Grampy cures the 'House Cleaning Blues'

House Cleaning Blues (1937)

Starring: Mae Questel (as the voice of Betty Boop) and Jack Mercer (as the voice of Grampy)

Directors: Dave Fleischer and Dave Tendlar

Rating: Six of Ten Stars

The day after hosting a wild birthday party, Betty Boop is hung-over, short-tempered, and she very quickly becomes frustrated with trying to clean up the mess. Grampy comes to her rescue by creating and make-shift cleaning machines.

In "House Cleaning Blues", Professor Grampy once again Does His Thing and saves Betty from house-cleaning... but in the process he pretty destroys a number of expensive household items, such as a record player, a player piano, and clock, and a bicycle. There isn't anything we haven't seen in other Betty & Grampy cartoons, but unlike those, the thought of how much property was being damaged to help Betty get out of house-cleaning kept popping into my head and so maybe I didn't enjoy this one as much as I should have.

While this may not be the most innovative of Betty & Grampy outings, there's still a lot to like about it. Betty has one of the cutest melt-downs ever put into animation--a bit the folks at Fleischer liked so much they recycled some of it in "Service with a Smile" (1937). Everything about Grampy driving his roadster is hilarious--especially the way one has to wonder what it is he has on tap when he serves Betty her drink as they drive off at the end of the episode. Finally, there is plenty of high-quality animation to enjoy--with a pan-shot across the wreckage of Betty's home before Grampy goes to work that has a 3D quality to it standing out in particular. And, despite my very joy-killing cringing at the property Grampy converts, the bits with his machines operating are as well done as they always are. 

If you have a few minutes, go ahead and check out "House Cleaning Blues" by clicking below.