Bimbo and Ko-Ko, a clown, were the Fleischer stars through the 1920s. Betty started as a guest in “Bimbo’s Initiation” (1931). Some of Betty’s earliest outings have been called by some critics, including Leonard Maltin, as a kind of “cartoon noir” because of the menacing shadows and looming backgrounds, and the inanimate objects that spring to life in threatening manner. (A technique which led to Popeye, another Fleischer production, noted for its humorous extemporaneous patter of dialogue.) The actors watched the cartoon and then invented lines to go with what was happening on the screen. Mae Questel was reportedly very good at ad libbing, as this is what she was required to do in the recording session after the cartoon was filmed.
Max Fleischer had the cartoon created first, a kind of stream-of-consciousness storytelling on the part of the cartoonist (which led to some pretty weird dream-like scenarios for Betty and her crew), and then the sound came afterwards. Mae Questel, who voiced Betty, did a Helen Kane impersonation, and “boop-oop-a-doop” became a catch phrase.Īn interesting evolution of Betty and the Fleischer manner of production is noted in “Serious Business” by Stefan Kanfer (Scribner, 1997), which notes that unlike the Disney studio which recorded the dialogue before creating the cartoon, a method which continues today, Fleischer did it the other way around.
Who voiced betty boop full#
The cartoon heroine with the giant head with its coy rolling eyes burst from the Fleischer studio in the early 1930s and made full use of what the new sound technology had to offer. Then the hapless creature suffered the indignity being called naughty by the Code. On TV, she appeared on panel shows and soap operas, but was perhaps best recalled as a commercial spokesperson for Playtex, Folger's Coffee and especially, as Aunt Bluebell in numerous advertisements for Scott Paper.Betty Boop suffered the indignity of lewd and lascivious employers groping her and threatening her for sexual favors. Perhaps her best screen role was as Woody Allen's domineering mother in his "Oedipus Wrecks" segment of "New York Stories" (1989). In "Funny Girl" (1968), Questel was one of the Lower East Side neighbors of Fanny Brice. Rubin in the 1959 stage production of "A Majority of One" and reprised it in the 1961 film version. Questel also found time to act on stage and in the occasional film, primarily in character parts. (In the series, Questel also gave voice to Swee'pea.) During her long career as a voice actor, she also lent her distinctive abilities to such cartoon figures as Winky Dink, Little Audry and Casper, the Friendly Ghost. Partly due to that pressure and partly because the series' popularity was waning due to changing tastes, Fleischer ended the Betty Boop shorts in 1939 with "Yip, Yip Yippy!." Beginning in 1933, Fleischer had also tapped Questel to lend her talents to the character of Olive Oyl in the Popeye cartoons, more than 450 of which were produced. The provocative character, noted for her short skirts and flirtatious manner, came under fire from women's clubs in the late 1930s. The bob-haired, saucer-eyed Betty Boop became a popular phenomenon, spawning everything from dolls to playing cards to candy to a syndicated comic strip.
Over an eight year period, Questel provided the sweetly saucy child-like tones for Betty (and the animators incorporated many of Questel's mannerisms) in more than 100 shorts, including "Boop-Oop-a-Doop" (1932), "Snow White" (1933) and the Oscar-nominated "Riding the Rails" (1938). In 1931, Max Fleischer signed her to provide the vocals for the Kane-inspired cartoon figure Betty Boop. An agent immediately signed Questel and before long she was appearing on the vaudeville circuit as a singer and impressionist, imitating performers from Fanny Brice to Maurice Chevalier. At age 17, the Bronx-born singer-actress won a talent contest mimicking the then-popular baby-voiced entertainer Helen Kane. Petite, with a high-pitched, rounded voice, Mae Questel was the voice behind such cartoon figures as Betty Boop, Olive Oyl and Little Audry.
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