When Bugs Bunny turned 50, it was a huge deal. It was celebrated by all. Joe Adamson even wrote a book. When other characters turned 50, their birthdays weren't celebrated as heavily. Besides Bugs, Looney Tunes character whose birthday was celebrated the most was probably Tweety. Tweety had merchandise, articles, and even a book written by Jerry Beck.
Here is some of the merchandise:
The times in London, England even did their own article on the little yellow bird. The article is below:
I taut I taw an anniversary; Tweety Pie
The cartoon canary Tweety Pie is 50 years old. David Robinson traces the story of the little bird and his always frustrated co-star, Sylvester the cat
Film industry pundits spent all last year trying to figure out how Home Alone a modestly-budgeted film with no stars and an infant protagonist soared to become the fourth-biggest earning film in history.
The answer came in a flash of revelation while watching old Warner Looney Tunes cartoons an occasional intellectual therapy that cannot be too highly recommended. Home Alone, I realised, is an unacknowledged, uncredited reworking of one of the universal David-and-Goliath myths of the 20th century, the warring of Tweety (sometimes spelt Tweetie) Pie and Sylvester.
Home Alone is the story of a small boy, alone in the house and menaced by a ramshackle pair of burglars. Tweety, it will be recalled, is an innocent baby canary, alone and apparently defenceless in his cage, who lisps out ``I taut I taw a puddy tat'' on sighting the prowling Sylvester.
Sylvester is a conniving alley-cat, whose schemes to get Tweety always go awry, as the little bird ingeniously lands him in booby traps that leave him crushed, concertinaed, stretched or flattened in proper cartoon style. Tweety regards the wrecked Sylvester with wide blue eyes and a sympathetic cry of ``Dat pore puddy tat''.
In Home Alone, little Kevin (Macaulay Culkin) exulted with a triumphant ``Ye-e-e-s!'' at the awful catastrophes he wrought upon his would-be persecutors. Reviewers all pointed out the cartoon nature of the comic violence.
This year is Tweety's golden jubilee. His first appearance was in 1942, in A Tale of Two Kitties. In this first outing, the likeness to Home Alone is even more striking, since, like Kevin, Tweety is menaced by not one but a pair of marauders. As further curious illustration of the artistic continuities of the movies, these bad cats were based on the comedy team of Abbott nd Costello and called Babbitt and Catstello.
Tweety was the invention of a genius of the Looney Tunes team, Bob Clampett (1913-1984). The character was based on Clampett's observations of baby birds in the nest and on a nude baby picture of himself which he particularly detested.
On his first appearance, Tweety, though his eyes were already their definitive baby blue, was flesh pink. The censors objected to his apparent nakedness however, and in Tweety's third film, A Gruesome Twosome, Clampett resisting the suggestion of putting the bird in short pants dressed him in yellow feathers.
Sylvester, created by Friz Freleng, first appeared in 1945, though he did not acquire a name until 1948. ``Sylvester'' seemed particularly appropriate to an animal with such splashy sibillants.
Tweety and Sylvester were finally teamed in 1947, when their first picture together, Tweetie Pie, won Warners' first ``Oscar'' for an animated cartoon. The team became a popular cult, and their song ``I Taut I Taw a Puddy-Tat'' earned a platinum disc in 1950. The voices were provided by Mel Blanc.
Tweety and Sylvester acquired a supporting cast, including a beaming old Granny who could wield a mean broom if Sylvester got out of hand, and Spike the bulldog, Sylvester's bane.
Together they made more than 40 pictures, in which Sylvester suffered endless torture. The titles generally invoked puns and plays on the titles of current films. They include All A-Bir-r-r-d, Home Tweet Home, Ain't She Tweet, Canary Row, Room and Bird, Sandy Claws, Tweet and Sour, Bird in a Guilty Cage, A Streetcat named Sylvester, Muzzle Tough, Trick or Tweet and Rebel Without Claws.
Sylvester frequently co-starred in films with other cartoon characters such as Road Runner and Speedy Gonzales; but Tweety never appeared without his partner. Clampett himself pointed out that he was essentially a verbal character: his embryonic wing-arms were so short that he could not even put on a hat.
In 1957 the couple won their second Oscar with Birds Anonymous, in which Sylvester vainly tries to kick the bird-eating addiction. At the end of the film Tweety sorrowfully concludes, ``Once a bad ol' puddy tat, always a bad ol' puddy tat.''
Their last appearance together was in Hawaiian Aye Aye in 1964; but 28 years later, their pictures go on delighting successive generations on Saturday morning television and Bugs Bunny specials. Tweety and Sylvester remain best-sellers in the new chain of Warner merchandising stores. And of course their spirit lives on in Home Alone.
Copyright (C) The Times, 1992
