How Green Was His Spinach

I’m late in promoting a few things for Christmas gift-giving — gifts that I’m giving to myself!

All of the Popeye cartoons produced by the Fleischer Bros. studio from the 30’s and 40’s are available on DVD. All of them, with a couple of notable exceptions, are in black & white. Being out of print, good luck finding volumes 2 and 3 without spending a small fortune.

A new Popeye disc is about to be released on Blu-ray as well as DVD. It picks up where Paramount called in its loans to the Fleischer brothers and took over the studio and began producing Popeye cartoons in Technicolor.

Animation maven Jerry Beck and others behind this project, discuss how it came to be and the considerable efforts that went into making it a must-get release for fans like myself. As you would expect, the business side of the deal had to be worked out before the restoration work could begin.

3 thoughts on “How Green Was His Spinach”

  1. Yes, “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.” Bruce loved Kirk, but Dick locked horns with him because old cleft chin wanted to do the directing! They had the same problem working together on “The Vikings,” (with Ernie!) Yet they were close friends. Bruce showed us many photos of Walt, the Douglas family and the Fleischers together. My favorite is them at the pre-opening day VIP day at Disneyworld. My friend young Bruce Fleischer is holding young Mike Douglas’s hand, big grins of anticipation on their faces. And they were hardly tiny!

  2. Wow! The old ones are the best. I was looking for a photo of myself with Bruce Fleischer, son of director Richard and grandson of Max. He directed me in two plays here in State College. Can’t find it. The stuff in his house would really make your eyes light up!

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