Tweety Bird

Tweety (aka Tweety Pie or Tweety Bird) is a fictional character in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of animated cartoons. Fairly popular during the late 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, Tweety's popularity, like that of The Tasmanian Devil, actually grew in the years following the dissolution of the Looney Tunes cartoons. Today, Tweety is considered, along with Taz and Bugs Bunny, among the most popular of the Looney Tunes characters, especially (because of his "cute" appearance and personality) among girls and young women. Despite widespread speculation to the contrary, Tweety is and has always been a male character.

History

Creation Warner Bros. Presenting Tweety Bird

Bob Clampett created the character that would become Tweety in the 1942 short A Tale of Two Kitties, pitting him against two hungry cats named Babbott and Catstello (based on the famous comedians Abbott and Costello).

Related Topics:
Bob Clampett - 1942 - A Tale of Two Kitties - Babbott and Catstello - Abbott and Costello

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Tweety was originally naked (pink), jowly, and far more aggressive and saucy, as opposed to the later, more well-known version of him as a less hot-tempered (but still somewhat ornery) yellow canary. In the movie Bugs Bunny, Superstar, animator Clampett stated, in a sotto voce "aside" to the audience, that Tweety had been based "on my own naked baby picture". Clampett did three more shorts with the "naked genius", as a Jimmy Durante-ish cat once called him in Gruesome Twosome. The last of these, Birdy and the Beast, finally bestowed the baby bird with his name.

Related Topics:
Bugs Bunny, Superstar - Sotto voce - Jimmy Durante

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Many of Mel Blanc's characters are notable for speech impediments. Tweety's comes from having a beak, with no lips or teeth. Thus he has trouble saying certain words, especially ones with "dental" sounds. For example, "pussy cat" comes out as "putty tat" or "puddy tat", and "sweetie pie" comes out as "tweetie pie", although it is doubtful he ever actually called himself by that name on-screen. Aside from this speech challenge, Tweety's voice (and a fair amount of his attitude) is similar to that of Bugs Bunny.

Related Topics:
Mel Blanc - Bugs Bunny

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Tweety & Sylvester