Hop, Skip and a Chump

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Airdate:
3 January 1942 Blue Ribbon reissue: 5 March 1949

Series:

Merrie Melodies

MPAA Number:	Production Number:	Vitaphone Number:
7080	MM-6-11	223

Runtime:

7 minutes, 2 seconds (reissue)

Copyright Renewed:

22 April 1969^[1]

Crew

Hop, Skip and a Chump is a 1942 Merrie Melodies short directed by I. Freleng.

Title[]

The title is a play on the phrase "hop, skip and a jump."

Plot[]

A grasshopper named Hopalong Casserole is hopping freely. Meanwhile, two blackbirds that resemble Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy hide behind a bush while preparing to whip the grasshopper behind there. Hopalong sneaks behind Laurel, who asks what he is trying to catch. When Hardy peeks out of the bushes, Laurel ends up smashing him with a whip.

Laurel is told to bag the grasshopper, but only grabs a bumblebee instead, which chases after the birds until they run into a lake. Hardy attempts to hop after the grasshopper, using springs from several junk beds, but ends up getting hit repeatedly by tree branches and eventually falls off a cliff. Laurel falls down the same cliff trying to find Hardy. Using a fishing rod with corn, while hiding in a piano, Hopalong tramples upon the piano, which causes the hammers to repeatedly hit the birds. The grasshopper hides in a cuckoo clock, where the grasshopper carries a hammer to repeatedly sock Hardy. Hopalong manages to outrun the birds behind an iris out and brags upon a black screen, but Hardy reappears via an iris in the take the grasshopper.

Caricatures[]

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy

Availability[]

Streaming[]

Goofs[]

The restored print has digitally removed a quotation from the "That's all Folks!" ending card. This gaffe also occurs with "The Bug Parade" and "The Shell Shocked Egg"'s ending cards for their restored versions.

Notes[]

The original title card is currently lost, but included a comma after "Hop",^[3] as seen on the lobby cards below. The Blue Ribbon reissue omits the comma from the title.
- A cel of the original title card once existed in Michael Maltese's personal collection, but has since likely deteriorated.^[4]