\n<\/p>\n
Betty Boop has arrived on Broadway, nearly a century after she first boop-oop-a-dooped her way onto the big screen. \u201cBoop! The Musical<\/a>,\u201d like the \u201cBarbie<\/a>\u201d and \u201cElf<\/a>\u201d films that preceded it, imagines a transformational encounter between an anthropomorphic character and the real world (well, a fictional world full of people).<\/p>\n Betty\u2019s journey to the stage has been an unusual one. The original character didn\u2019t have much of a back story, which has made her an appealing blank slate for storytellers. But her image \u2014 and Betty, at her core, is a remarkably long-lived illustration \u2014 has managed to straddle media and merchandise, surviving court battles and changing mores.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \u201cHer popularity goes on and on,\u201d said Peter Benjaminson, author of \u201cThe Life and Times of Betty Boop<\/a>.\u201d \u201cThe musical is the latest in a series of incarnations.\u201d<\/p>\n The animated cartoon character, who did not yet have a name, made her first appearance in 1930 in hybrid form \u2014 part poodle, part human \u2014 in \u201cDizzy Dishes,\u201d which was one of a series of animated shorts, called Talkartoons, produced by Fleischer Studios. All of the characters in the film \u2014 a slapstick comedy set in an incompetent restaurant \u2014 were animals with human attributes. The secondary character that became Betty Boop was a jazz singer who already had many of the elements that came to define her \u2014 a curvaceous body and flirty looks, with big eyes and an oversized head, and a high-pitched, babyish voice.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Jasmine Amy Rogers, the actress starring as Betty Boop on Broadway, described her as \u201cfull of joy\u201d and \u201cunapologetically herself.\u201d \u201cShe is sexy, but I don\u2019t think it is merely sex that makes her sexy,\u201d she continued. \u201cI would say it\u2019s the way she carries herself, and her confidence and her unabashed self.\u201d<\/p>\n Betty, created at the height of the Jazz Age, is obviously modeled on flappers, and her relationship to music history has been a subject of debate and litigation.<\/p>\n In 1932, a white singer named Helen Kane sued, alleging that the \u201cbaby vamp\u201d style of the Betty Boop character, including the \u201cboop-oop-a-doop\u201d phrase, was an unlawful imitation of Kane. At a widely publicized trial in 1934, Fleischer countered by pointing out that a Black singer, Esther Lee Jones, who performed as Baby Esther, had used similar scat phrases before Kane. Kane lost.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Fleischer Studios argues that Betty had many influences, but was not based on a particular woman. \u201cShe\u2019s from the Jazz Age, and all the animators lived in Manhattan, so she was influenced by that culture,\u201d said Mark Fleischer, the chief executive of Fleischer Studios, and the grandson of a company founder.<\/p>\n Rogers said she hopes that over time, women of different ethnicities will portray the character, but said she is proud to play her as a Black woman, with nods to Baby Esther and the scat technique of jazz singing. \u201cJazz lives so deep in the heart of Betty that I feel as if we can\u2019t really have a full discussion about her without involving the African American race,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n By the early 1930s, Betty had shed her canine features and become fully human, or as fully human as an animated character could be. Most notable \u2014 her floppy ears became hoop earrings.<\/p>\n Some aspects of her became formalized over time, according to Frank Caruso, the creative director of Fleischer Studios. She has 16 spit curls \u2014 eight on each side of her oversized head. Her eyes float low, leaving space on the forehead for expressive lashes and brows. \u201cIf you can recognize a character in silhouette, you\u2019ve done your job,\u201d Caruso said, \u201cand Betty is immediately recognizable.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n She was decidedly sexy \u2014 and perpetually single. \u201cShe\u2019s actually surprisingly virginal \u2014 she doesn\u2019t have romantic relationships, she\u2019s just pretty and confident and full of life, and not embarrassed about her own sexuality,\u201d said Bob Martin, the musical\u2019s book writer. \u201cShe\u2019s continually being chased by men \u2014 she doesn\u2019t have a conventional relationship, but she\u2019s always chased and objectified.\u201d<\/p>\n The arrival of the Hays Code \u2014 content guidelines for movies that started in the mid-1930s \u2014 had a big influence on Betty. Her dresses got longer, her blouses covered her cleavage, and she had more sedate jobs or was a homemaker. \u201cGone was the garter, the short skirt, the d\u00e9colletage that made her so unique,\u201d Heather Hendershot wrote in the Journal of Design History. \u201cIn its place was a more fully clothed Betty, a character stripped of her charm.\u201d<\/p>\n The series of animated shorts ended in 1939.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Since the demise of the animated shorts, Betty has appeared in comic books, television shows, films and video games. But the platform that has sustained her for decades \u2014 and made her globally recognizable \u2014 is merchandise.<\/p>\n \u201cThe miracle of Betty Boop is that she achieved iconic status without any entertainment behind her \u2014 she developed a very robust life through licensing,\u201d Fleischer said. It started with collectibles \u2014 dolls and magnets and so on \u2014 but before long there were housewares and games and toys and, most successfully, clothing. And it\u2019s not just T-shirts \u2014 Betty has had couture collaborations with designers including Zac Posen<\/a> and Marc Jacobs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Paramount Pictures has owned the copyrights to the Betty Boop cartoons, and some are entering the public domain as those expire. But the character is still owned by Fleischer Studios, and is protected by copyright and trademark laws. Mark Fleischer said the company controls the rights to adapt the character for stage or screen, and also, he wrote in an email, \u201cexclusive rights to allow others to display the Betty Boop name and\/or image on their products (e.g., clothing, coffee cups, etc.) is not only protected by copyright, it is also protected by the enormous body of U.S. and international trademarks that Fleischer Studios has acquired in the Betty Boop name and image.\u201d<\/p>\n Betty, who arrived just a decade after American women won the right to vote, was always working, and she often had jobs that were adventurous.<\/p>\n \u201cBetty Boop did things that until then were unimaginable,\u201d Fleischer said, \u201clike being a racecar driver, owning a diner; she was a pilot, she ran for president, and she was an early animal activist.\u201d<\/p>\n In her merch era, her life has been audacious in different ways.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were always keeping her in step with what was going on,\u201d said Caruso, who has been Fleischer\u2019s creative director for 38 years. \u201cIn the \u201990s she got a little grungy, or hip-hop. We started doing this Biker Betty, which is one of our most popular iterations. And people love Zombie Betty. We\u2019ve done everything under the sun.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Caruso said there are always people proposing new ways to use the Betty Boop image, including, he said, on tombstones. Grieving families, he said, periodically approach the company for permission to use the image on headstones; the company often says yes.<\/p>\n As society evolved, Betty became more socially conscious. In recent years, Betty Boop merchandise has come with an empowering message \u2014 some uplifting bit of text included in the package.<\/p>\n
\nFilm Debut<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\nJazz Age Inspirations<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\nPre-Code: Sexy, Sassy, Single<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\nPost-Code: Buttoned-Up Betty<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\nEvolving With the Times<\/h2>\n
\nA \u2018Boop!\u2019 for Broadway<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n