{{short description|1932 American animated short film}} {{Use American English|date=January 2025}} {{Use mdy dates|date=December 2020}} {{Infobox film | name = Betty Boop for President | image = | caption = | director = Dave Fleischer | story = | animator = Seymour Kneitel<br />Roland Crandall<br />Bernard Wolf (uncredited) | starring = Mae Questel | music = Sammy Timberg | producer = Max Fleischer | studio = Fleischer Studios | distributor = Paramount Pictures | released = {{Film date|1932|11|04}} | color_process = Black-and-white | runtime = 7 mins (one reel) | language = English }} '''''Betty Boop for President''''' is a 1932 Fleischer Studios animated short film starring Betty Boop.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Lenburg |first1=Jeff |title=The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons |date=1999 |publisher=Checkmark Books |isbn=0-8160-3831-7 |access-date=June 6, 2020 |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780816038312/page/54/mode/2up |pages=54–56}}</ref> It was released by Paramount Pictures on November 4, 1932, four days before that year's presidential election day.
==Plot==
Betty runs for the office of President against Mr. Nobody. Both candidates state their platform through song and dance.
In answer to various problems and political issues, Mr. Nobody consistently promises that "nobody" will solve the problem: <blockquote> Who will make your taxes light?... Mr. Nobody!<br /> Who'll protect the voters' right?... Mr. Nobody!<br /> Should you come home some early dawn,<br /> Find a new milkman is on:<br /> Who cares if your wife is gone?... Mr. Nobody </blockquote> Betty's promises for improvements are shown, including door to door trolley stops, improved conditions for keeping the streets clean, and even a giant umbrella to protect the whole city from rain. Betty also promises to tame a split and incorrigible Congress made up of donkey Democrats and elephant Republicans, and offers a simple solution for prison reform: she will transform each hardened criminal into a limp-wristed sissy.
Betty's campaign promises win the crowd over, and she is voted into the White House by a landslide. A large parade is held in the new President's honor, as she thanks one and all. The film ends with a static shot of a glass of beer, possibly indicating that Betty will also end prohibition.
==Notes and comments== * Betty Boop briefly morphs into caricatures of Herbert Hoover and Al Smith.<ref name=RetFan10>{{cite journal|last=Saavedra|first=Scott|date=August 2020|title=Cartoon Characters for President|journal=RetroFan|publisher=TwoMorrows Publishing |location=United States|issue=10|page=13}}</ref> Smith was the Democratic Party candidate in 1928 and was widely expected to run again, but the nominee would end up being Franklin D. Roosevelt. The use of Smith in the cartoon was probably the result in the lead time needed to animate the cartoon before it appeared in theaters. * The cartoon ends with the image of a glass of beer; repeal or modification of Prohibition in the United States was a major contemporary issue. *''Betty Boop for President'' was reworked by the Fleischer staff sixteen years later, when the studio, by then known as Famous Studios, produced a ''Popeye the Sailor'' cartoon entitled ''Olive Oyl for President''. This 1948 short reuses many of the gags, as well as a reworked version of Betty's "If I Were President" song, applying them to a fantasy story about Olive Oyl running for president. * The "Nobody for President" slogan was later taken up by hippie activist and entertainer Wavy Gravy. *It is the first depiction of a fictional president to appear on screen.{{Citation needed|date=January 2021}}
==Remake== There is a film called ''Hurray for Betty Boop'' made in 1980, based on this short's running-for-office premise.<ref name=RetFan10/> Record producer Dan Dalton took scenes from over 30 Korean-colorized 1930s Betty Boop cartoons and wrote a connecting narrative to make this feature. He employed the voice-acting talents of Tommy Smothers and Victoria D'Orazi, and songs by Debby Boone, Cab Calloway, and The Association. Dalton claimed "it was difficult to keep the continuity" to Fleischer authority Michael Dobbs. Dalton explicitly asserted in 1982 that New Line Cinema's lack of promotion was from the film's failure to receive a theatrical release.{{citation needed|date=July 2022}} It only made its home video release by Warner Home Video in 1984 before it was stored away in obscurity resulting its negative reception.
This 90-minute film finally received a DVD release in 2004, under the name ''Betty Boop for President'', on the Brentwood Home Video imprint. Despite this, Dalton uploaded the abandoned compilation film on social media in March 2016.<ref>{{Cite AV media |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t0OW7vozKc |title=Betty Boop for President A Max Fleischer Musical in Color! |date=2016-03-19 |last=Dan Dalton |access-date=2024-07-27 |via=YouTube}}</ref>
==References== {{reflist}}
==External links== *[https://archive.today/20130117204709/http://www.bcdb.com/cartoon/4383-Betty_Boop_For_President.html ''Betty Boop for President'' at the Big Cartoon Database] * {{YouTube|1h3vnYSTtrg|''Betty Boop for President''}} *{{IMDb title|0022667}}
{{Betty Boop films}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Betty Boop for President}} Category:1932 films Category:American political comedy films Category:Betty Boop cartoons Category:1932 American animated films Category:1932 animated short films Category:Paramount Pictures short films Category:Fleischer Studios short films Category:Short films directed by Dave Fleischer Category:1930s political comedy films Category:1932 comedy films Category:American comedy short films Category:Films about elections Category:American animated black-and-white films