The Screwball

Infobox Hollywood cartoon
cartoon_name = The Screwball
series = Woody Woodpecker


caption =
director = Walter Lantz
story_artist = Ben Hardaway
Milt Schaffer
animator = Alex Lovy
LaVerne Harding
voice_actor = Ben Hardaway (uncredited)
Harold Peary (uncredited)
musician = Darrell Calker
producer = Walter Lantz
studio = Walter Lantz Productions
distributor = Universal Pictures
release_date = flagicon|US February 15, 1943
color_process = Technicolor
runtime = 7 min
movie_language = English
preceded_by = "The Loan Stranger"
followed_by = "The Dizzy Acrobat"
amg_id =
imdb_id = 0152342

"The Screwball" is the seventh animated cartoon short subject in the "Woody Woodpecker" series. Released theatrically on February 15, 1943, the film was produced by Walter Lantz Productions and distributed by Universal Pictures. The film is set at a baseball park. It features Ben Hardaway as the voice of Woody Woodpecker and Harold Peary as the voice of the policeman. Both men are uncredited in the title card for their voice roles.

Plot Summary

A huge crowd gathers at a baseball park for a game between the Droops and the Drips. A lone policeman stands at the park gate discouraging spectators who have not paid to see the game. Woody Woopecker notices that kids returning baseballs can get in for free, so he tosses the policeman a cannonball and enters the park.

Woody tries to watch the game but the policeman finds him. He escapes by shaking a soda pop in his face.

Woody joins the game as the pitcher for the Drips. When he is up to bat, he causes so much trouble that the entire team chases him along the baselines while the policeman waits for him at home plate. He escapes by pecking his way through a barrage of baseball bats.

Cultural References

*"Take Me Out to the Ball Game" can be heard in the background score during the establishing shot of the baseball park. The music is used sporadically throughout the film.

ee also

*List of Woody Woodpecker theatrical cartoons

References