The Flea Circus

The Flea Circus is a 1954 MGM animated short created and directed by Tex Avery, about a French flea circus that breaks up when they decide to attack a dog, and the two members of the circus who inadvertently save it.[2]

This article is about the Tex Avery animated short. For flea circuses in general, see flea circus.
The Flea Circus
Directed byTex Avery
Produced byFred Quimby
Story byHeck Allen
StarringShepard Menken
Bill Thompson
Francoise Brun-Cottan
William Hanna (all uncredited)[1]
Music byScott Bradley
Animation byGrant Simmons
Michael Lah
Robert Bentley
Walter Clinton
Color processTechnicolor
Production
company
Distributed byMetro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release date
November 6, 1954 (USA)
Running time
7 minutes
LanguageEnglish

Plot

The story starts out with the performance of the flea circus. The two main protagonists of the short are a sad clown flea named Francois (voiced by Bill Thompson, who also does the voice of Droopy), whose act isn't well received by the audience, and a pretty female dancing flea named Fifi, the star of the show. Francois is in love with Fifi (Francoise Brun-Cottan), and would do anything to win her heart. His attempts to show his chivalry flatter Fifi, but it is never enough to win her over completely, as she has admonished him every time he asks to marry her.

During Fifi's big dancing number (done to the tune of the Ira Gershwin and Burton Lane song, "Applause, Applause" and parodying the dancing scene in the movie, Give a Girl a Break), a dog walks into the rear stage door, and when the fleas see it, the show stops entirely, the fleas run off the stage and form the words, "WOW! A DOG!", then after a brief chase, latch onto it, causing it to run for the hills.

The circus owner, Pepito (Shepard Menken), tries in vain to stop them, but it's futile. Francois, the only flea to not latch onto the dog, promises Pepito he'll find a way to get the circus going again, then takes off after the dog and other fleas.

The dog, after running quite a while, jumps into a pond to break up the fleas. As he sinks, it is found that Fifi doesn't know how to swim, and once the dog sinks below the surface, Fifi struggles and cries for help. Francois arrives in time and runs into the water to save her, but once he gets her back to dry land, he starts to walk away sadly, feeling even that wasn't enough to win her over...but it was. Fifi actually gets on her knees and asks him to marry her, which he more than happily accepts with a happy shout of "Vive Le France".

After marrying, Fifi and Francois procreate enough baby fleas to bring back to Pepito and revive the circus. During one performance, Francois goes to Fifi's dressing room to check on her to find her with knitting needles at work (as shown earlier when they were expecting the first time), suggesting they were going to have even more offspring. Francois pleads "no", but Fifi reminds him of his catchphrase, "Vive Le France", before going back to her knitting.

References
  1. "AVERY…. Vol. 2??? WELL, IMAGINE THAT! -". cartoonresearch.com. 7 December 2020. Retrieved 13 December 2020.
  2. Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. pp. 146–147. ISBN 0-8160-3831-7.
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