Jerry Mouse
Encyclopedia
Jerry Mouse is a fictional
animated character, one of the main characters in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
's series of Tom and Jerry
theatrical cartoon short films. Created by William Hanna
and Joseph Barbera
, Jerry is a brown anthropomorphic
mouse
, who first appeared in the 1940 MGM animated short Puss Gets the Boot
. Hanna gave the mouse's original name as "Jerry", while Barbera claimed the mouse went unnamed in his first appearance.
, he took delight in besting, and often torturing, his antagonist. Hanna and Barbera considered Tom and Jerry "the best of enemies", whose rivalry hid an unspoken amount of mutual respect.
In later Tom and Jerry cartoons, Jerry acquired a young ward: a small grey mouse called "Tuffy
" or "Nibbles" depending upon the cartoon, who was left on Jerry's doorstep as a foundling
baby in the 1946 short The Milky Waif
. Jerry and Tuffy were also featured together in a sub-series of Tom and Jerry cartoons set in 17th century France
which featured the characters as musketeers. The first of these shorts, The Two Mouseketeers
, won the 1952 Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons
.
Hanna and Barbera served as writer/directors of the Tom and Jerry cartoons until 1956, when they also became the producers. Fourteen Tom and Jerry cartoons between 1940 and 1954 were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons, with seven of the shorts winning that award. MGM shut down its animation department in 1957, but new Tom and Jerry cartoons were produced by Gene Deitch
and later Chuck Jones
during the 1960s. Jerry would also appear in later Tom and Jerry productions made for television, a series of direct-to-video features, and Tom and Jerry: The Movie
, a 1992 theatrical film. Later productions eschewed much of the violence the 1940s and 1950s shorts were known for, and in several of the television shows Jerry was given a red bow tie and a kinder disposition.
MGM musical film
Anchors Aweigh
. Jerry appears as the ruler of a kingdom where music is banned because he feels he lacks talent, and Kelly persuades the mouse into performing a song-and-dance number with him. Kelly and MGM had originally wanted Walt Disney
's Mickey Mouse
as Kelly's dance partner for the sequence, but Disney was unwilling to license the character.
Hanna and Barbera achieved the effect of Kelly dancing with Jerry by rotoscoping: live-action plates of Kelly dancing alone were shot first, and the action traced frame by frame so that Jerry's movements would match. The success of the animated segment of Anchors Aweigh, which was noted as "stealing the show" in contemporary trade reviews, led to two more live-action/animated projects for Hanna and Barbera and MGM: an underwater ballet sequence featuring both Tom and Jerry in Esther Williams
' 1953 film Dangerous When Wet
, and the "Sinbad the Sailor" sequence of Kelly's 1956 film Invitation to the Dance
.
In the Family Guy
episode Road to Rupert
the dance with Gene Kelly in Anchors Aweigh was featured by rotoscoping Stewie Griffin
in Jerry's place.
in most incarnations of Tom and Jerry. William Hanna
provided the vocal effects for Jerry in most of the 1940-58 Tom and Jerry shorts. Vocal effects in the 1961 Gene Deitch shorts were provided by Allen Swift
. Sara Berner sings and speaks for Jerry in Anchors Aweigh, while Dana Hill
voices Jerry in Tom and Jerry: The Movie.
In later years, Jerry was voiced by:
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
animated character, one of the main characters in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon studio
The Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon studio was the in-house division of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer motion picture studio in Hollywood, California during the Golden Age of American animation, responsible for producing animated short subjects to accompany MGM feature films in Loew's Theaters...
's series of Tom and Jerry
Tom and Jerry
Tom and Jerry are the cat and mouse cartoon characters that were evolved starting in 1939.Tom and Jerry also may refer to:Cartoon works featuring the cat and mouse so named:* The Tom and Jerry Show...
theatrical cartoon short films. Created by William Hanna
William Hanna
William Denby Hanna was an American animator, director, producer, and cartoon artist, whose film and television cartoon characters entertained millions of people for much of the 20th century. When he was a young child, Hanna's family moved frequently, but they settled in Compton, California, by...
and Joseph Barbera
Joseph Barbera
Joseph Roland Barbera was an influential American animator, director, producer, storyboard artist, and cartoon artist, whose film and television cartoon characters entertained millions of fans worldwide for much of the twentieth century....
, Jerry is a brown anthropomorphic
Anthropomorphism
Anthropomorphism is any attribution of human characteristics to animals, non-living things, phenomena, material states, objects or abstract concepts, such as organizations, governments, spirits or deities. The term was coined in the mid 1700s...
mouse
Mouse
A mouse is a small mammal belonging to the order of rodents. The best known mouse species is the common house mouse . It is also a popular pet. In some places, certain kinds of field mice are also common. This rodent is eaten by large birds such as hawks and eagles...
, who first appeared in the 1940 MGM animated short Puss Gets the Boot
Puss Gets the Boot
Puss Gets the Boot is a one-reel animated cartoon and the first Tom and Jerry short, although not billed as such in the cartoon. It was released on June 24, 1940 by Metro-Goldwyn Mayer...
. Hanna gave the mouse's original name as "Jerry", while Barbera claimed the mouse went unnamed in his first appearance.
Tom and Jerry cartoons
The name "Jerry" was chosen by MGM animator John Carr, who submitted "Tom and Jerry" as potential names for the duo after an important Loews Inc. distributor in Texas asked for follow-ups to Puss Gets the Boot. While the idea of a cat-and-mouse duo was considered shopworn by the 1940s, Hanna and Barbera decided to expand upon the standard expected hunter/prey relationship. Their Jerry Mouse, an "incurable scene stealer", served more or less as the protagonist of most of the films; instead of being a "cowering victim" of his pursuer, Tom CatTom Cat
Thomas "Tom" Cat is a fictional character and half of the academy-award winning Tom and Jerry cartoon cat-and-mouse duo. He is a blue/grey anthropomorphic cat who first appeared in the 1940 animated short Puss Gets the Boot...
, he took delight in besting, and often torturing, his antagonist. Hanna and Barbera considered Tom and Jerry "the best of enemies", whose rivalry hid an unspoken amount of mutual respect.
In later Tom and Jerry cartoons, Jerry acquired a young ward: a small grey mouse called "Tuffy
Tuffy
Tuffy is a fictional character from the Tom and Jerry cartoon series. He is the little grey, diaper-wearing orphan mouse whose cartoon debut came in the 1946 short The Milky Waif. Tuffy was later featured in the 1949 Academy Award-winning short The Little Orphan...
" or "Nibbles" depending upon the cartoon, who was left on Jerry's doorstep as a foundling
Child abandonment
Child abandonment is the practice of relinquishing interests and claims over one's offspring with the intent of never again resuming or reasserting them. Causes include many social and cultural factors as well as mental illness. An abandoned child is called a foundling .-Causes:Poverty is often a...
baby in the 1946 short The Milky Waif
The Milky Waif
The Milky Waif is a 1946 American one-reel animated cartoon and is the 24th Tom and Jerry short directed by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, produced by Fred Quimby in Technicolor, released in theaters on May 18, 1946, and re-released in theaters on January 9, 1954 by Metro-Goldwyn Mayer...
. Jerry and Tuffy were also featured together in a sub-series of Tom and Jerry cartoons set in 17th century France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
which featured the characters as musketeers. The first of these shorts, The Two Mouseketeers
The Two Mouseketeers
The Two Mouseketeers is a 1952 American one-reel animated cartoon and is the 65th Tom and Jerry short, produced in Technicolor and released to theatres on March 15, 1952 by Metro-Goldwyn Mayer. It was produced by Fred Quimby and directed by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, with musical supervision...
, won the 1952 Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons
Academy Award for Animated Short Film
The Academy Award for Animated Short Film is an award which has been given by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences as part of the Academy Awards every year since the 5th Academy Awards, covering the year 1931-32, to the present....
.
Hanna and Barbera served as writer/directors of the Tom and Jerry cartoons until 1956, when they also became the producers. Fourteen Tom and Jerry cartoons between 1940 and 1954 were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons, with seven of the shorts winning that award. MGM shut down its animation department in 1957, but new Tom and Jerry cartoons were produced by Gene Deitch
Gene Deitch
Eugene Merril "Gene" Deitch is an American illustrator, animator and film director. He has been based in Prague, capital of Czechoslovakia and the present-day Czech Republic, since 1959. Since 1968, Deitch has been the leading animation director for the Connecticut organization Weston...
and later Chuck Jones
Chuck Jones
Charles Martin "Chuck" Jones was an American animator, cartoon artist, screenwriter, producer, and director of animated films, most memorably of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts for the Warner Bros. Cartoons studio...
during the 1960s. Jerry would also appear in later Tom and Jerry productions made for television, a series of direct-to-video features, and Tom and Jerry: The Movie
Tom and Jerry: The Movie
Tom and Jerry: The Movie is a 1992 American animated musical film directed by Phil Roman, and produced by Film Roman and Turner Pictures. It is a film adaptation of the Tom and Jerry series of theatrical shorts....
, a 1992 theatrical film. Later productions eschewed much of the violence the 1940s and 1950s shorts were known for, and in several of the television shows Jerry was given a red bow tie and a kinder disposition.
Anchors Aweigh
On his own, Jerry Mouse appears in a fantasy sequence in the 1945 Gene KellyGene Kelly
Eugene Curran "Gene" Kelly was an American dancer, actor, singer, film director and producer, and choreographer...
MGM musical film
Musical film
The musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate...
Anchors Aweigh
Anchors Aweigh (film)
Anchors Aweigh is a 1945 American musical comedy film directed by George Sidney in which two sailors go on a four-day shore leave in Hollywood, accompanied by music and song, meet an aspiring young singer and try to help her get an audition at MGM...
. Jerry appears as the ruler of a kingdom where music is banned because he feels he lacks talent, and Kelly persuades the mouse into performing a song-and-dance number with him. Kelly and MGM had originally wanted Walt Disney
Walt Disney
Walter Elias "Walt" Disney was an American film producer, director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur, entertainer, international icon, and philanthropist, well-known for his influence in the field of entertainment during the 20th century. Along with his brother Roy O...
's Mickey Mouse
Mickey Mouse
Mickey Mouse is a cartoon character created in 1928 by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks at The Walt Disney Studio. Mickey is an anthropomorphic black mouse and typically wears red shorts, large yellow shoes, and white gloves...
as Kelly's dance partner for the sequence, but Disney was unwilling to license the character.
Hanna and Barbera achieved the effect of Kelly dancing with Jerry by rotoscoping: live-action plates of Kelly dancing alone were shot first, and the action traced frame by frame so that Jerry's movements would match. The success of the animated segment of Anchors Aweigh, which was noted as "stealing the show" in contemporary trade reviews, led to two more live-action/animated projects for Hanna and Barbera and MGM: an underwater ballet sequence featuring both Tom and Jerry in Esther Williams
Esther Williams
Esther Jane Williams is a retired American competitive swimmer and MGM movie star.Williams set multiple national and regional swimming records in her late teens as part of the Los Angeles Athletic Club swim team...
' 1953 film Dangerous When Wet
Dangerous When Wet
Dangerous When Wet is an Technicolor Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer musical starring Esther Williams, Fernando Lamas, and Jack Carson, directed by Charles Walters, and featuring an animated swimming sequence starring Williams with the famous cat-and-mouse duo, Tom and Jerry.-Plot summary:Katie Higgins is...
, and the "Sinbad the Sailor" sequence of Kelly's 1956 film Invitation to the Dance
Invitation to the Dance (film)
Invitation to the Dance is a 1956 anthology film consisting of three distinct stories, all starring and directed by Gene Kelly.The film is unusual in that it has no spoken dialogue, with the characters performing their roles entirely through dance and mime...
.
In the Family Guy
Family Guy
Family Guy is an American animated television series created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series centers on the Griffins, a dysfunctional family consisting of parents Peter and Lois; their children Meg, Chris, and Stewie; and their anthropomorphic pet dog Brian...
episode Road to Rupert
Road to Rupert
"Road to Rupert" is the ninth episode of season five of Family Guy. The episode follows Brian after he inadvertently sells Stewie's teddy bear, Rupert, during a yard sale. In an attempt to retrieve him, Stewie and Brian travel across the United States, eventually discovering he is with a child...
the dance with Gene Kelly in Anchors Aweigh was featured by rotoscoping Stewie Griffin
Stewie Griffin
Stewie Griffin is a fictional character from the animated television series Family Guy. Once obsessed with world domination and matricide, Stewie is the youngest child of Peter and Lois Griffin, and the brother of Chris and Meg....
in Jerry's place.
Tom and Jerry Kids
In 1990, this version of Jerry wears a red bowtie, and has a tuft of hair on his head. He often taunts Tom (as a kitten) any chance he gets. Sometimes, in a few episodes, he is friends with Tom.Voice actors
Jerry is primarily muteMuteness
Muteness or mutism is an inability to speak caused by a speech disorder. The term originates from the Latin word mutus, meaning "silent".-Causes:...
in most incarnations of Tom and Jerry. William Hanna
William Hanna
William Denby Hanna was an American animator, director, producer, and cartoon artist, whose film and television cartoon characters entertained millions of people for much of the 20th century. When he was a young child, Hanna's family moved frequently, but they settled in Compton, California, by...
provided the vocal effects for Jerry in most of the 1940-58 Tom and Jerry shorts. Vocal effects in the 1961 Gene Deitch shorts were provided by Allen Swift
Allen Swift
Ira Stadlen , known professionally as Allen Swift, was an American voice actor, known for playing characters including Simon Bar Sinister and Riff-Raff on the Underdog cartoon show...
. Sara Berner sings and speaks for Jerry in Anchors Aweigh, while Dana Hill
Dana Hill
Dana Hill was an American actress and voice actor with a raspy voice and childlike appearance, which allowed her to play adolescent roles into her 30s...
voices Jerry in Tom and Jerry: The Movie.
In later years, Jerry was voiced by:
- Frank WelkerFrank WelkerFranklin Wendell "Frank" Welker is an American actor who specializes in voice acting and has contributed character voices and other vocal effects to American television and motion pictures.-Acting career:...
: The Tom and Jerry Comedy ShowThe Tom and Jerry Comedy ShowThe Tom and Jerry Comedy Show is an animated television program produced by Filmation for MGM Television in 1980, on CBS for Saturday mornings. The show lasted two seasons and the individual episodes were eventually added to syndicated Tom and Jerry packages, and also occasionally appeared on...
, Tom and Jerry Kids, Tom and Jerry: The Magic RingTom and Jerry: The Magic RingTom and Jerry: The Magic Ring is a 2001 animated direct-to-video film starring Tom and Jerry. This was the first made-for-video attempt to recapture the style of Hanna and Barbera's original Tom & Jerry theatricals... - Dee Bradley BakerDee Bradley BakerDee Bradley Baker is an American voice actor. He is noted as his long-running-role as Klaus Heissler in American Dad! and other various characters including Squilliam Fancyson in the hit TV series SpongeBob SquarePants, Nightcrawler in X-Men: Legends and Marvel: Ultimate Alliance...
: Tom and Jerry: Blast Off to MarsTom and Jerry: Blast Off to MarsTom and Jerry: Blast Off to Mars is a Tom and Jerry outer-space-themed direct-to-video film produced by Warner Bros. Animation.-Plot:...
, Tom and Jerry: The Fast and the FurryTom and Jerry: The Fast and the FurryTom and Jerry: The Fast and the Furry is a 2005 animated direct-to-video film starring the oscar-winning cat and mouse pair, Tom and Jerry. The subtitle is a parody of the hit Universal Studios film, The Fast and The Furious. It was released theatrically in select cites of the U.S...
(uncredited), Tom and Jerry: Shiver Me WhiskersTom and Jerry: Shiver Me WhiskersTom and Jerry: Shiver Me Whiskers is a 2006 animated made-for-video motion picture starring Tom and Jerry.-Plot:The movie starts above a big ocean, which was having a huge storm with very loud thunder. A group of jolly pirates are sailing on their ship, and all of them are scared of the thunderstorm...
(uncredited) - Jeff BergmanJeff BergmanJeff Allen Bergman is an American voice actor, who provides the modern day voices of various classic cartoon characters, including Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Elmer Fudd, Yosemite Sam, George Jetson, Fred Flintstone, Yogi Bear, and Huckleberry Hound.-Life and career:Originally from Philadelphia,...
: The Karate Guard - Sam VincentSamuel VincentSamuel Vincent is a Canadian voice actor who works with the Ocean Productions based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. He was born in North Vancouver, British Columbia.-Biography:...
: Tom and Jerry TalesTom and Jerry TalesTom and Jerry Tales is an animated television series which began production in 2005, and premiered in the United States on September 23, 2006 and cancelled on March 22, 2008 on Kids' WB!. It is the fourth television show in the franchise that continues the chase and violence of the cat and mouse...
, Tom and Jerry: A Nutcracker TaleTom and Jerry: A Nutcracker TaleTom and Jerry: A Nutcracker Tale is a 2007 holiday themed animated direct-to-video film starring Tom and Jerry produced by Warner Bros. Animation...
(uncredited) - Joe AlaskeyJoe AlaskeyJoseph "Joe" Alaskey is an American actor, comedian, and voice artist, credited as one of the successors of Mel Blanc in impersonating the voices of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and other characters from Warner Bros. cartoons. He was born in Watervliet, New York.-Other work:Alaskey has also done voices...
: Tom and Jerry Meet Sherlock HolmesTom and Jerry Meet Sherlock HolmesTom and Jerry Meet Sherlock Holmes is a 2010 animated direct-to-video film starring Tom and Jerry produced by Warner Bros. Animation. It is the first Tom and Jerry direct-to-video film to be produced without any of its original creators, William Hanna and Joseph Barbera...
(uncredited), Tom and Jerry and the Wizard of OzTom and Jerry and the Wizard of OzTom and Jerry & The Wizard of Oz is a 2011 animated direct-to-video film starring Tom and Jerry, produced by Warner Bros. Animation. It is a crossover film version of MGM's famed 1939 film The Wizard of Oz, with characters from the Tom and Jerry/Droopy universe sharing screen with Dorothy and her...
(uncredited)
See also
- Tom and JerryTom and JerryTom and Jerry are the cat and mouse cartoon characters that were evolved starting in 1939.Tom and Jerry also may refer to:Cartoon works featuring the cat and mouse so named:* The Tom and Jerry Show...
- List of Hanna-Barbera characters
- Metro–Goldwyn–Mayer cartoon studio