Mouse Cleaning
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| Mouse Cleaning
Tom and Jerry series |
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 The title card of Mouse Cleaning |
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| Directed by | William Hanna Joseph Barbera |
| Produced by | Fred Quimby |
| Voices by | Lillian Randolph (as Mammy Two Shoes, uncredited) |
| Music by | Scott Bradley |
| Animation by | Ray Patterson Irven Spence Kenneth Muse Ed Barge |
| Studio | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| Distributed by | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| Release date(s) | December 11, 1948 |
| Color process | Technicolor |
| Running time | 7 min 23 secs. |
| Preceded by | Professor Tom |
| Followed by | Polka-Dot Puss |
| IMDb profile | |
Mouse Cleaning is a 1948 animated cartoon short subject, starring Tom and Jerry. It was produced in Technicolor and released to theatres on December 11, 1948 by Metro-Goldwyn Mayer. It was animated by Ray Patterson, Irven Spence, Kenneth Muse and Ed Barge, who were the usual animators for the Tom and Jerry cartoons in the early 1940s up until the late 1950s. As per most Tom and Jerry cartoons, it was directed by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, and produced by Fred Quimby. The music was scored by Scott Bradley and the backgrounds were by Robert Gentle.
[edit] Plot
The cartoon opens with Mammy Two Shoes mopping the kitchen floor. As she stands up straight, her back cracks and she says, "That's that. The whole house is clean and brother, it better stay that way."
Then we see Tom chasing Jerry outside. Tom rounds a corner too wide and ends up running through a mud puddle. He runs into the house, leaving mud all over Mammy's clean kitchen floor. He runs into Mammy and she hits him with the mop saying, "Hold on there you no good cat! Just look what you done to my clean floor! Get up here! Take this mop! Now start cleaning!" Tom then starts to mop. As he finishes, Mammy walks pass Tom with her coat and gloves on. She tells Tom, "And furthermore, if I find one spot of dirt in this house when I get back, we is gonna be minus one cat around here. Understand?" Tom nods his head and Mammy leaves. Jerry has overheard what Mammy has said and nods his head in agreement. After Mammy closes the door, Tom sticks his tongue out at her and makes a face. But she opens the door and points her finger at Tom saying, "And keep it clean." Tom then nods again and kisses her finger, smiling politely.
Jerry does his very best to sabotage Tom's cleaning routine. Tom looks over and screams in horror when he sees Jerry scooping ashes from an ashtray onto the floor. Tom quickly grabs a broom and dustpan and cleans up the mess. He gets angry and hurls a tomato at Jerry. The tomato misses by about an inch and splatters into the wall making an even bigger mess for Tom to clean. Tom grabs a bucket and starts to clean the wall. But Jerry grabs an ink pen and ejects ink into the water bucket turning the water blue. Tom doesn't notice the water change and he makes another big mess. When he realizes this, he starts to chase after Jerry who is standing in front of the drapes with the ink pen, threatening to squirt ink over the drapes. But when he tries, the pen appears to be empty. Tom then grabs the pen and goes to empty it and he ends up shooting the last bit of ink onto the drapes. In horror, he grabs the drapes and runs them through the washing machine. He runs them through the wringer, irons it, and puts it back. Now Tom is exhausted from all the work he has done.
Tom then looks over at Jerry who is juggling eggs while walking a tightrope. Jerry then throws the eggs toward the kitchen drawers and Tom has to catch them and start juggling himself. Then Jerry starts spinning a cream pie on a fork. Jerry throws the pie and Tom catches it and balances it on his nose while still juggling. Jerry then pulls the rug from under Tom causing everything to go up in the air. Tom grabs the egg carton and safely puts the eggs back but the pie ends up hitting him in the face and making a mess. Jerry then opens the front door and an old horse then walks into the house (whose potential for "spreading dirt" has scatalogical implications rarely found in a 1940s cartoon). Tom grabs the horse and throws him out. Jerry then re-enters the house through an electral outlet marked, "Emergency entrance". Tom then lies down in front of a chair to relax. While Tom is asleep, Jerry takes an ink pad and puts ink on Tom's paws. Jerry then closes the ink pad on Tom's nose and Tom starts to chase Jerry. As he is chasing Jerry, his paw prints are everywhere he runs. Jerry stops the chase and points into the room. Tom looks at his paws, grabs Jerry, and throws him down the laundry chute. Tom then frantically cleans up another big mess. Meanwhile a truck full of coal has come to the house to make a delivery. Jerry grabs a rope and ties it to the delivery chute.
While Tom is cleaning, he looks out the window and sees Mammy coming up the sidewalk. He hides the cleaning supplies behind the couch and sits. Jerry has taken the delivery chute and placed it on the front window of the house. The truck then delivers all of its coal into the living room in one big wave. Then Mammy opens the front door and she gets knocked down by the coal. She then says, "Boy! When I get a hold of that low down, good for nothing..." Then Tom emerges from the coal in blackface. Mammy asks him, "Hey you. Has you seen a no good cat around here?" Tom then answers, "No ma'am. I ain't seen no cat around here. Uh-uh. There ain't no cat, no place, no how, no ma'am." Tom starts to walk away from the coal pile but as we see the rest of his body, only his head is blackened. Mammy then realizes she has been tricked by Tom and she starts to throw coal at Tom. Tom responds by making a face at her and he runs away. As Tom runs away, Mammy throws a piece of coal a long distance and it ends up hitting Tom square on the head, knocking him out.
[edit] Censorship
- When Mammy hits Tom with the mop, she says "Hold on there, you no good cat!" In the versions where Mammy's voice is dubbed over, the line is changed to "Hold on there, you crazy cat!"
- In some cases, the final scene of Tom speaking stereotypically in blackface, has been edited out and the cartoon ends after the coal has been dumped into the living room and Mammy walking down the street. In others, the voice of Mammy has been dubbed into a voice considered less offensive (However, at the end when the coal is dumped and Mammy screams THOMAS, Lilian Randolph's voice is still heard). In another version, after Mammy arives, the cartoon skips to Mammy throwing coal at Tom (he's still in blackface though.) This scene may also be the reason that Warner Home Video decided to omit the short from the DVD release "Tom and Jerry Spotlight Collection, Volume 3" [1].
[edit] DVD
- This cartoon can be found uncut but not digitally remastered on the European Warner Bros. PAL DVD set "Tom and Jerry - The Classic Collection " Vol. 02. The Classic Collection is available in the UK (6 double-sided or 12 single-layer) and Germany (12 single DVDs).
