DISCOVER--the best of the Tweety and Sylvester cartoons
Rather like Stan and Ollie of Laurel and Hardy fame, who appeared solo to little avail until finding each other, Tweety and Sylvester both appeared in individual solo cartoons (three each) before being teamed for the first time in 1947's "Tweetie Pie", a true classic overseen by Friz Freleng, who directed the vast majority of team-ups to follow. Tweety premiered in 1942's "A Tale of Two Kitties", followed by "Birdy and the Beast" and "A Gruesome Twosome", and Sylvester in 1945's "Life With Feathers" and then "Peck Up Your Troubles" and "Kitty Kornered". This latter title was a Porky Pig cartoon followed by the equally inspired "Back Alley Oproar", which has the most amazing and eclectic musical soundtrack of any cartoon ever.
Once Tweety had teamed with Sylvester, he continued to appear only with his new tormentor/tormentee, but Sylvester continued to appear in other formats by other Warners animators, occasionally with his whiny, embarrassed son Sylvester Jnr. and interminably with a kangaroo mistaken for a giant mouse, and eventually tiresomely with the one-joke Speedy Gonzales. While these tended to overuse the character, Chuck Jones did turn out a series of three inspired horror spoofs with Porky Pig ("Scaredy Cat", "Claws for Alarm", and the sci-fi "Jumpin' Jupiter") in which Sylvester was necessarily mute! In these, Porky is oblivious to the fantastic and scary events around him, while Sylvester desperately tries to clue him in with frantic mimes! What was interesting here is that Warners placed no restrictions or restraints on how a character was used or interpreted in those days, giving animators complete artistic freedom in how they chose to employ or portray even major faces. However, all of these traded on the goodwill generated by Freleng's Sylvester and his amazing sense of timing and attention to detail. I think it's the appalling few micro-seconds of resignation, horror, confusion, or despair on Sylvester's face before he pays the painful price for his evil intent that makes these cartoons so agonisingly funny.
Sylvester also appeared in a Foghorn Leghorn cartoon (1947's "Crowing Pains"), in Daffy Duck's legendary "Scarlet Pumpernickel" in 1950, and alongside Wile E. Coyote (in 1965's awful "The Wild Chase").
However, it is with the malicious and vindictive and far from cute and innocent Tweety that Freleng's lisping alley cat truly shone, in a series of just over forty almost heartbreakingly violent encounters with his malevolent meal. The Tweety and Sylvester cartoons rival Tom and Jerry for sheer laugh-out-loud entertainment, replacing their cosy rough and tumble with brutal, sheer wanton cruelty. Those expressions of despair, resignation, and misery on the poor creature's face say it all...
Once Tweety had teamed with Sylvester, he continued to appear only with his new tormentor/tormentee, but Sylvester continued to appear in other formats by other Warners animators, occasionally with his whiny, embarrassed son Sylvester Jnr. and interminably with a kangaroo mistaken for a giant mouse, and eventually tiresomely with the one-joke Speedy Gonzales. While these tended to overuse the character, Chuck Jones did turn out a series of three inspired horror spoofs with Porky Pig ("Scaredy Cat", "Claws for Alarm", and the sci-fi "Jumpin' Jupiter") in which Sylvester was necessarily mute! In these, Porky is oblivious to the fantastic and scary events around him, while Sylvester desperately tries to clue him in with frantic mimes! What was interesting here is that Warners placed no restrictions or restraints on how a character was used or interpreted in those days, giving animators complete artistic freedom in how they chose to employ or portray even major faces. However, all of these traded on the goodwill generated by Freleng's Sylvester and his amazing sense of timing and attention to detail. I think it's the appalling few micro-seconds of resignation, horror, confusion, or despair on Sylvester's face before he pays the painful price for his evil intent that makes these cartoons so agonisingly funny.
Sylvester also appeared in a Foghorn Leghorn cartoon (1947's "Crowing Pains"), in Daffy Duck's legendary "Scarlet Pumpernickel" in 1950, and alongside Wile E. Coyote (in 1965's awful "The Wild Chase").
However, it is with the malicious and vindictive and far from cute and innocent Tweety that Freleng's lisping alley cat truly shone, in a series of just over forty almost heartbreakingly violent encounters with his malevolent meal. The Tweety and Sylvester cartoons rival Tom and Jerry for sheer laugh-out-loud entertainment, replacing their cosy rough and tumble with brutal, sheer wanton cruelty. Those expressions of despair, resignation, and misery on the poor creature's face say it all...
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- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetThomas the cat finds Tweety in the snow, warming himself by a cigar butt. Thomas's mistress rescues the little yellow bird before her cat can devour him, but Thomas doesn't give up.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetWoman wonders why her little pet birds keep disappearing. Sylvester the cat knows, but other than burping feathers, he's not saying. But it looks like he's met his match when the woman orders another bird from the pet shop: a little yellow canary named "Tweety".Why is there a picture of Dowwis Day here?
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarMel BlancSylvester the Cat makes every attempt to snatch or lure Tweety from his birdhouse.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetTweety Bird is washing in a bird bath in a city park when Sylvester Cat interrupts him. Sylvester chases Tweety, and Tweety takes refuge near a feisty nanny and her toddler. Sylvester dresses as the toddler to try to grab Tweety but is stopped and spanked. Tweety flies to a building ledge, and Sylvester unsuccessfully uses chewing gum to try to reach him. Next, Sylvester angers a bulldog, who chases him away.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetSylvester Cat, Tweety Bird, and a bulldog are passengers on a train. Sylvester's attempts to catch Tweety are thwarted by the bulldog and a conscientious conductor.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetSylvester spots Tweety Bird in an apartment and tries to gain access but cannot make it past Granny or the cat-hating desk clerk. He tries climbing up the drainpipe, posing as an organ grinder's monkey, impersonating a bellhop, swinging across the street on a rope, and walking on a wire, but but in each case either Granny, Tweety, or his own miscalculations foil his plans.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetSylvester Cat and a one-eyed orange tabby have a feud over catching Tweety Bird, who seems to merely be enjoying himself.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetSylvester Cat and Tweety Bird are pets of tenants in the Spinsters Arms Hotel, where pets aren't allowed. As they try to keep out of sight of the landlord, Sylvester discovers Tweety and chases him in and out of the hotel rooms.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetSylvester Cat stows away aboard a seagoing passenger liner to try and catch Tweety Bird, who is guarded by his mistress, Granny. Sylvester becomes seasick and runs to the sickbay for a remedy. Tweety mixes nitro into the medicine before Sylvester drinks it. When Granny hits Sylvester with her broom, he is blown sky-high.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarMel BlancSylvester Cat leaves a trailer in a National Forest Camping Ground to go bird hunting and discovers an egg in a nest. Sylvester decides to sit on the egg to hatch it, and when it hatches, out crawls Tweety Bird! Sylvester chases Tweety into a geyser and down a river in a boat toward a waterfall.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetDaws ButlerSylvester gets a rubber mouse for Christmas, but he much prefers Granny's gift: a new Tweety Bird.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetSylvester Cat discovers Tweety Bird in a pet store window. Tweety is taken to be delivered by truck to a new owner - Granny. Sylvester chases the delivery truck to Granny's home, where Granny has a huge, fenced-in area for her army of bulldogs. Sylvester makes several unsuccessful attempts to pass the dogs and reach Tweety inside Granny's house.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarMel BlancSylvester Cat spots Tweety Bird in a display window of an after-hours department store and sneaks inside through a mail server chute. Tweety flees Sylvester by hiding in a hat pile and a doll house, evades the shots from a rifle Sylvester uses, and escapes in a vacuum tube. Tweety sends a dynamite stick through another tube, and Sylvester swallows it, thinking it is Tweety. The dynamite blows up inside Sylvester after the cat leaves the store and walks down the street.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetSylvester Cat and Tweety Bird are snowbound in a mountain cabin, and though Tweety has lots of bird seed, Sylvester will starve unless he can cook the unsuspecting Tweety. Meanwhile, a starving mouse thinks Sylvester is edible and keeps springing on the cat, chewing the fur off his head and tail and trying to cook his various body parts. Granny returns just in time with groceries, to find she mistakenly brought back only more bird seed!
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetGranny is Tweety Bird's mistress on a farm. She assigns a bulldog named Hector to take care of Tweety while she's away. Sylvester Cat disguises himself as a scarecrow to sneak up on Tweety. Tweety runs into a chicken coop and is protected by a mother hen and an aggressive rooster. Hector, seeing that Tweety is gone and fearing Granny's wrath, paints Sylvester yellow and puts him in Tweety's cage to fool Granny. Tweety returns and makes like a cat since turnabout is fair play.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetSettlers Granny and Tweety do battle against a hostile Indian tribe of Sylvester variants.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetThe title of this cartoon is a misnomer, because it is, in fact, Tweety Bird who is the homeless one here, and Sylvester is Granny's pet. Tweety seeks shelter from a blizzard and taps on Granny's house door. Sylvester answers and grabs the canary. He tries to hide Tweety from Granny while evading the attacks of Hector, Granny's bed-ridden bulldog, who wants revenge on Sylvester for his broken leg. Tweety keeps escaping Sylvester's clutches, with Hector's help.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarMel BlancRocky the gangster kidnaps Tweety Bird for a million dollar ransom and holes up in an abandoned city building. Sylvester Cat in an alley below hears Tweety's sad cries and decides to rescue him - for his lunch.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarMel BlancSylvester Cat tries to catch Tweety Bird, who is up in a tree in the middle of the city dog pound.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetTweety Bird moves into a city brownstone with his mistress, Granny. A stray Sylvester Cat watches them move in and delights on seeing Tweety. Another of Granny's pets is a bulldog who, as usual, complicates Sylvester's plan to sneak up close enough to make a grab for Tweety. Sylvester unsuccessfully tries all sorts of disguises, including a moving man, a lamp, a bearskin, and a female dog. He ends up being captured by the dog catcher and placed in the back of a truck surrounded by all sorts of snarling canines.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarMel BlancChasing Tweety all over the rooftops, Sylvester falls off a building and dies. While waiting for his other eight lives, a satanic bulldog goads Sylvester into losing all eight by continuing to chase Tweety into risky situations.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancBea BenaderetTweety Bird is taken by his mistress, Granny, to a beach, where Sylvester Cat spots him and tries to reach his cage, only to be stopped again and again by tidal waves.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarMel BlancSylvester Cat pays a visit to a closed-to-business circus and finds Tweety Bird in one of the cages. All that changes when Tweety escapes his cage and flees Sylvester... and thus, the chase begins. Meanwhile, Sylvester must flee from an uncaged lion he had angered with his earlier remarks. The chase results in Sylvester being pounded by an elephant, falling into an empty water tank, swallowing fire, and losing his balance on the high wire and falling into the lion's mouth. Sylvester locks himself in a cage thinking he is safe from the lion, only to find he has locked himself in with 50 more!
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancJune ForayThe classic story of Little Red Riding Hood has a new twist. Set in more modern times, this story about Red takes Tweety to visit her sick Grandmother. Both Sylvester and the Big Bad Wolf try to capture Red and Tweety.
- DirectorFriz FrelengStarsMel BlancJune ForaySylvester Cat tries to catch Tweety Bird in Granny's farm house, but Granny catches Sylvester and warns him if anything ever happens to Tweety, she will have Sylvester turned into violin strings. A one-eyed orange tabby makes off with Tweety, and Sylvester must rescue the canary to avoid being sent by Granny to the violin string factory.
