I've Got to Sing a Torch Song

This was another of the Merrie Melodies cartoons based on the songs from Gold Diggers of 1933 that is now on that movie's DVD. In this one, we see many celebrity parodies such as Bing Crosby in the bathtub (here, he's Cros Bingsby), Greta Garbo, Mae West, Ed Wynn, etc. There's plenty of movement and some amusing gags though nothing really hilarious. Still, I was entertained enough by the way the animators were trying to fill the 6-minute running time that was standard for these theatrical filler cartoons meant to fill a block program that also included one live action short, a newsreel, some trailers, and the main feature. So on that note, I've Got to Sing a Torch Song is worth a look if you're interested enough.

They didn't have videos way back in the 1930s, and they didn't have television, either. However, you can still do aerobics from a voice on the radio encouraging and instructing you. That's what we see in the opening minutes as people of all ages are seen exercising in unique and clever ways. One guys is doing pulleys from the girdle on his fat wife! An old rich guy is doing arm exercises while reading ticker tape on the stock market quotations. There are a lot of these type of things, all in a short space of time.

Then the story, if you want to call it that, switches from aerobics to celebrities as we see movie stars and others on the radio and people listening to it from all over the globe, from Shanghai to Alaska. Some of the celebrities I couldn't recognize, making this a cartoon more for folks back in the that era.

This cartoon was a showcase by Warner Brothers for some of its stars and the title song comes from "Gold Diggers Of 1933," one of their films.

Like others have already said, this cartoon is a fine example of the difference between "Looney Tunes" and "Merrie Melodies". A lot of people will say that music videos didn't come around until the 1980s, with the airing of MTV, but in reality these could be considered the earliest forms of music video. While the actual singer or band that wrote the song doesn't perform it, it should be noted that the film/record company, Warner Brothers, owned the rights to the song, so they could use it in any way they saw fit, which was a common practice at the time when this cartoon was produced, including having it performed by various celebrity caricatures, a bunch of babies (Shuffle Off to Buffalo), or two foxes and a few billboards (Smile, Darn Ya, Smile!). They could even alter the lyrics to match the plot or theme for the film in which the song would be reused (see: Shuffle Off to Buffalo, I Love to Singa), as a way to get audiences to purchase the records or sheet music for that song, and play it themselves. Back then you could buy song books or subscribe to a monthly magazine that featured sheet music and lyrics to popular songs of the time.

Way back long ago, before Bugs, before Daffy, even before Porky - heck, they weren't even filming anything in color yet - Leon Schlesinger Studios tried various and sundry ideas in their cartoons. "I've Got to Sing a Torch Song" shows several people around the world exercising to a radio broadcast, with a few gags along the way, and caricatures of famous people from the era.

If you're wondering why they named the cartoon after the song, that was the policy with Merrie Melodies cartoons. You see, when Leon Schlesinger Studios started releasing Bosko cartoons in 1930, all the cartoons carried the Looney Tunes tag. Before too long, they created the Merrie Melodies tag (playing off Disney's Silly Symphonies). While the Looney Tunes cartoons continued showing off Bosko - and later Buddy, and then Porky - the Merrie Melodies cartoons would have the names of songs, and the characters would sing the song in one scene. Such was the case not only with this one, but also "I Haven't Got a Hat" and "I Love to Singa", among others. Eventually, they stopped having characters sing title songs. When the Looney Tunes switched to color, the two series became indistinguishable.

Overall, this is a look into Warner Bros. animation's very early days. Within ten years, their cartoons didn't look the same at all. Hell, within five years, the combination of stars Porky and Daffy, plus directors such as Tex Avery, had totally changed the look. But this one is still worth seeing. Because Greta Garbo did want to be let alone.

I never knew that Bing Crosby was already famous in 1933. Of course, I have no kind words for him.

Merrie Melodies started as something like animated music videos. Leon Schlesinger sold Warner Brothers on the idea of a series of animated shorts that would feature songs from Warner Brothers movies, serving partially as ads for the movies. This one features the titular song from "Gold Diggers of 1933".

It's a pretty straightforward series of blackout gags featuring (then) famous folks singing the song ... George Bernard Shaw, James Cagney, Joan Blondell, Benito Mussolini (yes, indeed), Bing Crosby (identified as "Cros Bingsby"), Greta Garbo, ZaSu Pitts, Mae West and Ed Wynn all show up. It's very very thin, but hey ... I was amused.

It also unfortunately has a string of really unpleasant racial stereotypes in the middle that were cut when in aired on TV in the 1980s.