Dumbo is a very special film for the Walt Disney Studios. It was basically made with the intention of being as inexpensive and simple as possible to make up for the financial failures of Pinocchio and Fantasia. Not only did Dumbo accomplish this by turning in a major profit for the Studios, but it also introduced the world to one of the most beloved, and cutest, Disney characters of all time.
Premiered: October 23, 1941 at the Broadway Theatre in New York City
Directed by: Ben Sharpsteen (supervising); Norman Ferguson, Wilfred Jackson, Bill Roberts, Jack Kinney, and Sam Armstrong (sequences)
Produced by: Walt Disney
Based on: Dumbo written by Helen Aberson and illustrated by Harold Pearl
Sequels: None
Cast:
John McLeish – Narrator
Edward Brophy – Timothy Q. Mouse
Verna Felton – Elephant Matriarch / Mrs. Jumbo
Noreen Gammill – Elephant Catty
Dorothy Scott – Elephant Giddy
Sarah Selby – Elephant Prissy
Cliff Edwards – Lead Crow
The Hall Johnson Choir – Crow Chorus
Herman Bing – The Ringmaster
Margaret Wright – Casey Jr.
Sterling Holloway – Mr. Stork
Animation Directors:
Vladimir Tytla
Fred Moore
Ward Kimball
John Lounsbery
Art Babbitt
Woolie Reitherman
Music by:
Oliver Wallace
Frank Churchill
Ned Washington
Songs:
“Look out for Mr. Stork”
“Casey Jr.”
“Song of the Roustabouts”
“Baby Mine”
“Pink Elephants on Parade”
“When I See an Elephant Fly”
Academy Awards:
Best Scoring of a Motion Picture
Best Original Song – “Baby Mine” (nomination)
The Story:
Dumbo catches the audience’s attention right from the start with colourful opening credits set to upbeat music. The credits are all written to look like bright circus posters.
The opening shot after the credits is of a dark storm. There is narration in the form of a poem about getting through the storm and waiting for the hope of Mr. Stork. A formation of storks carrying bundles of babies fly through the night sky to the song “Look Out For Mr. Stork.” The storks drop down onto the state of Florida to the winter quarters of the WDP Circus. Many cute baby animals are safely delivered to their expecting mothers. Poor Mrs. Jumbo is desperately trying to get a bundle of her own but does not receive one during the night.
The next morning, Casey Jr. the circus train is getting ready to leave and is loading up all the animals. The song “Casey Jr.” plays as the small circus train travels through the beautiful countryside.
Mr. Stork is trying to find his way and takes a break on a cloud but his baby bundle keeps slipping down. He finally takes out a map to figure out where he is when he hears Casey Jr. whistle and takes off after the train. He finds Mrs. Jumbo with all the other elephants and reads a poem for her,
“Here is a baby with eyes of blue,
straight from heaven, right to you.
Or – straight from heaven up above,
here is a baby for you to love.”
He then makes her sign to receive her baby elephant, sings happy birthday to the new baby, and asks Mrs. Jumbo what the name will be, all as part of the service. Mrs. Jumbo then speaks her one line of the entire film, and names her baby “Jumbo Jr.” She opens up her bundle to find an adorable baby elephant and even all the haughty elephants are enamored with him. The matriarch starts to tickle Jumbo Jr. which causes him to sneeze and his large ears pop out. All the elephants gasp and start to make fun of the baby’s large ears. Mrs. Jumbo is defensive and smacks one of the elephants and then they nickname him Dumbo. Poor Mrs. Jumbo is so upset that she closes the stall door on them for some quiet time with her new baby.
Casey Jr. is still travelling throughout the countryside when it stops at night during a rain storm to set up the circus. All members of the circus help out in the routine while singing “Song of the Roustabouts.”
The welcomed circus has a parade the next day and Dumbo makes his debut. During the parade he ends up tripping over his ears into the mud and the entire crowd laughs at him. Afterwards, he has a bubble bath to get cleaned up and then plays hide and seek with his mom but keeps tripping over his ears.
The circus is now open to public and teenage boys come right up to Dumbo and torment him because of his large ears. When they start to really pick on him, Mrs. Jumbo gets very angry. Circus people intervene and tie her up. They take Dumbo away from her and all the violence only makes matters worse.
Mrs. Jumbo is locked away in solitary confinement inside a wagon labelled “Danger. Mad elephant” and Dumbo is all alone in his mom’s previous stall. The gossipy elephants are nearby and are talking shamefully about the entire situation and decide to all ignore little Dumbo. There is a little mouse eating leftover peanuts nearby who is annoyed with the elephant’s attitude. He then scares all of the elephants to get back at them and tries to befriend Dumbo, who is hiding in a hay pile. The mouse tries to lure Dumbo out with a peanut but when that doesn’t work, he hints that he can help get Mrs. Jumbo out of the clink. So the mouse and Dumbo become friends and the mouse wants to turn Dumbo into a headliner act! He overhears the ringmaster concocting an idea of making a pyramid of pachyderms! However, the ringmaster does not yet have an idea for a big climax so the mouse sneaks into the ringmaster’s tent while he is asleep. The mouse whispers that he is the voice of his subconscious and gives the idea of Dumbo being the big climax of the show before sneaking back out of the tent. The mouse’s name is revealed to be Timothy Q. Mouse.
The next scene opens with the ringmaster announcing his brand new act. The elephants attempt to make a pyramid and succeed, though with great difficulty. The last step is for Dumbo to jump off a springboard, land at the very top, and wave his little flag. With his ears tied up and ready for action, Dumbo suddenly gets stage fright so Timothy pokes him with a pin. Dumbo takes off but his ears come undone and he trips on them, causing the pyramid to be knocked over. The falling of the elephant pyramid is so dramatic that it results in the entire big top tent breaking down and poor Dumbo is left waving his little flag as in surrender.
After the disaster, Casey Jr. sets off for a new town to bring the circus to. Inside of the elephant car, all the elephants are miserable and in a lot of pain. They are all wrapped in bandages with giant ice blocks or hot water bottles strapped to their heads. One elephant mentions that she heard that Dumbo has been made to be a clown and all of the elephants take a vow that Dumbo is no longer considered an elephant.
The next act at the circus is the clown show where Dumbo is dressed as a baby and is put on top of a burning building. A clown dressed as his mother is screaming and running around the circus floor while firemen clowns try to rescue him but every attempt ends as a comedic gag. The show ends with Dumbo being pushed off the building into a bucket of plaster. After the show, the clowns are all taking about their great success in their tent. They think they are fantastic showmen that deserve more respect. The clowns have a celebration and make a toast to Dumbo. Timothy is washing off Dumbo’s face paint near the clown’s tent and he is telling Dumbo how proud he is of Dumbo’s success. The little elephant is still very sad so Timothy brings him to see his mother to cheer him up. Dumbo and Mrs. Jumbo cuddle while the song “Baby Mine” plays and describes how Mrs. Jumbo is feeling about her child. Other circus animals are shown cuddling their own babies. Dumbo swings in his mother’s trunk before needing to go back and when he does, he waves goodbye with his trunk all the way out of sight.
Back at the clowns’ tent, the clowns are thinking up ideas for their show and still drinking their champagne. They think that having Dumbo jump from a height that is twice as tall will result in twice as much laughter. The elephants have no care for Dumbo’s safety and they think that elephants are made of rubber. They decide that they need a higher pay for their great idea and leave the tent singing “Hit the Big Boss (For a Raise).” The champagne bottle is accidently dropped into a water bucket.
Dumbo and Timothy return and poor Dumbo has gotten the hiccups from crying so much. Timothy brings him to drink some water out of the water bucket but they have no idea that it is champagne infused. Timothy inspects the water after Dumbo gets a little bit loopy but he accidently falls right in. Timothy pops out of the bucket and is singing with joy! The two friends have fun blowing bubbles of champagne. The round and square bubbles then turn elephant shaped and Dumbo and Timothy hallucinate “Pink Elephants on Parade.”
The pink elephants change into clouds as the sun rises and the shot pans in on a group of crows up high in a tree. The crows are flabbergasted at their new neighbours! Dumbo and Timothy have somehow made their way up into the tree and are fast asleep. The Lead Crow wakes Timothy up with his cigar smoke (gross, don’t do that) and Timothy is very confused as to why there are crows down on the ground. The crows just laugh at him since he has no idea he is up in a tree. Timothy figures where they actually are and wakes up Dumbo, but Dumbo is so scared that he tumbles down into the pond below, much to the amusement of the crows.
Dumbo and Timothy start to walk back to the circus as they try to figure out how they got into the tree. The crows suggest that maybe they flew and Timothy gets excited about the idea that Dumbo could potentially use his ears to fly. The crows think the idea is hilarious and sing “When I see an Elephant Fly.” Timothy gets mad at the crows for laughing and tells them Dumbo’s sad story. The crows feel bad and want to help out so they give Timothy a plan to use psychology to help Dumbo fly. They give him a magic feather and tell him that it will help him fly. Dumbo is then on top of a cliff with the crows about to push him off. Timothy gets Dumbo to flap his ears and it works! Dumbo flies off to the reprise of “When I see an Elephant Fly.”
Back at the big top, the clowns are back at their building on fire act. This time Dumbo is ready to fly with his magic feather and surprise everyone. He takes off but loses his magic feather before he can get his momentum going. Dumbo is scared that he can’t actually fly and is going to fall right into the plaster again. Timothy tries to convince him to fly and admits the magic feather was a gag. Dumbo gathers up all his courage and flies! He soars all around the big top and pelts the pompous elephants with peanuts and chases the clowns.
Dumbo has now made the front page of many newspapers and is known as “Miracle Mammoth startles the world”. One paper even says that Timothy Q. Mouse got a big Hollywood contract.
The film ends with Casey Jr. on the go with another reprise of “When I see an Elephant Fly.” The last train car is Dumbo’s own private and very modern looking, coach. His mother is also out of solitary confinement and is enjoying the luxury coach. Dumbo chooses to fly part of the way with his crow friends and then joins his mother. They ride off into the sunset, waving back at the crows.
Trivia:
- At 64 minutes, Dumbo is often mistakenly referred to as Disney’s shortest film. However, the shortest film is actually Saludos Amigos at 42 minutes.
- The original story of Dumbo was based on a children’s book that was written to demonstrate the new “Roll-a-Book” toy in the late 1930s.
- Walt gave the project to story artists Joe Grant and Dick Huemer, who wrote the story in chapters instead of as a film script. They pitched the story to Walt chapter by chapter instead of the entire storyline at once.
- The original story had a little bird as a friend for Dumbo but the bird was changed to a mouse for the film. This was done as a gag to play on the old joke that elephants are scared of mice.
- The song “Hit the Big Boss (For a Raise)” was a caricature of the animators strike that was happening during the making of Dumbo.
- This was the first Disney film, and still one of few to this day, that was both set in America and set in the present time.
- As the present time was during World War II, all of background newspaper articles have war references.
- The name of the circus is the WDP Circus: Walt Disney Productions Circus.
- Though Dumbo is well-known for his flying abilities, he does not actually fly until less than ten minutes from the end of the film.
- A puppet T.V. show aired on the Disney Channel in 1985 for three and a half seasons titled Dumbo’s Circus and was based on the characters from the original film.
Representation in the Disney Parks:
Dumbo is one of two characters to have their own attraction in all six Magic Kingdom-style Parks (the other character is Buzz Lightyear). Dumbo the Flying Elephant is a classic spinner ride that appears in Fantasyland in five of the Parks and Gardens of Imagination in Shanghai Disneyland.
There is also a Casey Jr. Circus Train attraction in both Disneyland and Disneyland Paris, and a Casey Jr. themed water play area in Magic Kingdom.
Dumbo has starred in many parades over the decades such as in the Dumbo Circus Parade in Magic Kingdom (1979), the Main Street Electrical Parade (first appearing in Disneyland in 1972), and the Flights of Fantasy Parade in Hong Kong Disneyland (2011).
Dumbo also flew over Disneyland during the Magical summer fireworks between 2009 and 2014.
And believe it or not, but Dumbo has also been a meet and greet character in the Parks from time to time.
Check out the other films of Disney’s Golden Age:
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