Wot a Skeleton

Maybe it was because of Disney’s “The Skeleton Dance,” but it seems skeletons proliferated in cartoons made by the Van Beuren studio in the early ‘30s.

Here’s one in the nonsensical Tom and Jerry debut cartoon “Wot a Night” (1931). I like the gag. A skeleton is bathing and then is shocked two guys are seeing him naked. So he escaped by swirling down the bathtub drain.



Later, the skeleton plays the piano and we get skeletons minueting.

John Foster and George Stallings get the co-direction credit. Gene Rodemich does a nice job with the score, as usual.