Pat Powers to open a cartoon studio of his own and receive a salary of $300 a week, an offer that Disney couldn't match at the time. Iwerks was to produce new cartoons under Powers' Celebrity Pictures and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The first series he was to produce was to feature a character called Tony the Frog, but Iwerks disliked the name and it was subsequently changed to Flip.

Flip's debut short was Fiddlesticks (released on August 16, 1930). Although the short looks to be very much like one of Iwerks' Silly Symphony endeavors, it attracted public attention by being the first full-length color sound cartoon ever produced. The short was produced in two-color Technicolor and is the only Flip cartoon known have been processed in color. However, some evidence points to the second Flip short, Flying Fists to have been produced in Technicolor as well and some have speculated that the later Techno-Cracked (1933) may have been photographed in Cinecolor. The Cinecolor process was a new two-strip color process came out in 1932 and was considered superior to the two-strip Technicolor process. Iwerks would go on to make extensive use of this process with his ComiColor Cartoon series.

Iwerks studio quickly began accumulating new talent such as animators Fred Kopietz, Irv Spence, Grim Natwick, and Chuck Jones (who worked at the Iwerks studio as a cel-washer before going on to inbetweening and then animating at the Leon Schlesinger studio). After the first two cartoons, the appearance of Flip the Frog gradually became less frog-like. This was done under the encouragement of MGM who thought that the series would sell better if the character were more humanized. Flip's major redesign is attributed to Grim Natwick who made a name for himself at the Fleischer Studios with the creation of Betty Boop. Natwick also had a hand to changing Flip's girlfriend. In earlier films, she was consistently a cat. Natwick, however, changed that. Flip's new girlfriend, Fifi was now a human who shared distinct similarities with Betty (even down to her spit curls).

The frog's personality also began to develop. As the series progressed, Flip became more of a down-and-out, Chaplin-esque character who always found himself in everyday conflicts surrounding the poverty-stricken atmosphere of the Great Depression. Due to the influx of New York City animators to Iwerks' studio, such as Natwick, the shorts became increasingly risqué. In Room Runners (1932), Flip, out of cash and luck, attempts to sneak out of his hotel in order to avoid paying his past-due rent. One of several gags has Flip watching a girl taking a shower through a keyhole in the door. In The Office Boy, released the same year, Flip tries to secure a low-level office job and meets a shapely secretary. At one point in the short, a mischievous mouse which Flip tries to apprehend scoots up the secretary's skirt. In A Chinaman's Chance (1933), Flip and his dog track down the notorious Chinese criminal, Chow Mein. While investigating in a Chinese laundry, Flip stumbles into an opium den, inhales the stuff via opium pipe, and begins hallucinating.

The character eventually wore out his welcome at MGM. His final short was Soda Squirt, released on October 12, 1933. Subsequently, Iwerks replaced the series with a new one starring an imaginative liar named Willie Whopper. Flip became largely forgotten by the public in the coming years. However, the character would make a small comeback when animation enthusiasts and historians began digging up the old Iwerks shorts. Most of the Flip cartoons are now available on DVD, in particular, on the Cartoons That Time Forgot series.

[edit] Filmography

[edit] 1930

Film	Original release date
Fiddlesticks in Technicolor (2-striped) 1	August 16, 1930
Flying Fists	September 6
The Village Barber	September 27
Little Orphan Willie	October 18
The Cuckoo Murder Case	October 18
Puddle Pranks	December

¹ Filmed in two-color Technicolor

[edit] 1931

Film	Original release date
The Village Smitty	January 31, 1931
The Soup Song	January 31
Laughing Gas	March 14
Ragtime Romeo	May 2
The New Car	July 25
Movie Mad	August 29
The Village Specialist	September 12
Jail Birds	September 26
Africa Squeaks	October 17
Spooks	December 21

[edit] 1932

Film	Original release date
The Milkman	February 20, 1932
Fire! Fire!	March 5
What A Life!	March 26
Puppy Love	April 30
School Days	May 14
The Bully	June 18
The Office Boy	July 16
Room Runners	August 13
Stromy Seas	August 22
Circus	August 27
The Goal Rush	October 3
The Pony Express	October 27
The Music Lesson	October 29
Nurse Maid	November 26
Funny Face	December 24

[edit] 1933

Film	Original release date
Coo Coo the Magician	January 21, 1933
Flip's Lunch Room	April 3
Techno-Cracked	May 8
Bulloney	May 30
A Chinaman's Chance	June 24
Pale-Face	August 12
Soda Squirt	October 12

[edit] References

• Iwerks, Leslie and Kenworthy, John. (2001): The Hand Behind the Mouse. Disney Editions.
• Maltin, Leonard (1987): Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated Cartoons. Penguin Books.
• Lenburg, Jeff (1993): The Great Cartoon Directors. Da Capo Press.

[edit] See also

• The Golden Age of American animation
• Watch Flip's debut in Fiddlesticks (1930) on Archive.org

	The Ub Iwerks Studio (1930–1936)
	Flip the Frog | Willie Whopper | ComiColor Cartoons