Happy Harmonies
Animated film series
title: "Happy Harmonies" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["happy-harmonies", "film-series-introduced-in-1934", "animated-short-film-series", "metro-goldwyn-mayer-animated-films", "metro-goldwyn-mayer-animated-short-films", "american-animation-anthology-series", "anthology-film-series"] description: "Animated film series" topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Harmonies" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0
::summary Animated film series ::
::data[format=table title="Infobox film"]
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| director | {{Plainlist |
| producer | {{Plainlist |
| color_process | Technicolor |
| studio | Harman-Ising Productions |
| distributor | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| released | September 1, 1934 – |
| March 12, 1938 | |
| runtime | 7–10 minutes |
| country | United States |
| language | English |
| :: |
| image = | caption = | director = {{Plainlist|
- Hugh Harman
- Rudolf Ising
- William Hanna | producer = {{Plainlist|
- Hugh Harman
- Rudolf Ising | color_process = Technicolor | studio = Harman-Ising Productions | distributor = Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer | released = September 1, 1934 – March 12, 1938 | runtime = 7–10 minutes | country = United States | language = English Happy Harmonies is a series of twenty-six animated cartoons distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and produced by Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising between 1934 and 1938.
Produced in Technicolor, these cartoons were very similar to Walt Disney's Silly Symphonies and Warner Brothers’ Merrie Melodies musical series. They occasionally featured Bosko, a character who starred in the first Looney Tunes shorts that the duo produced for Leon Schlesinger. After the first two cartoons, the design of Bosko changed from an "inkblot" to a more realistic African-American boy.
The two final titles in the series were originally produced by Harman and Ising as Silly Symphonies cartoons. Disney originally had Harman and Ising create three shorts for Disney, but when they only kept one of their three shorts (Merbabies), the copyrights to the other two (Pipe Dreams and The Little Bantamweight) were sold to MGM who released them as Happy Harmonies.
List of cartoons
1934
::data[format=table]
| No. | Title | Directed by | Notes | Release date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Old Pioneer | Rudolf Ising | September 29, 1934 | |
| 2 | Tale of the Vienna Woods | Hugh Harman | October 27, 1934 | |
| 3 | Bosko's Parlor Pranks | Hugh Harman | November 24, 1934 | |
| 4 | Toyland Broadcast | Rudolf Ising | December 22, 1934 | |
| :: |
1935
::data[format=table]
| No. | Title | Directed by | Notes | Release date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 | Hey-Hey Fever | Hugh Harman | January 9, 1935 | |
| 6 | When the Cat's Away | Rudolf Ising | February 16, 1935 | |
| 7 | The Lost Chick | Hugh Harman | March 9, 1935 | |
| 8 | The Calico Dragon | Rudolf Ising | March 30, 1935 | |
| 9 | Good Little Monkeys | Hugh Harman | April 13, 1935 | |
| 10 | The Chinese Nightingale | Rudolf Ising | April 27, 1935 | |
| 11 | Poor Little Me | Hugh Harman | May 11, 1935 | |
| 12 | Barnyard Babies | Rudolf Ising | May 25, 1935 | |
| 13 | The Old Plantation | Rudolf Ising | September 21, 1935 | |
| 14 | Honeyland | Rudolf Ising | October 19, 1935 | |
| 15 | Alias St. Nick | Rudolf Ising | November 16, 1935 | |
| 16 | Run, Sheep, Run! | Hugh Harman | December 14, 1935 | |
| :: |
1936
::data[format=table]
| No. | Title | Directed by | Notes | Release date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 17 | Bottles | Hugh Harman | January 11, 1936 | |
| 18 | The Early Bird and the Worm | Rudolf Ising | February 8, 1936 | |
| 19 | The Old Mill Pond | Hugh Harman | March 7, 1936 | |
| 20 | Two Little Pups | Rudolf Ising | April 4, 1936 | |
| 21 | The Old House | Hugh Harman | May 2, 1936 | |
| 22 | The Pups' Picnic | Rudolf Ising | May 30, 1936 | |
| 23 | To Spring | William Hanna | June 4, 1936 | |
| 24 | Little Cheeser | Rudolf Ising | July 11, 1936 | |
| 25 | The Pups' Christmas | Rudolf Ising | December 12, 1936 | |
| :: |
1937
::data[format=table]
| No. | Title | Directed by | Notes | Release date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26 | Circus Daze | Hugh Harman | January 16, 1937 | |
| :: |
Non-officially Happy Harmonies cartoons
In addition, the following list includes additional short films that are not officially part of the Happy Harmonies series but are considered part of it and are therefore included in this list. The first of these shorts, The Discontented Canary, was labeled as A Metro Color Cartoon and the rest were released as one-shot cartoons. The last two shorts on the list were produced for Disney as part of the Silly Symphony series but were eventually rejected by Disney and later sold to MGM and released as one-shot cartoons.
::data[format=table]
| Title | Directed by | Notes | Release date |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Discontented Canary | Rudolf Ising | September 1, 1934 | |
| Swing Wedding | Hugh Harman | February 13, 1937 | |
| Bosko's Easter Eggs | Hugh Harman | March 20, 1937 | |
| Little Ol' Bosko and the Pirates | Hugh Harman | May 1, 1937 | |
| The Hound and the Rabbit | Rudolf Ising | May 29, 1937 | |
| The Wayward Pups | Rudolf Ising | July 10, 1937 | |
| Little Ol' Bosko and the Cannibals | Hugh Harman | August 28, 1937 | |
| Little Buck Cheeser | Rudolf Ising | December 15, 1937 | |
| Little Ol' Bosko in Bagdad | Hugh Harman | January 1, 1938 | |
| Pipe Dreams | Hugh Harman | February 5, 1938 | |
| The Little Bantamweight | Rudolf Ising | March 12, 1938 | |
| :: |
Home media
The only official home release to date containing a significant number of the Happy Harmonies shorts is the Happy Harmonies Cartoon Classics LaserDisc box set. The LaserDisc set was released in 1994 by MGM/UA Home Video, which predated the merger of Turner Broadcasting System with Time Warner in 1996. The four-disc set contains 17 of the 37 Happy Harmonies shorts while the remaining 25 shorts include one side of six Barney Bear cartoons, the 1939 short Peace on Earth and the 1940 animated short The Milky Way. In 1999, MGM paid Time Warner $225 million to end its lease of distributing content owned by Turner Entertainment Co. prior to 1996 (the cartoons are part of MGM's pre-May 1986 library in which Turner had purchased 13 years ago). While the copyrights remain with Turner, distribution rights are now with Warner Bros. Pictures, Turner's current parent company.
References
References
- Lenburg, Jeff. (1999). "The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons". Checkmark Books.
- "[https://archive.today/20120723085737/http://www.bcdb.com/cartoons/MGM/Shorts/Happy_Harmonies/index.html Happy Harmonies]". ''www.bcdb.com'', February 2, 2012
- [https://books.google.com/books?id=FVShFCjVzvIC&pg=PA154&lpg=PA154 Who's Who in Animated Cartoons: An International Guide to Film and Television's Award-Winning and Legendary Animators]
- Webb, Graham. (2011). "The Animated Film Encyclopedia: A Complete Guide to American Shorts, Features and Sequences (1900-1999)". McFarland & Company Inc..
- Baxter, Devon. (4 October 2017). "Harman-Ising's 'The Early Bird and the Worm' (1936)". Cartoon Research.
- Webb, Graham. (2011). "The Animated Film Encyclopedia: A Complete Guide to American Shorts, Features and Sequences (1900-1999)". McFarland & Company Inc..
- "LaserDisc Database - Happy Harmonies: MGM Cartoon Classics #1 [ML104688]".
- "LaserDisc Database - Happy Harmonies: MGM Cartoon Classics #1 [ML104688]".
- (16 March 1999). "MGM Buys Its Way Out of Pact for $225 Million".
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