A weird, forgotten chapter of 'Simpsons' history has been rediscovered

The Simpsons consult a family therapist in this forgotten 1989 cartoon.

By the time cartoonist Matt Groening unleased The Simpsons on an unwitting world in 1987—it debuted as a segment on Fox's live-action sketch comedy The Tracey Ullman Show—the era of the theatrical animated short was long over. Movie audiences of the 1930s, '40s, and '50s were accustomed to getting cartoons before features, and studios like Disney, MGM, and Warner Bros. famously produced them by the hundreds. Characters like Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Bugs Bunny, and Tom & Jerry thrived in this medium for decades. This was an era we now call the Golden Age of Animation.

But animation was commonplace on television by the 1960s. Ex-MGM animators Joseph Hanna and William Barbera proved that cheap, made-for-TV 'toons could be successful, and other producers followed suit. People who wanted to see cartoons could do so at home whenever they wanted, so movie studios phased out their animated shorts over the course of that turbulent decade. From the 1970s on, theatrical cartoons were parceled out only as occasional treats, usually in conjunction with children's films. That's the way it still is today. If you see a Pixar feature, for example, you expect a short cartoon first. But you won't get one with most live-action movies.

So I watched 'Coyote vs. Acme' and...

Wile E. Coyote and Will Forte team up in Coyote vs. Acme.

An uphill climb to the big screen.

It's not often I review recent movies on this blog. Then again, it's rare that I actually watch any film made in this century. Or this millennium, come to think of it. It's not that I'm against current movies; I just have so much old stuff to review that I don't get around to the new stuff that much.

I made an exception for Dave Green's Coyote vs. Acme (2026), the long-delayed feature film that Warner Bros. shelved for tax purposes several years ago, now finally released through the intercession of a company called Ketchup Entertainment. If you're reading this blog, you probably don't need me to explain what this movie is. You already know the characters and the basic plot. Like me, you grew up with Looney Tunes and its cadre of wacky animated characters: Wile E. Coyote, Road Runner, Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, etc. You're probably also familiar with the fictional Acme Corporation and its wide variety of faulty products.

So what did I think of Coyote vs. Acme? Short answer: I liked it. It's inventive, amusing, and well-made, and an elaborate tribute to the cartoons I loved in my youth. I recommend it unreservedly to Looney Tunes fanatics, especially those who also happen to be fans of actor and comedian Will Forte. In the past, Will has demonstrated his range on such shows as Saturday Night Live, The Great North, and The Last Man on Earth, plus such feature films as MacGruber (2010) and Nebraska (2014). If you've witnessed Mr. Forte at work, you likely do not need to be sold on his talents.

Do I have anything of particular value to say about Coyote vs. Acme? Any special insight to bring to this material? Well...

Los Cos: The original 'Fat Albert' special from 1969 has resurfaced!

Fat Albert bursts onto the screen in 1969.

A Cosby album.

Long before his name became associated with the drugging and raping of women, comedian Bill Cosby (born 1937) was known as a purveyor of warm, relatable humor about the day-to-day foibles of mid-20th-century American life. Leaning heavily on anecdotes from his own experiences, he talked about such subjects as sports, driving, childhood, marriage, parenthood, etc. in that friendly, conversational cadence of his. During a time of tremendous racial strife in this country, Cosby's act transcended color lines and appealed to a broad spectrum of the public.

In the 1960s, Cosby emerged as one of the top stand-up comics in America, headlining at nightclubs and appearing frequently on talk shows and variety shows. He also released a series of well-received comedy albums, starting with Bill Cosby is a Very Funny Fellow... Right! (1963). Meanwhile, his acting career took off with his groundbreaking dramatic role on I Spy (1965-1968). In short, Bill Cosby was big but nowhere near as big as he'd one day become. Ironically, his next major step forward came from looking backward.

In his act, Cosby frequently talked about his youth, growing up poor in North Philadelphia in the 1940s and '50s. He would regale his audiences with stories about his rambunctious childhood buddies, including Dumb Donald, Old Weird Harold, and the jubilant but massively overweight Fat Albert, the latter of whom was known for his catchphrase: "Hey, hey, hey!" Soon, thanks to these standup routines, several of which wound up immortalized on LPs, all of America was familiar with Bill Cosby's childhood.

Podcast Tuesday: "The Top 5 Episodes of The Fonz and the Happy Days Gang"

Scenes from various episodes of the '80s animated series The Fonz and the Happy Days Gang.

Rather like Joanie Loves Chachi, The Fonz and the Happy Days Gang occupies a place of infamy in the Fonzieverse. Why did we even need an animated version of Happy Days? Why does it feature a talking dog and a "future chick" with magic powers? Why are the characters traveling through time in a flying saucer? The Fonz and the Happy Days Gang seems like another example of the Happy Days franchise completely selling out and betraying its own origins as a sweet, simple show about 1950s nostalgia. File it alongside that time Fonzie jumped over a shark in Season 5.

But, over the course of doing These Days Are Ours: A Happy Days Podcast since 2018, I've learned a few surprising things. Joanie Loves Chachi, though totally disposable, is a competent, occasionally amusing sitcom. The "jump the shark" episode is actually a lot of fun if you don't take Happy Days seriously (and you shouldn't). And even The Fonz and the Happy Days Gang has its redeeming qualities.

This week, my cohost and I go over our respective picks for the Top 5 episodes of the animated series, and we talk about our overall impressions of the show and its characters. It'd be awfully nice if you would join us.

Ed Wood Wednesdays, week 194: 'Jim's Introduction to Gender Identity' (2017)

An animated short film from 2017 deals with some of the same issues as Glen or Glenda.

As I was rewatching Glen or Glenda (1953) recently, I took note of just how many earnest heart-to-heart conversations this one film contains. Let's see here. Inspector Warren (Lyle Talbot) talks to Dr. Alton (Timothy Farrell). Glen (Ed Wood) talks to his fiancée, Barbara (Dolores Fuller). Glen's sister Sheila (Evelyn Wood) talks to her unnamed female coworker. Glen talks to Barbara some more. Two unseen foundry workers, Jack and Joe, talk to each other. Glen talks to his friend Johnny (Charles Crafts). Glen talks to Barbara a third (!) and fourth (!!) time. Finally, Dr. Alton talks to Glen and Barbara. That's a lot of conversation for a film that's barely feature-length.

Some Glenda-esque poster art.

Glen or Glenda deals with some sensitive and highly controversial topics, including cross-dressing and gender reassignment, and writer-director Edward D. Wood, Jr. obviously felt the best strategy was to have his characters sit down and exchange their thoughts and feelings about these things. In Cult Movies 3 (1988), critic Danny Peary even compares Glenda to old-fashioned soap operas in which women talk through their problems with friends over the kitchen table. It's a nice thought, isn't it? Maybe more of the world's problems could be solved if we'd just stop shouting at each other and started a calm, reasonable dialogue instead.

That's the theory, anyway. Your results may vary.

I thought about all of this as I watched Jim's Introduction to Gender Identity aka My Friend is Transgender (2017), a short film by New York-based animator K. Kypers. A video like this might have flown under my radar, despite garnering over 800K views, but Kypers recently began posting to an Ed Wood group on Facebook that I also frequent. In one thread, Kypers mentioned that the poster art for the short film was directly inspired by the iconic, instantly familiar Glen or Glenda poster. As I watched the film itself, I noticed that it contained numerous references to the Ed Wood canon, making it a prime candidate for coverage in this series.

So who is Karl Wiedergott, anyway?

German-born actor Karl Wiedergott in the movie 2 Days. Inset: one of Karl's many, many Simpsons characters

Bill Clinton on The Simpsons

If you have been following the 12-day Simpsons marathon on FXX, there is one name you have undoubtedly seen in the cast credits but may not be able to immediately connect to any particular role. Born in Germany in 1969, Karl Wiedergott lent his vocal talents to a staggering 248 episodes of the extremely long-running animated series, joining the cast in 1998 and staying with the show until 2010 when he left the United States.

In addition to its six principal cast members (Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, etc.) and recurring guest stars (Kelsey Grammar, Marcia Wallace, et al.), The Simpsons employs a talented and versatile troupe of additional voice actors, nearly all of them women. Performers like Russi Taylor, Tress MacNeille, Pamela Hayden, and Maggie Roswell have been with the show for decades, voicing a slew of child and adult characters.

The odd man out here, in more ways than one, is Wiedergott. Not only is he male and German, but (unlike the women I just mentioned) he doesn't really have any recurring characters on the show. Instead, along with impersonating celebrities like Bill Clinton and John Travolta, Karl Wiedergott spent his time on The Simpsons bringing life to such parts as "Care Worker," "Angry Man," and "Boyfriend 2." Ironically, this thankless work is probably what Wiedergott is best known for, even though he has appeared in dozens of television shows and movies for nearly 30 years. His CV includes such well-known titles as Coach, Columbo, 21 Jump Street, and Star Trek: Voyager. In 2003, he wrote and acted in Two Days, an indie drama whose cast included Paul Rudd, Adam Scott, and Donal Logue. Other film credits for the actor include 18 Again! (1988) and Breakfast of Champions (1999), in which he coincidentally plays a character named Homer. So there you have it, folks. That's the scoop on Karl Wiedergott. And now you know... the rest of the story.
      

I'm concerned that you haven't been having enough nightmares lately, so here's this thing.

He's saying, "Mom! Mom! Mom! Mom!"

"Let me say this about that..."

I'm kind of obsessed with wax museums, and I especially love bad wax figures. In my travels, I happened to come across this nice little roundup of 31 of them on Buzzfeed. I was especially taken with the hideous paraffin effigy of Richard Milhous Nixon which closes the article. Tricky Dick kind of looked like a ventriloquist dummy, so I decided to animate the image and make this little mini art piece out of it. I hope you don't enjoy it.

(today's zomby) AND A SINGING ORANGE!

To paraphrase C. Montgomery Burns: Oh, Zomby, will you ever win?

But speaking of the legends of animation...

Forty years before the Annoying Orange

It's strange what sticks with you from childhood. For years, I have been haunted by the memory of a particular stop-motion film from Sesame Street. The clip in question involved an orange who comes to "life" and sings the famed "Habanera" aria from Georges Bizet's 1875 opera Carmen. A little research turns up the fact that this clip dates back to Episode 277 from November 9, 1971 -- almost exactly 40 years ago. A YouTube clip attributes the film to Jim Henson, but I could find no confirmation of this. In any event, the film aired regularly on the show for years, warping the minds of several generations in the process.

Here's the notorious clip:



There's an eerie, David Lynch-eseque quality to this film, heightened by the quasi-futuristic synthesizer music. I personally remember loving this as a kid, but also being sort of scared of it.

Others, meanwhile, were apparently scarred for life by this clip. (Warning: NSFW language!)

(no zomby today) INSTEAD, I PRESENT MY FAVORITE CARTOON EVER!

Ha ha ha HAAAA ha!!!!!

Today, dearest readers, it is my birthday. And my present to you and to myself is that I am not doing another torturous Zomby!!!! cartoon today. Instead, I have decided to present to you the absolute greatest cartoon of all time, 1954's Alley to Bali with Woody Woodpecker.

Have you ever thought back to some weird show, movie, or cartoon you saw as a kid and asked yourself, "Did I really see that or just imagine it?" That's exactly my history with Alley to Bali. It's a Woody Woodpecker cartoon, sure, but not like any other Woody Woodpecker cartoon I have ever seen. Normally, Woody is a sort of avian variation on Bugs Bunny, the rascally trickster getting on the nerves of some comedic foil. Here, though, he is basically is the foil. More specifically, he is one of two foils. His partner in punishment is the rather obscure Buzz Buzzard. If nothing else, this cartoon gives us a Woody and Buzz forty years before Toy Story.

I don't want to spoil any of the strange, surreal, and unsettling things that happen in this cartoon. I just want you to watch it.


Woody Woodpecker - Alley to Bali by Lupus-novus