Finding His Voice
About Finding His Voice
A live-action hand draws a strip of film that grows a head and a body made of notes. The strip, Talkie, sings until a silent strip, Mutie, jumps him. Talkie says, "Hey, Mute! What's the big idea, busting up my act?" Mutie answers in sign language, with titles, and is taken to Dr. Western for vocal cords. On a set, Talkie sings "Love's Old Sweet Song" while the doctor walks through the recording steps. Mutie gets a voice, wrecks the solo, and the two finish "Goodnight, Ladies" in a boat that a whale then swallows. A Western Electric card ends it.
Cast & crew
More about Finding His Voice
Max Fleischer and F. Lyle Goldman directed. Western Electric produced and distributed the short on June 21, 1929. The story credit reads W. E. Erpi, a joke on Electrical Research Products Inc., the AT&T and Western Electric licensing arm set up in 1926. Running time is 10 minutes 38 seconds.
Themes
Making
Western Electric wanted theater men and the public to see how a picture track and a sound track were made. Fleischer's studio turned the lesson into two film strips with faces.
Technique
The middle of the short is a step-by-step of the Western Electric recording chain, drawn as a trip through Dr. Western's plant.
Music
Talkie sings "Love's Old Sweet Song." The close is "Goodnight, Ladies," sung by Billy Murray and Walter Van Brunt.
Preservation
A print of about 10 minutes 47 seconds circulates with the short.
Notes
- Billy Murray and Walter Van Brunt speak and sing, uncredited. Carlyle Ellis narrates. Murray also voiced Fleischer's Bimbo.
- The picture explains a sound-on-film system, but the first release carried its own sound on Western Electric discs.
- Goldman had animated earlier Bray and International Film Service technical shorts, including The Ear (1920).
Scenes
- A hand draws the film strip, and notes become its body.
- A whale eats the boat after "Goodnight, Ladies.
Quotes
Hey, Mute! What's the big idea, busting up my act?
