| Three Little Bops | |
|---|---|
 Title card | |
| Directed by | Friz Freleng |
| Story by | Warren Foster |
| Produced by | Eddie Selzer |
| Starring | Stan Freberg (all voices) |
| Edited by | Treg Brown |
| Music by | Shorty Rogers |
| Animation by | Gerry Chiniquy Bob Matz Harry Love |
| Layouts by | Hawley Pratt |
| Backgrounds by | Irv Wyner |
| Color process | Technicolor |
Production company | |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. Pictures The Vitaphone Corporation |
Release date |
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Running time | 6:43 |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Three Little Bops is a 1957 Americananimatedmusical comedy film, directed byFriz Freleng and written byWarren Foster.[1] A takeoff onThe Three Little Pigs told as ahip, jazzymusical filled withjive talk, the short features the voice ofStan Freberg, with music provided byjazz composer/trumpeterShorty Rogers.[2] It was released byWarner Bros. Pictures on January 5, 1957 as part of theLooney Tunes series.[3]
Presented primarily in the style oftwelve-bar blues, the short opens with a display of the book that showsthe Three Little Pigs who used to play pipes and dance jigs but now play modern instruments and perform as The Three Little Bops.
During a Bops gig at the House of Straw, theBig Bad Wolf shows up (and quotes the title of the 1947Dizzy Gillespie jazz song "Ool-Ya-Koo"), demonstrates that he is friendly by shaking hands and states that he wants to sit in with the band. He immediately shows he is a terrible trumpet player, however, so the pigs, labelling hima square, throw him out. Insulted, the Wolf retaliates by using the trumpet to blow down the House of Straw, forcing the pigs to go to the Dew Drop Inn, the House of Sticks.
Things go well (including the piano playing pig doing an imitation ofLiberace's "I wish my brother George was here"), until the Wolf arrives and sits in again. The audience calls for the pigs to "throw the square out", which they do. The Wolf retaliates by blowing down the Dew Drop Inn. The pigs then realize that to escape the Wolf's "windy tricks", they must become the band of choice at the House of Bricks (built on May 1, 1776, according to a cornerstone).
The House of Bricks has a "No Wolves Allowed" rule, so when the Wolf tries to get in, he is punched in the face by a bouncer. He then unsuccessfully tries to ram the door down with a log. The Wolf falls back on trying to use his trumpet to blow down the building, but soon runs out of breath.
He disguises himself, reentering in a fur coat, playing a perfect rendition of theCharleston on aukulele (cut short when the piano player pig recognizes him and tosses a banana peel). The Wolf returns, hidden inside a houseplant. He pops up and begins playing his trumpet, but the pig playing the double bass fires a plunger off the strings and blasts the Wolf out of the building. For his third try, the Wolf shows up in adrum major outfit playing a bigbass drum to the tune of "Don't Give Up the Ship". The Bops' drummer throws a dart and deflates the bass drum. Humiliated, the Wolf leaves. The pigs shut and lock the door to ensure he cannot get in again.
He returns with a large cylinder ofTNT and says, "I'll show those pigs that I'm not stuck! If I can't blow itdown, I'll blow itup!" One of the pigs blows out the fuse, so the Wolf carries the cylinder a few feet away from the door to light it a second time. He has moved too far away and as he is carrying it back to the door of the building, it explodes and the Wolf is killed.
The narrator says that the explosion that killed the Wolf did not send him to Heaven but down to "the other place", where his trumpet playing improves. When the pigs hear this, one of them says, "The Big Bad Wolf, he learned the rule: you gotta get hot to play real cool!" The Wolf's spirit then rises up through the floor and, now playing expertly, joins in for the final notes, prompting the pigs to alter their band's name to "The Three Little Bops Plus One".
Instrument credits are believed to be:[4]
This is one of rare Warner Bros. cartoons to not feature voice contributions fromMel Blanc in any capacity during the period of his exclusive contract with the studio. It is also one of three from that period to credit anyone other than Blanc (the others wereThe Mouse that Jack Built, which credits the cast ofThe Jack Benny Program, of which Blanc was a cast member and thus was credited accordingly, andThe Unmentionables, which credits Blanc andRalph James). Though Freberg contributed voices to many other Warner Bros. cartoons, he did not receive credit for them. It is also one of the fewLooney Tunes shorts not to use the "That's all, Folks" endline.
Three Little Bops was included inJerry Beck's bookThe 100 Greatest Looney Tunes Cartoons. In the book, professor of musicology Daniel Goldmark writes, "Three Little Bops is a return to the swinging sounds that once dominated the Warner Bros. cartoons. Los Angeles boasted a thriving jazz scene in the 1950s, so not only was the studio able to feature trumpeter Shorty Rogers, it also made great use of comedian (and voice artist) Stan Freberg as the cartoon'shep narrator. The entire cartoon is told inscatlike rhyme, and the pigs really play some smokin' jazz — as does the wolf once he finally gets 'hot' down in hell."[5]