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Jakob & Bronislaw Gimpel Archives
The Cat Concerto Controversy (Mystery Solved?)
by Peter Gimpel
Copyright © 2005 by Peter Gimpel
___Recently I have been receiving emails from diverse parts of the globe, inquiring about the recordings my father made for the cartoons. So far as I know, he made only two, "Rhapsody Rabbit" for Warner Brothers, and "Johann Mouse" for MGM. The film credits for "Rhapsody Rabbit" (Bugs Bunny in tails performing Lizst's 2nd Hungarian Rhapsody over, under and around an interloping mouse) did not include my father. This was at his own request, because at that early stage of his American career, he did not wish to become known as "the guy who played the piano for Bugs Bunny."Nevertheless, my father's collaboration is documented, I believe, in Joe Adamson's fine book, "50 Years and only One Gray Hare," (New York, Henry Holt, 1990), and is confirmed by my father's daybook, which lists, for Thursday, January 31, 1946, at 8:00 AM: "Warner Bros. - 2nd Rhapsody for cartoon." The playing is also clearly recognizable to me as my father's, notwithstanding the many comedic interruptions and distortions of tempo.The Academy Award-winning cartoon "Johann Mouse" was made in 1952 and correctly credits my father as the pianist and composer of the musical arrangements.There was also a third cartoon which has sometimes been attributed to my father and has been the subject of several inquiries. This is an MGM cartoon called "Cat Concerto," featuring Tom & Jerry in roles virtually identical to those of Bugs and the unnamed mouse in "Rhapsody Rabbit." In "Cat Concerto," Tom appears as a concert pianist performing the same Second Hungarian Rhapsody heard in "Rhapsody Rabbit!"According to information available on the internet, both "Cat Concerto" and "Rhapsody Rabbit" came out in the same year, 1946, and their screening at the Academy was marred by scandal and reciprocal accusations of plagiarism. The award for Best Short Subject went to "Cat Concerto," although many felt that "Rhapsody Rabbit" was the better cartoon. Like my father in "Rhapsody Rabbit," the pianist in "Cat Concerto" performed incognito, and, so far as I know, his true identity remains either unknown or undisclosed to this day.I believe that I am able to solve the mystery.First of all, in comparing the two versions of the Rhapsody, an experienced musical ear will immediately recognize that they are not at all alike. The most obvious differences are at the beginning and end. Bugs's Rhapsody begins with a galvanizing burst of dramatic energy, whereas Tom's opening chords are sombre and slow - very slow - an eccentric tempo my father would never have chosen. The fiendish octave passage at the end of Tom's recital is played in single octaves and with phenomenal speed and accuracy. In "Rhapsody Rabbit," my father executes the same passage in thundering double octaves - less difficult, but much more effective. In addition, there are many signature nuances throughout my father's performance that are missing from the "Cat Concerto" version. Furthermore, while my father had a fabulous technique, simple octaves were not his special "forte," and he would never have recorded the ending of the 2nd Rhapsody in simple octaves.Don't misunderstand me. Both pianists are terrific, and share certain stylistic traits in common; but, clearly, they are not one and the same. When I first heard "Cat Concerto," I thought of Shura Cherkassky, a great pianist with a phenomenal technique, whose playing was comparable in some respects to my father, though - when it comes to the classical/romantic repertory - somewhat less refined in musicianship and musical taste. Wondering if I could compare "Cat Concerto" with an actual Cherkassky recording of the 2nd Rhapsody, I phoned a dear friend of mine in British Columbia who happens to be a devoted collector of Cherkassky recordings. I am speaking of the poet Alexander Forbes (whose delightful Rumours of Bees I was privileged to publish on my Red Heifer Press - see www.redheiferpress.com). My friendship with Alex Forbes is a family heirloom: his father, Charles Forbes, a pupil of Egon Petri, was a gifted pianist and a great admirer and close friend of both my father and Cherkassky. Forbes-the-son played Cherkassky's beautiful 1985 recording of the 2nd Rhapsody for me over the phone. Notwithstanding the 39 years intervening between the earlier and later recordings, the resemblance to the "Cat Concerto" was quite compelling - from the eccentrically slow introductory chords to the concluding single octaves. At 76, Cherkassky didn't play octaves as fast or as brilliantly as he played them in 1946, but they were still fluent and easy. Alex Forbes then listened to a downloaded version of "Cat Concerto," and concurs with me that the pianist is "without a doubt" Shura Cherkassky.The hypothesis of Cherkassky as the mystery pianist of "Cat Concerto" fits more than musically. There is a more serious aspect to the puzzle: indeed, it appears that neither MGM nor Warner was ever able to completely purge itself of the taint of plagiarism - although Warner Brothers (once again, according to information available on the internet), put on the defensive, allegedly floated the story that their film processing lab sent the prints of "Rhapsody Rabbit" to MGM by mistake. For its part, MGM was reported to have insisted that it had been working independently on the same idea all along.Personally, I don't believe either version. If it were true that Technicolor sent the prints to the wrong studio, the last thing MGM would have done would have been to try to produce such an obvious copy from scratch. Conversely, the happenstance of two major competing studios in the same city each independently working on exactly the same idea with no leaks involved simply challenges belief. Clearly, there was a leak - just enough of a leak to get extraneous persons interested in the idea, but not enough of a leak to frighten them off. Here is what I think really happened:Cherkassky, as I mentioned, was very friendly with my parents during the early '40s. According to my parents, he was a charming and amusing man, and, they were often together for meals, parties and outings. There was a friendly rivalry between the two pianists, each vying to outdo the other at the piano. The young Cherkassky had one unfortunate flaw, however, which eventually ended the relationship: he was an inveterate prankster, and it was a defect that affected more than his sense of humor. There are various stories about Cherkassky's antics, but I have three on excellent authority.Alex Forbes tells me that Cherkassky used to pass by his (Alex's) father's business from time to time and borrow 50 cents or so for "gas money." This continued for a considerable period. To pay back the mounting tab, Cherkassky finally invited Forbes to a sumptuous luncheon at the Brown Derby (a famous Hollywood restaurant, no longer extant). "Order whatever you like. My treat." A treat it was, and it included a very fine bottle of wine; but when the the waiter brought the bill, Cherkassky charged it all to the account of Josef Hoffman - the famous pianist - Cherkassky's teacher and a celebrated patron of the Brown Derby!On another occasion, tells Alex Forbes, his parents were at a party with Cherkassky at my parents' home. There were several guests, and, the evening being warm, jackets and neckties were deposited in the bedroom. Late that night, as the Forbeses were walking back to their car with Cherkassky, the latter drew a bunch of neckties from his coat pocket and showed them to Charles. "Where did you get those?" asked Forbes, in surprise. "From the Gimpels' bedroom," came the nonchalant reply.According to my mother, what ended their friendship with Cherkassky was the following. There had been a series of prank phonecalls of unknown origin to my parents' home, and my mother and father were quite concerned. One evening during a party, my mother happened to observe Cherkassky in the hallway dialing random numbers on the telephone. The next time she got a prank call, she said into the receiver, "Shura, I know it's you. Stop it, or I'll tell the police." The calls stopped.In light of the foregoing, I think it is safe to conjecture that somehow word got back to Cherkassky that my father was recording the Liszt Rhapsody for Warner Brothers. Possibly, my father or some other colleague mentioned it to him in confidence, or, just as possibly, Warner had initially approached Cherkassky to do the job and the deal had not gone through. One way or another, I suspect that Cherkassky, cackling with glee, visited his contacts at MGM (all the great Los Angeles musicians recorded for the studios) and casually let fall, "Hey, you know what? I had this great idea for a Tom & Jerry cartoon . . . !"I can almost hear the reaction. "Wonderful! Let's do it! And why don't you record the piano part?"If my conjecture is correct, then it is true, after all, that MGM had no inkling that Warner Brothers had been working on this very same idea, or indeed that Warner was the source of Cherkassky's suggestion. Had they known, they would never have expended the resources to produce a film that was bound to draw them into a very ugly controversy. For its part, Warner might have had its suspicions, but, as always with leaks, there was very little they could do about it.Ultimately, of course, the joke was on Cherkassky. He must have been bursting to tell everybody that he was the mystery pianist of the Academy-Award-winning "Cat Concerto!" Ironically, he couldn't allow himself to do that, for if the truth got out, it could have seriously damaged his reputation and career. How that must have hurt! Even more ironic is the fact that sixty years after the event, Cherkassky's performance is still being attributed to my father!In closing, it is worth noting that my parents attended a recital of Cherkassky's in Los Angeles some time, I believe, during the early '80s. They went backstage to congratulate the artist after what they said was a marvellous performance. From what I heard, it was a genuinely joyous reunion, and a rather emotional one, after so many years.Postscript: A Curious Twist
January 22, 2011
I was recently informed by an unimpeachable source that the MGM Archives contains documentation that the pianist who recorded Liszt's Rhapsody No. 2 for MGM's "Cat Concerto" was John Crown, a virtuoso pianist from South Africa, I believe, who for many years headed USC's piano department.
Why, then, have I not scrapped my theory and replaced the above essay with a brief note as per the foregoing paragraph? Because nearly everything I wrote about Cherkassky could apply to John Crown as well. All three were social friends, all three were rivals, and all three were brilliant technicians. On the other hand, I never heard John Crown described as a prankster, and it is hard to imagine him sneaking over to MGM out of sheer competitive malice. The exploit was obviously meant as a joke, and it has Cherkassky's fingerprints all over it. Whether Crown was in on it is simply too deep to speculate.
Resumindo e em suma: o desenho The Cat Concerto (Concertista Desconcertado ou O Concerto do Gato), de Tom e Jerry (Tom and Jerry), produzido, lançado e distribuído pela MGM é plágio do desenho Rhapsody Rabbit (Concerto sem Dó ou O Concerto), do Pernalonga (Bugs Bunny), produzido, lançado e distribuído pela Warner Bros., eis os links para cada um lá no YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsLq-ktkRzM e https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=geE-2nDQqzw!
Em 1946, foram produzidos os curtas-metragens "The Cat Concerto"
(da série Tom e Jerry) e "Rhapsody Rabbit (da série Merry Melodies
(Pernalonga)).
No ano seguinte, os dois curtas foram indicados ao Óscar, como melhor curta animado e o da MGM venceu.
Joseph Barbera era um velho amigo de Friz Freleng e
ficou muito surpreso com a semelhança entre seus respectivos desenhos,
mas enquanto William Hanna e Joseph Barbera acusaram Friz Freleng de
plágio, Freleng negou ter roubado a ideia deles.
Tanto a MGM como a Warner Bros. se acusaram de
plágio, mas existem três teorias quanto a isso: uma plagiou a outra, a
empresa Technicolor enviou impressos do desenho de um estúdio para o
outro por engano ou malícia, ou foi só uma coincidência.
Constatei e descobri isso enquanto debatia e discutia com dois americanos via e-mail, aqui estão as conversas originais e na íntegra:
"2012/1/17 Eocostello <eocostello@aol.com>
(1) While Bugs normally wins at the end of his cartoons, there are significant exceptions. "Bugs Bunny and the Three Bears," for example. Another, quite arguably, would be "Falling Hare," where the Gremlin repeatedly defeats Bugs. Some other cartoons are a bit vague as to who wins, for example, "Hare-Brained Hypnotist." While defeats for Bugs are not common, the defeat he suffers in Rabbit Rhapsody is by no means unusual. Yes, of course, I was viewed all of the Bugs Bunny cartoons and in fact, he lose in the end in several moments...___
(1a) Bugs versus a mouse may, perhaps, be unusual, but after all, at various times he dealt with lions (Acrobatty Bunny), gorillas (Gorilla My Dreams, Hurdy Gurdy Hare), wolves (The Windblown Hare), buzzards, and so forth. Mice have a long history of antagonistic roles going back to the early days of animation. Yes, but don't have logic or sense a rodent fight with other rodent, much less a rabbit versus a mouse, you don't agree?
(2) The choice of music isn't surprising. Certain popular classics, such as "Poet and Peasant," or "Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2" became elements of popular culture. As such, it wouldn't be hugely surprising to see a cartoon revolving around the performance of such a number. As I mentioned in the earlier email, there was a significant overlap in MGM and Warner Bros. personnel in the 30s and 40s, so it isn't hugely surprising that you would see similar thought-patterns. OK, but both tom and Bugs are defeated by the mice in both cartoons (Tom by Jerry and Bugs by the unnamed mouse)...
During the 1940s, there were a number of problems with the music rights organizations, which led to a sharp decrease in the availability of popular music on radio, with the resulting sharp increase in the popular classics. Lantz had "Poet and Peasant" in 1945, WB had "The Corny Concerto" not long before that, and I imagine if I put my mind to it, I could probably come up with a large number of examples. When you're dealing with the same pool of music, as I say, certain gags/plots are going to repeat themselves. Well, according Joseph Barbera, the similarities between the two cartoons are a complete coincidence, but Friz Freleng wasn't convinced that this was true...
(3) For another example of similar cartoons, I could point you to UPA's "The Magic Fluke" versus Tex Avery's MGM cartoon "Magical Maestro." It's certain, but these two cartoons aren't of the same year (the first is from 1949, and the second is from 1952)...
-----Original Message-----
From: Sávio Morais Cristof
oletti <saviochristi@gmail.com>
To: Eocostello <eocostello@aol.com>
Sent: Tue, Jan 17, 2012 11:07 am
Subject: Re: Cat Concerto v. Rhapsody Rabbit
Hello, but the two cartoons have the same plot, the same jokes, the same music and are from the same year, isn't very coincidental?
Joseph Barbera was surprised for see that cartoon made by Friz Freleng was the same cartoon made by William Hanna and him, also for see Bugs Bunny fighting with a mouse, why the Bugs oponent had to be a mouse?
Moreover, Bugs Bunny generally win at the end of his cartoons, with some exceptions, isn't really?
2012/1/15 Eocostello <eocostello@aol.com>
My apologies for not responding sooner.
The question of whether The Cat Concerto or Rhapsody Rabbit steal from each other is still in dispute (the article I wrote came out a number of years ago, before additional research had been done). The Cat Concerto was put into limited release in December, 1946 and not fully released until April, 1947, whereas Rhapsody Rabbit was fully released in November, 1946 (six months before Cat Concerto). One peculiarity is that the Cat Concerto's production number is significantly out of sequence with other MGM cartoons released in late 1946 and early 1947, suggesting that the cartoon was originally to be released in April, 1947, but was rushed to limited release to qualify for the 1946 Academy Awards. (In those days, a limited release in a few theatres in Los Angeles qualified a film for consideration.) It's also perhaps worth noting that the MPPA copyright number for Rhapsody Rabbit is earlier than that of Cat Concerto.
All that said, it's still up in the air over which is which. It could, in fact, be neither, and pure coincidence, given the fact that Hanna and Barbera had worked with Freleng during the latter's tenure at MGM in 1937-1939, or that Avery had worked with Freleng at Warners. Common experiences, plus public domain music, may have led to simultaneous thinking of an innocent nature.
My own, personal view is that it's largely coincidental the two cartoons were in production at the same time, though the leakage of the existence of the WB cartoon to MGM probably provoked MGM to speed up release of their cartoon, and rely (successfully) on MGM's vaunted clout to get it the nomination and the Oscar.
The citation to the other alleged WB incidents are probably not on point; the Warner Bros. cartoon studio was noted for its independence from the head office, to the point where, allegedly, neither Jack nor Harry Warner were familiar with the characters. (That may be comic exaggeration.)
-----Original Message-----
From: Sávio Morais Cristof
oletti <saviochristi@gmail.com>
To: eocostello <eocostello@aol.com>
Sent: Fri, Jan 13, 2012 7:50 am
Subject: Excuse me, I read an article written by you and I have a comment about this...
The article is the follow: http://www.i-foo.com/~eocostello/wbcc/eowbcc-f.html.
Sorry, but I think that "The Cat Concerto" is the plagiarism of "Rhapsody Rabbit", not the inverse...
First because is very strange Bugs Bunny fight with a mouse, second because Bugs Bunny generally win in the end of your cartoons, third because the end of "Rhapsody Rabbit" can was changed with the small piano for don't to be equal of the end of "The Cat Concerto", fourth because Joseph Barbera was surprised in see that the cartoon made by Friz Freleng was the same made by William Hanna and he and fifth because the Warner Bros. have fame of plagiarism of other studios (a example is the movie Catwoman (2004), partial plagiarism of three movies of the Warner Bros. same (Batman (1989), Batman Returns (1992) and The Crow (1992) and of two Sony Pictures / Columbia Pictures movies (Spider-Man (2002) and Spider-Man 2 (2004))...
Then, in my opinion, Technicholor send prints of the MGM Work for the Warner Bros., not the inverse!
Freleng made before a similar cartoon ("Rhapsody in Rivets") and "Rhapsody Rabbit" was release before "The Cat Concerto", even so, seems to me that "The Cat Concerto" is the original cartoon and not "Rhapsody Rabbit!".
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