Pink Elephants on Parade

Pink Elephants on Parade is the name of a segment, and the song played therein, from the Disney animated feature film Dumbo in which Dumbo and Timothy Q. Mouse, after accidentally becoming intoxicated (after drinking water spiked with champagne), see pink elephants sing, dance, and play trumpets during a hallucination sequence.

The song was written by Oliver Wallace and Ned Washington^[1] and sung by the Sportsmen. The segment was directed by Norman Ferguson, laid out by Ken O'Connor and animated by Hicks Lokey, Frank Thomas and Howard Swift.^[2]

The Dumbo the Flying Elephant ride at Disneyland was originally going to be based on this scene, but the idea was scrapped and the ride creators changed it to the friendlier titular elephant from the movie.

Covers

• The song was covered by Sun Ra. A recording of this arrangement is available on Stay Awake, a tribute album of Disney tunes played by various artists, and produced by Hal Willner. The song was also covered by Circus Contraption and Lee Press-on and the Nails.

• Daladubz samples the song in his dubstep song entitled Pink Elephants VIP.

Appearances in other media and theme parks

• Part of the song is played during "Hallowishes" at Walt Disney World's Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party.
• In Enchanted, the song can be heard briefly as Prince Edward watches television.
• This song is parodied in the Bob's Burgers episode "Art Crawl"
• In Tiny Toons (Tessed Stressed) Plucky has a simerlar experience whilst being given Einstein's geniouses by Shirley. Instead of Pink Elephants, Plucky sees Einstein's that are just outlines. Speilburg did base the scene on the Pink Elephants sequence, and the pink elephants tune can be heard in the background.
• The song was used for Gus Engle's part in the snowboard film company Videograss' 2011 release Shoot the Moon.

See also

• Heffalumps and Woozles
• Frank Churchill

References