Oral Dorothy One More Time
Continued from last time, the parade of Terrytoons picket signs from the early 1940s. I don’t know who drew this one, but it’s a one-off, original design that looks better than most of the Terry one-sheet posters of the period. Beautifully lettered. By the way, the sign reads: : “A Standard Contract will Put Him On His Feet”, there is a light flare on the original that interferes with the lettering.
In the Felix strips from 1-20 to 1-26-1936, Punk Chow lives up to his name by trying to serve Felix poisoned food. Danny Dooit comes back into the action in the 1-24 and in the 1-25, whistles up a great collection of Messmer dog and cat characters. Look at all the variant cats from the last panel of the 1-25. Otto could draw cartoon cats many different ways. In the Sunday, Otto seems to be making a sly comment on the humor content of the “funnies”.
Krazy this time was originally published 7-8 through 7-13-1940. Ignatz is handled like a disobedient school boy by Mimi and Offissa Pupp, much to the disgust of Molly, Ig’s wife.
Patrick, originally published 4-11 to 4-16-1966 co-stars Godfrey Snodgrass. In trying to convince Patrick that the world is round, Godfrey gets the “Patrick Sock” for his trouble. Patrick sounds like the Global Warming deniers as he declares that he is a firm believer in “Might is Right”.
Last on the programme for this outing is Dorothy Parker’s story from the 1920s: “Here We Are”. This is another of her “bickering couples” yarns, featuring a couple of newlyweds out for a honeymoon trip to New York. It’s another example of her gift at revealing character through dialog. Can anyone supply me a list of her screenwriting credits? Did she receive credit for her Hollywood labors? Just click on the link below to visit archives.org land and listen to your storyteller reading “Here We Are”. (About 14 minutes)
www.archive.org/details/HereWeAre_677
I hope you enjoyed it. Let me know if you think I should continue reading stories, there are many others I like. Until the next time.
Barry Siegel says:
Hi Mark- Thank your you fine reading of Dorothy Parker’s marvelous short story “Here We Are”. It was well worth the 14 minutes investment of time and frankly I’m amazed that I’m the only one who has commented on it (so far). I’ve known who Dorothy Parker was for years and even have her is a collection of short stories “The Best of American Humor” published in the 1940s. I was just recently in a bookstore (yeah, they still have brick & mortar stores) and I saw a couple of Dorothy Parker books. I plan on picking at least one of them up so I can enjoy her breezy and witty style of storytelling. Thanks again for bringing her to attention of people who might not have considered how great she was. I hope you record more of her work. -Barry
Mark says:
Thanks Barry, for your kind comment,
I really enjoyed reading the Dorothy Parker stories, and if I get any more requests, I will re-post the earlier stories I read to archives.org. The old sharing site I used erased my recordings. Dorothy wrote the original screenplay to “A Star Is Born” with Janet Gaynor, and also worked on the Judy Garland re-make. Lionel Stander’s character in the Janet Gaynor version really is the snide side of Parker’s personality, I think. Esther’s mother is the sweet, wise side. I’m working on some new reading ideas which I will post in the coming months.
Yours, Mark