Monday, June 23, 2008

Goofy as Lovable Archetype


I've always had a very great affection for Goofy.

I guess it's an identification thing, though maybe lots of people - in their most honest moments - see themselves in his (archetypal) character. And this is probably why his name has entered the language to describe a certain type of wacky naive persona, as in this 1950's cartoon:





Goofy was first known as Dippy Dawg and then Dippy the Goof, and even as Mr Geef, who had a wife and a son, Max. As Disney attempted to smooze the character into its most widely acceptable form. The anthropomorphic hound first appeared in 'Mickey's Revue' (1932) as a member of the audience of the show:

'Mickey's Revue' (1932)

What I remember most is Goofy's highly distinctive laugh, first done by former circus clown, Pinto Colvig, and which can be heard to great effect in 'Goofy Gymnastics':



I think it's the Goofy's unaffected childlike and out-going character that makes his cartoons among Disney's sweetest and funniest, particularly the 'How to ... ' series, such as 'How to Swim':



His everyman character in this is truly adorable!

7 comments:

  1. Nick,
    This is so great! I have a 34 year old daughter(I was married for 23 years) who loves goffy.Of coarse, I can't show her this site.
    Thanks

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  2. he is pretty great. i also (secretly) liked scrooge duck, cos he had all that cash - not for its own sake but for the freedom it gave him - i was obviously not free at the time! being dependent on my folks. take care. nick

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  3. Those were the days, Nick.
    Yeah, I liked Goofy and Donald and the gang. And loved the Looney Tunes gang as well with Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, etc etc. Now those were great cartoons!! lol

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  4. hey greg. nostalgia IS a kind of drug! and with no after effect next day. never liked bugs bunny tho - not sure why - just grated - how bout you? take care. nick

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  5. I liked Goofy, but I really loved Scrooge! I had all the Uncle Scrooge comic books that were published in the late '50s and early '60s. I still remember the one where Scrooge hired Donald to do his worrying for him! I loved Scrooge, his money bin, and his gigantic ball of saved string (he and his rival Flintheart Glomgold had a contest once, unrolling their balls of string across Africa--for some reason--to see whose ball was the longest). I think it's because I, too, am basically a saver at heart--although it hasn't made me rich.

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  6. hey keith. i think there's often a particular comic you remember. the one i recall is when scrooge gets into a money spending competition with another rich guy - a 'mine-is-bigger-than-yours' kinda scenario. the other guy exhausts his whole fortune in this struggle - only to be told by scrooge that he hadn't even spent his spare change. loved it!

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  7. hey keith again - just realized that your story was yet another version of the 'mine-is-bigger-than-yours' thing!disney has SOME sub-texts going on here!

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