Quiet Please!
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| Quiet Please!
Tom and Jerry series |
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 Title card of Quiet Please! |
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| Directed by | William Hanna Joseph Barbera |
| Produced by | Fred Quimby |
| Story by | William Hanna Joseph Barbera |
| Voices by | Billy Bletcher (as Spike, uncredited) |
| Music by | Scott Bradley |
| Animation by | Kenneth Muse Ray Patterson Irven Spence Ed Barge |
| Distributed by | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| Release date(s) | December 22, 1945 |
| Color process | Technicolor |
| Running time | 7 min 43 secs |
| Preceded by | Flirty Birdy |
| Followed by | Springtime for Thomas |
| IMDb profile | |
Quiet Please! is a 1945 Tom and Jerry cartoon, which won the 1946 Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons. It was produced by Fred Quimby and directed by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, with music by Scott Bradley. The cartoon was animated by Kenneth Muse, Ray Patterson, Irven Spence, and Ed Barge.
The cartoon is notable for featuring a speaking Tom, a decided rarity throughout the original series. In this film, Tom says to Jerry: "One custard pie?! Let me have it!"
[edit] Plot
Tom's nemesis, the large dog (often called Spike, Killer or Butch) is trying to take a nap ("a little beauty rest", in his words) and is awakened three times by Tom's attempts to catch the mouse by first swinging at him with an ax and a hammer, and shooting at the mouse. Spike gets caught in the thick of all three attacks, gets fed up, and tells Tom that if he is disturbed from his sleep once more, he will skin him alive. The rest of the episode revolves around Tom's attempts to thwart Jerry's attempts to wake Spike up.
As Tom chases him (fueled initially by Jerry's unveiling of a drawing of the cat with the word "stinky" underneath), Jerry threatens to create noise by bashing a spoon and frying pan together by Spike's ears. The cat backs away, out of sight, and grabs the utensils from Jerry. The mouse later attempts to trip Tom up with a lamp cord. As Tom falls over, he is headed for a table of breakable wine glasses. Luckily, in midair, he manages to push the table out of the way and replace it with a pillow.
From there, Jerry gets ready to fire a large rifle, which would make enough noise to wake the dog up, but Tom immediately sticks his fingers in the gun barrels before Jerry can fire. As he examines his throbbing fingers, Jerry tries to push a grandfather clock to the floor. Tom can do nothing but stick his fingers in Spike's ears. Fortunately, the dog does not hear the loud crashing.
After this, Jerry begins to drop lightbulbs off the mantelpiece. Tom amazingly manages to catch them all, but Jerry plugs his tail into the light socket, lighting the cat up as if he were a set of Christmas decorations. Jerry then pushes a roller skate under Tom's foot, and sends him straight into Spike. The impact wakes the dog up, as do the subsequent lightbulb explosions.
Tom manages to send the dog back to sleep by rocking him and singing him Rock-a-bye Baby and, after putting him down, a twisted version of Brahms' Lullaby ("…close your big bloodshot eyes...you're a dope, and you're a lie, and I hope you don't wake up…") while pouring an entire bottle of "Knock-Out Drops" into Spike's mouth (and nose). The drug and song combination works like a charm (as evidenced by lifting Spikes eyelid to reveal: OUT COLD). Jerry noisily bangs a drum, with no effect. To demonstrate the power of the Knock-Out Drops, Tom repeatedly imitates numerous percussion instruments on the KO'ed Spike. When he is shown the bottle of Knock-Out Drops, Jerry's mouth drops to the ground. Then Jerry in kitchen writes his last will: My last will to Tom, my favourite cat I leave my sole earthly possession - one custard pie. Signed: Jerry. Tom reads it and answers: One custard pie? Let me have it!, and he does get it...in the face. While the chase ensues, Jerry does everything in his power to wake Spike up, but to no avail. This includes yelling "Yo!" in his ear, jumping on him, and stabbing him in the rear with a pin. Eventually, Jerry places a huge stick of dynamite underneath Spike. As Tom attempts to pull it out from underneath Spike, the dog awakens and growls at him. Tom smiles and slides the explosive device back under Spike and runs off. Before Spike can react, the dynamite explodes. A battered Spike chases after Tom and furniture flies through the air.
At the cartoon's end, Tom is severely bruised and bandaged, rocking Spike in a cradle as he sleeps. Jerry is also sleeping in the cradle, from which a "Do Not Disturb" sign is hung.
