Donald Duck and the Gorilla is a Donald Duck animated short.
Synopsis[]
One stormy night, Donald and his nephews overhear the radio announcer, Breckenridge, notify the listeners that a six-foot-tall, 400 pound gorilla named Ajax has escaped from the city zoo. The nephews pale with fright, and Donald laughs at them. As a prank, Donald frightens his nephews with gorilla hands to make it seem as if he is Ajax. The nephews spotted Donald from the keyhole and to retaliate on their uncle, the nephews dress up in a gorilla suit and lay under Donald on the armchair (which Donald was sit on the armchair to read a book), and eat Donald's lollipop while Donald is unaware at one point. Donald heard the crunchy noise and discovered the sharp teeth and stare up at the fake gorilla, pale with great fright, he rushed away, the nephews popped up from the suit and all laughed hysterically.
At the same time, the real Ajax appears in front of the window and breaks into the house. Ajax then let out an enormous roar, the nephews dashed away, still wearing the suit, and Donald, who was hiding beneath the umbrella, spotted them and their disguised gorilla suit and ranted to chase them, and Ajax has appeared in front of them, the triplet escaped, but Donald momentarily assumes that Ajax is the triplets' disguise and hollered at the triplet and use the umbrella poked and grabbed Ajax from outside to inside before spotting them. When Donald realize that Ajax isn't the fake, he trembled and almost fainted, when the radio says you can master any wild animal by looking them straight in the eye, Donald stares at Ajax's eye; however, as it turn out its pupil only forms a tombstone reading "Here lies a dead duck". As Ajax was about to bite Donald alive, Donald shoves an umbrella into Ajax's mouth and escaped, making Ajax momentarily stop fighting.
Donald and his nephews quietly tiptoe away, but one of them accidentally spill some candle wax on Donald's buttock and later burned Donald's back, Donald's head formed a boiling kettle, and Donald angrily driven the triplets away and his hand got burned on the doorknob due to the candle's heat, yet again, he later tiptoe away on his own, but he unfortunately crosses paths with Ajax, who was stand on his head, and Donald didn't even realized until his buttock hinted him, and Ajax started to chasing Donald.
Ajax chases Donald through his decrepit house, causing a lot of havoc of the house, like scraped the column, smash the ceiling, and destroy the wooden plank from the table, and they finally meet up on the gateleg table. Ajax pushes the table to try to flatten Donald and bite Donald's tail, but it poked Ajax in his eye. Amid all these things, with the help of the radio announcer, the nephews use a tear gas in the hope that to stop Ajax, and it successfully subdues Ajax, but affects Donald as well. Tearing up, Ajax and Donald console one another as the cartoon closed.
Characters[]
- Donald Duck (voiced by Clarence Nash)
- Huey, Dewey, and Louie (voiced by Clarence Nash)
- Ajax the Gorilla (voiced by Jimmy MacDonald)
- Breckenridge (voiced by Unknown)
Releases[]
Television[]
- Disneyland, episode #1.4: "The Donald Duck Story"
- Disney's Halloween Treat
- Walt Disney's Mickey and Donald, episode #15
- Good Morning, Mickey, episode #79
- A Disney Halloween
- Scary Tales
- The Ink and Paint Club, episode #1.34: "Donald's Nephews"
- Donald's Quack Attack, episode #93
Home video[]
VHS
- Walt Disney Cartoon Classics: Scary Tales
- Walt Disney Cartoon Classics: Donald's Scary Tales
- Huey, Dewey, and Louie's Greatest Hits
- Disney's Halloween Treat
- Mickey's House of Villains (restored, without the opening or closing titles)
Laserdisc
- Walt Disney Cartoon Classics: Scary Tales
- Walt Disney Cartoon Classics: Donald's Scary Tales / Halloween Haunts
DVD
- Mickey's House of Villains (restored, without the opening or closing titles)
- Walt Disney Treasures: The Chronological Donald, Volume 2 (unrestored)
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- This is first one of the two animated shorts released in 1944 to have Huey, Dewey and Louie appearing.
- At one point, Donald's tail gives Ajax an eye-poke, one of the signature moves of the Three Stooges.
- While the short itself is presented as the unrestored '90s print on The Chronological Donald, Volume 2 DVD release, a restored version of the short appears as part of the film Mickey's House of Villains, albeit with its opening and closing titles edited out. This is despite the fact that said DVD release came out in 2005, exactly three years after the release of that film.
- As of 2024, this restored version of the short has yet to appear in its entirety on any home media release or streaming service.
