Cat Napping

Infobox Hollywood cartoon
cartoon_name = Cat Napping
series = Tom and Jerry


caption = The title card of "Cat Napping"
director = William Hanna
Joseph Barbera
story_artist = William Hanna
Joseph Barbera
animator = Irven Spence Ray Patterson
Ed Barge
Kenneth Muse
voice_actor =
musician = Scott Bradley
producer = Fred Quimby
distributor = Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
release_date = December 8, 1951
color_process = Technicolor
runtime = 6 minutes 52 seconds
movie_language = English
imdb_id = 0043387
preceded_by = Nit-witty Kitty
followed_by = The Flying Cat

"Cat Napping" is a 1951 one-reel animated cartoon and is the 62nd "Tom and Jerry" short directed by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera and produced by Fred Quimby.

Plot

Jerry is snoozing in a hammock, until Tom walks out with a drink, a radio, a pillow and a newspaper and tries to sit on it. He spots the mouse and is angry. Tom slides Jerry off the hammock and into the water. Jerry wakes up and gasps for breath. He sees that Tom did it and flips the hammock over so that Tom swallows his drink glass and falls. Tom responds by shaking Jerry off the hammock and into the air. Jerry, by pure fortune, falls into a bird's nest, which transports him through a tree trunk and right back onto the hammock before Tom can lay down. Tom is dumbfounded, but scoops up the mouse and deposits him on top of a marching ant army. Before Jerry can understand what has happened, he bumps his head on a steel sprinkler. Jerry redirects the ants such that they march onto the hammock, causing the strings to snap and Tom to be rolled up.

Tom has patched up the broken strings and takes a drink while keeping a lookout. Jerry gets onto a lily pad and kicks a bullfrog into Tom's drink. Tom notices nothing and drinks the drink and the frog. All is well until the frog jumps inside of Tom and hops the cat all the way home. Tom hits his head numerous times along the way. Jerry steals a sip of Tom's drink until Tom gives chase. Jerry unleashes a lawn mower on the cat, and Tom, fearing the loss of his fur, runs away until he gets tied up into the hammock and gets sheared.

Tom has patched up the hammock and sleeps with a baseball bat. Jerry hooks up the hammock to a crank, pulls the crank back as far as it goes, and cuts the line, catapulting Tom into the air, still asleep. Tom wakes up when he sees and hears an airplane, but returns to sleep. When Tom sees a flying bird, he is puzzled and looks down to see nothing but ocean below him. Tom panics and hits the ocean so hard he breaks into 16 pieces.

Meanwhile, Jerry lures Spike onto the hammock with a bone. Tom is irate and storms back faster than a speeding bullet to catch Jerry in the hammock. He wraps up Spike instead and hits him numerous times. Tom reaches in and pulls out a collar. Tom tries to figure out what that could go to. He discounts Jerry and hits it right on the mark with his second guess: Spike. Tom gulps as Spike emerges barking mad. Tom wraps Spike in his own collar and runs off. Spike easily frees himself by flexing and annihilates Tom.

Tom is made to fan Jerry while being constantly kicked by a sleeping Spike.

Trivia

*The ants that crawl up and bounce on Tom's hammock also appear in the classic shorts "Pup on a Picnic" and "Barbecue Brawl". The marching music also plays in those episodes.
*The scene with the frog has a bit of Irish Music.