The Haunted House
About The Haunted House
On a stormy night Mickey Mouse pulls at the door of an empty-looking house and the porch falls in. The door locks behind him. Bats come out of the walls. A spider drops from the ceiling and he hides in a chamber pot. A cloaked figure chases him, lifts the hood, and is a skeleton. More skeletons make him play the organ while they dance. One uses a radiator as an accordion. Mickey slips away. A doorknob becomes a skeleton hand. He hits two skeletons in a bed, dives into a barrel of them, and runs to an outhouse. A skeleton is already inside and slams the door. Mickey runs.
Cast & crew
More about The Haunted House
Jack King directed. It was his first film as director. Walt Disney produced it and spoke Mickey's voice. Ub Iwerks was the main animator. Carl Stalling wrote the music. Celebrity Productions released it on 2 December 1929. It is the fourteenth Mickey Mouse short and runs 7 minutes. Columbia later reissued it. Some of the skeleton dancing is reused from The Skeleton Dance, released earlier in 1929. State censors objected to the chamber pot and the outhouse.
Themes
Making
King's first directing job puts Mickey at an organ the skeletons will not let him leave. Iwerks animated most of it, with a stretch of dancing lifted from The Skeleton Dance.
Music
Carl Stalling wrote the music. Walt Disney is Mickey's voice. The skeletons compel a turn at the organ.
Preservation
A print survives. The short entered the public domain in the United States on 1 January 2025.
Notes
- It was the eleventh Mickey short released in 1929.
- The porch collapses when Mickey pulls the knob, before he is inside.
- One skeleton plays the radiator like an accordion.
- The cartoon entered the public domain in the United States on 1 January 2025.
- Later Mickey horror shorts in the same line include The Gorilla Mystery (1930) and The Mad Doctor (1933).
Scenes
- Mickey hides from the spider in a chamber pot.
- A skeleton lifts its hood and the others make him play.
- He opens the outhouse and a skeleton is sitting there.
Influenced by
- The Skeleton Dance (1929)
Also available
- Wikimedia Commons (The Haunted House (1929).webm)
