Beginning at 6 p.m. C.S.T. tonight — April 6 — Heritage is holding Day Two of its weekly comics, comic-art and animation auction. Otherwise known as: Your chance to own the original artwork from beloved memories. Like, say, a Curt Swan 1978 Superman splash page. Or an original Ernie Bushmiller Nancy comic strip from June 18, 1949. Or the original cover art to the Harlequin Romance novel A Talent For Loving.
Something, literally, for everyone.
For the purposes of this post, there’s also quite a bit of animation art upcoming tonight, some from classic films and shorts available online. So we put together this brief film fest to let you watch before you buy. Because nothing goes better with quarantining and collecting than watching cartoons.
We begin with this offering from September 1935: “Judge For A Day,” starring Betty Boop. This is one of the Paramount offerings from the Fleischer brothers — Dave and Max, who would go on to make iconic Superman shorts in the 1940s. The very rare cel up for sale shows: “Court stenographer Betty has had quite enough of the rude people everywhere she goes, and she knows just what she would do if she were a judge.”
Watch below. Bid here.
Next up: Mickey Mouse reading to Pluto in the 1934 Burt Gillett-directed short “Mickey Plays Papa.” The still on the block is from the opening sequence, just before … well, Mickey is forced to play papa.
Watch below. Bid here.
The next two offerings are genuine classics. Childhood favorites. Iconic.
Let’s begin with this snapshot, so to speak, from Walt Disney’s 1937 immortal Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.
In this item up for grabs tonight, Grump’s swinging his pickaxe in the diamond mine. Those are rare images to come by — in large part, because they’re taken from one of the most memorable moments in any Disney film, the “Heigh-Ho” sequence.
Watch below — then try to get it out of your head for the rest of the day. Then bid here.
Here’s another iconic moment from another Disney immortal: Pinocchio as the almost-donkey boy plummeting to the ocean floor.
This, of course, is from one of the key moments in the 1940 film as Pinocchio follows Jiminey Cricket, to make their escape from Pleasure Island as the boys are being made jackasses to work the mines. Such a memorable moment it has been preserved in snow globes, the fanciest of all keepsakes.
Watch (out) below. Bid here.
Then there’s this set of eight production cels from Ralph Bakshi’s 1978 animated rendering of Lord of the Rings — which is how most of experienced the J.R.R. Tolkien novels before Peter Jackson got his hands on them years later. Still a masterwork … if only because of its relative brevity at 133 minutes.
In this lot, you will find Aragorn, Gimli, Samwise, Boromir and Gollum.
The trailer is below. The precious is here.
