A post on the super-nifty blog Neato Coolville got to one of my weak spots: The Banana Splits. And it reminded me of some other rare collectible Banana Splits stuff I had seen.
Here’s Neato Coolville’s Window Clings of Fleegle and Bingo:
And here’s something really wild that I’ve never seen before. The Banana Splits done up as the band KISS. I have no idea who made it or where it came from. This was on an ebay auction that another (at-the-moment-defunct) blog found.
No celebration of cheesy Irishness is complete without Lucky the Leprechaun:
The first Lucky Charms commercial
This is the very first commercial for Lucky Charms. This was done by Bill Melendez — before he started his own studio to produce the Peanuts specials, he did a lot of work on animated commercials. This commercial is from about 1964.
Kites are fun!
I love this one because it reminds me of Kites Are Fun, by the Free Design:
The Leprechauns’ Christmas Gold is — and I say this as a massive Rankin/Bass fan — a disappointment. First off, why on earth didn’t Rankin/Bass make this as a St. Patrick’s Day special? Heck, even Groundhog Day got a Rankin/Bass special, but instead they chose to further glut their already overloaded Christmas special catalog with this. Leprechauns belong to St. Patrick’s Day, period. Rankin/Bass had a bad history of cross-polluting their holidays (see: Rudolph & Frosty’s Christmas in July, Rudolph’s Shiny New Year). But this is just a straight out omission. Okay, okay, it’s got the song “Christmas in Kilarney,” which nearly sells me on the concept… but really it’s a stretch.
Despite that, with all its over-the-top stereotypical Irish-like goodness, it’s Rankin/Bass’ sort-of St. Patrick’s Day special. If you squint. And turn the volume down. [and drink! -Hanford] It stars Art Carney as the leprechaun Blarney Kilakilarney, whose clan lives on a remote, fog-cloaked island uninhabited by humans. They share the island with a competing leprechaun clan, including his ex-wife. Along comes a boy looking for a Christmas tree, he takes the one on the island, which was really a trap for the banshee, who’s now on the loose, and wants the leprechauns’ gold, blah blah blah, she’s after me pot o’ gold!, blah blah blah, the end. Unless you’re a Rankin/Bass diehard, go watch Darby O’Gill and the Little People instead.
But, all this talk of “you’re just after me pot o’ gold!” gives me an excuse to post a link to this. Which only makes sense if you have your speakers on. And even then, not really. It just makes me giggle.
The image on the left is from a rare stop-motion puppet of Jerry Lewis that was built by the Rankin/Bass animation studio for some specials. While I’m not a huge Jerry Lewis fan, I can’t get over how cool it would have been if Rankin/Bass (creators of all the great stop-motion Christmas specials) had gone through and produced these cartoons. The puppet has a look to it that you just don’t see in modern animation. Check out the all the photos of the Jerry Lewis Puppet.
According to the Rankin/Bass Historian, it turns out that Arthur Rankin and Jules Bass were huge Jerry Lewis fans and were working on two projects to being Jerry Lewis to stop-motion world. One was “Punch and Judy” and the other was “The Bellboy”. They never went into full production but there was some work done on them. A song was written called “Hey Bellhop!”, which has been locked away in the Rankin/Bass vaults all these years. A demo recording of the song will be included in the soon-to-be-released soundtrack to the The Daydreamer, a special I’ve never seen. Seeing the image of the Jerry Lewis puppet fills my mind with thoughts of what this might have been.
Ze King! Ze Premier! Then all the ministers!
Army! Navy! Department Sanitaire! …
This Harveytoon cartoon isn’t really outstanding in any particular way, but it’s one I remembered as a kid I’ve wanted to see again for probably the last 20 years. I’ve searched for it several times before, and while it’s mentioned in several places in the web, I’ve only come across an actual video of it very recently! It’s beloved by many, but probably totally unknown to most. Here’s the description from IMDB’s entry for it, see if it shakes loose any memories:
A French shopkeeper’s life is disrupted by a daily parade. The parade consists of “ze king, ze premier, all ze lords and ministers, army, navy, department sanitaire.” When the “department sanitaire” hits a pothole, all the garbage gets dumped onto the street in front of his store.
The wonderful Disney Blog 2719 Hyperion has a great piece on the Man In Space episode of Walt Disney’s Wonderful World Of Color, (the episode turned 52 just a few days ago). The episode is a peek into what the 1950s envisioned the future of space travel to be like. It features both live action lectures by Disney animator Ward Kimball and rocket scientist Wernher von Braun, as well as some animated futurist visuals that are not to be missed. 2719 Hyperion does a better job than I do at really coveying the impact of this midcentury science film:
Perhaps the most interesting footnote about Man in Space is the largely unnoticed impact it had on the development of the U.S. space program. President Eisenhower was so impressed with the program, he requested a print of the film to screen for high-ranking Pentagon officials, which was evidently instrumental in kick starting the country’s space initiatives.
Check out 2719 Hyperion’s post on Man In Space. If you’re nuts about it like I am, be sure to pick up the Tomorrowland DVD, which contains Man In Space along with a few other not-to-be-missed Space Age edutainment shorts from Disney’s timeless TV show.
This has been burning a hole in my pocket for a while now. It’s an animated advertisement for drive-in movie theaters, pushing an intermission trip to the snack bar, sponsored by Dr. Pepper. It was created by Keitz & Herndon, a little animation studio in Dallas, in the early 1950s.
Dr. Pepper Intermission Cartoon
I first saw it on the Cartoon Modern blog. If you dig this, you’ll also dig the book Cartoon Modern. How can you not dig something so… frosty?
[UPDATE] SideShowCarny, who uploaded this clip to YouTube, reports that it came from one of the volumes of “Hey Folks! It’s Intermission Time!” from Something Weird. They sell them on DVD for $10. Do a search on “intermission” to find them.
The Leprechauns’ Christmas Gold
Cartoon Modern: Style and Design in 1950s Animation
Classic Drive-In Theater Intermission Film Clips
