Quack-a Doodle-Doo
About Quack-a Doodle-Doo
Mama Duck has waited so long for her egg that the baby supplies are cobwebbed. She swallows a week's vitamins at once, and a six-foot duckling, Baby Huey, hatches already asking when dinner is. He eats the flock's corn, empties the pond, and the other ducks throw him and Mama out. A fox arrives with a mallet and a run of traps. Huey catches on, the fox flees in his underwear, and Mama wears the fur home.
Cast & crew
More about Quack-a Doodle-Doo
I. Sparber directed this Noveltoon. Dave Tendlar and Tom Golden animated, Robert Connavale painted the backgrounds, and Carl Meyer, Jack Mercer, and Martin Taras wrote the story. Paramount released it in Technicolor on March 3, 1950.
Themes
Making
Winston Sharples wrote the music. EOFFTV lists the picture as 35mm Technicolor with RCA mono sound. Wikipedia counts eleven further Huey shorts between 1951 and 1959.
Music
Winston Sharples wrote the music for the hatching and the fox's traps.
Preservation
Public domain in the United States since 1978. Thunderbean later included a restored print on Noveltoons Original Classics.
Notes
- This is Baby Huey's first cartoon. Martin Taras created him for Famous Studios.
- The title mixes "quack" with "cock-a-doodle-doo.
- Sid Raymond voices Huey, Jack Mercer the fox, and Mae Questel Mama Duck and the other ducks.
- Huey hatches in a blue bonnet and a burlap flour-sack diaper, and the scale breaks when they try to weigh him.
- The line he uses when the fox pulls a carving knife, "I think you're tryin' to kill me," became a regular beat in later Huey cartoons.
- It was not sold to Harvey, but The Harveytoon Show ran it in 1998 without a title card.
- NTA missed the renewal. The short entered the U.S. public domain in 1978.
Scenes
- A mammoth egg hatches a duckling already about six feet tall.
- Huey's dive empties the pond and leaves a crater in his shape.
- He pinches a shotgun barrel so the shot blows up in the fox's face, and an anvil cracks on his head.
- The fox runs off stripped to his underwear, and Mama wears the fur.
Also available
- DVD and Blu-ray Noveltoons Original Classics (Thunderbean Animation, 2012 and 2019)
- DVD HarveyToons: The Complete Collection (Classic Media, 2006)
- VHS Baby Huey and Friends (Goodtimes Entertainment, 1992)
- DVD 300 Cartoon Classics (Image Entertainment, 2011)
Quotes
Duh, sorry I'm late, ma.
When do we eat?
He's a pig, not a duck.
I think you're tryin' to kill me.
