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Jack Mercer
| Winfield B. Mercer |
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| Jack Mercer | |
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Name |
Jack Mercer |
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Audio: |
Jack Mercer as Popeye the Sailor Man: |
Jack Mercer (January 13, 1910 – December 4, 1984) was an American animator, storyman and voice actor. He is best known as the voice of cartoon characters Popeye the Sailorman and Felix the Cat. The child of vaudeville and Broadway, he also performed on the vaudeville and legitimate stage.
When William Billy Costello, the original cartoon voice of Popeye (1933–1935), became difficult to work with, he was dismissed. Mercer had begun imitating Costello's interpretation of Popeye, and practiced it until his voice "cracked" just right and he had it down. Searching for a replacement for Costello, Lou Fleischer heard Mercer singing the Popeye song and gave him the job of doing the Popeye voice. Mercer's first cartoon was 1935's King of the Mardi Gras.
Mercer continued to voice the one-eyed sailor for the Fleischers, for Paramount's Famous Studios cartoons (1942–1957), for a series of television cartoons for King Features Syndicate, and for a Saturday morning cartoon show (1978) produced by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera. Mercer also did other cartoon voices, including all the voices for a series of Felix the Cat cartoons produced in 1959-1960. Mercer also did the voices of Wimpy, Poopdeck Pappy, Popeye's nephews, King Little, Twinkletoes the Carrier Pigeon, and the bumbling spies Sneak, Snoop, and Snitch in Fleischer's Gulliver's Travels, and a number of voices, including Mr. Bumble and Swat (the Fly) for Fleischer's Mr. Bug Goes to Town.
His natural voice was relatively high-pitched for a man, and he was able to do some of the female voices as well. He married Margie Hines,[1] in 1939, and the newspapers went wild by stating that the voices of Popeye the Sailor Man and his girlfriend Olive Oyl had been wed in real life. Hines was not only the voice of Olive Oyl, she was the "original voice" of Betty Boop.
In 1944, Hines quit voice-over and became an employee of the Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation at Bethpage, Long Island, an organization that produced military and civilian aircraft.[2]
On Sunday, March 12, at 4:00 p.m., both she and her then husband Jack Mercer appeared on Eddie Dowling's "Wide Horizons" show over on the Mutual Network as a guest speakers. According to Mercer's second wife Virginia Mercer in her memoir, Jack told her that his marriage to his first wife Margie Hines ended in heartbreak.
Quotes
- Jack Mercer: "Margie, you're wonderful!" (Youngstown Vindicator, 1939)
- George Tucker: "Jack, are you married?"
Jack Mercer: "Sure, I'm married to Olive Oyl."
Character Role(s)
| Character(s) | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1933 | 
|
Cat | Betty Boop's Penthouse |
| 1934 | 
|
Judge | Betty Boop's Trial |
| 1935-1980 | 
|
Popeye | King of the Mardi Gras |
| 1936-1938 | 
|
Myron | Happy You and Merry Me |
| 1936-1938 | 
|
Myron's Mother | Happy You and Merry Me |
| 1936 | 
|
Cat | Not Now |
| 1937 | 
|
Cat | Pudgy Takes a Bow-Wow |
| 1937 | 
|
Wiffle Piffle | Whoops! I'm a Cowboy |
| 1939 | 
|
Red Indian Chief | Rhythm on the Reservation |
| 1939 | 
|
Pa | Musical Mountaineers |
| 1939 | 
|
Ma | Musical Mountaineers |
Mad About Manhattan (1941)
A few moments later Jack Mercer came in. Jack is the "voice" of most of the characters in these animated cartoon movies you see. In Mr. Bug Goes to Town, Dave Fleischer's newest production nearing its release date, he is Swat the Fly. You say Swat like you say Harry the Horse. Mercer is also the voice of Popeye. I said, "Jack, you married?" "Sure," he told me, "I'm married to Olive Oyl." Olive is Popeye's sweetheart. Not long ago Jack was in New York on the "We The People" program. He is a Worthington, Indiana, product, a refugee from vaudeville, and he is himself an artist. Other voices that Jack has created include, Poopdeck Pappy and Spunky the donkey.
Seek "Popeye," "Olive Oyl" At Fabian Fox Brooklyn (1943)
Beginning next Monday night Paramount Pictures Famous Studios in conjunction with the Fox Fabian Theatre, Brooklyn, will inaugurate the first of a series of "Popeye" and "Olive Oyl" opportunity contests, tied in with the theatre's regular weekly amateur shows. Jack Mercer, who has been the voice of "Popeye," the sailorman, is in the Army now, and the contests are being staged in an effort to find a new vocal interpreter for the Technicolored cartoons series. "Popeye's" girlfriend, Olive Oyl, who in real life is Mrs. Jack Mercer, may go into defense work while hubby is away, and the contest accordingly becomes a double header. In addition to voice tests, Paramount Pictures is offering prizes of $150 in war bonds.
Draft Popeye (1943)
Popeye the sailor man is in the army now. Jack Mercer, who has been the screen voice of the spinach-eating gob for the past eleven years, has been inducted for camp on August 3, it is announced by Sam Buchwald, General Manager of Paramount Famous Studios. Mercer, who is a story and gag man for Famous Studios, has a trick set of vocal chords which permit him to talk into the gravel basso profundo of Popeye. The voice of Olive Oyl, the string-bean sweetheart of Popeye in the movies, is the voice of Marge Mercer, a really very beautiful young woman, and in real life the wife of Jack.
Wide Horizons (1944)
Other interesting spots in this variety hour included the presence of Margie Hines and Jack Mercer, better known as the comedy team of "Olive Oyl and "Popeye." Marjorie sang "Button Up Your Overcoat" and "How Many Hearts Have You Broken?" in her droll "Betty Boop Girl" style.
Death
- He died at the age of 74 at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan on December 4, 1984 after stomach cancer-related problems.
Gallery
Filmography
1933:
1934:
1935:
- Dancing on the Moon
- Mary's Little Lamb
- King of the Mardi Gras
- Adventures of Popeye
- The Spinach Overture
1936:
- You're Not Built That Way
- Not Now
- We Did It
- A Song a Day
- Happy You and Merry Me
- Vim, Vigor and Vitaliky
- A Clean Shaven Man
- Brotherly Love
- I-Ski Love-Ski You-Ski
- Bridge Ahoy!
- What--No Spinach?
- I Wanna Be a Life Guard
- Let's Get Movin
- Never Kick a Woman
- With Little Swee'Pea
- Hold the Wire
- The Spinach Roadster
- Popeye the Sailor Meets Sindbad the Sailor
- I'm in the Army Now
1937:
- The Impractical Joker
- House Cleaning Blues
- Peeping Penguins
- Organ Grinder's Swing
- Hospitaliky
- The Twisker Pitcher
- Morning, Noon and Nightclub
- Lost and Foundry
- I Never Changes My Altitude
- I Likes Babies and Infinks
- The Football Toucher Downer
- Protek the Weakerist
- Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves
- Fowl Play
1938:
- Riding the Rails
- Be Up to Date
- Buzzy Boop
- Buzzy Boop at the Concert
- Let's Celebrake
- Learn Polikeness
- The House Builder-Upper
- Big Chief Ugh-Amugh-Ugh
- A Date to Skate
1939:
- Rhythm on the Reservation
- Customers Wanted
- Aladdin and His Wonderful Lamp
- Leave Well Enough Alone
- Wotta Nitemare
- Ghosks Is the Bunk
- Hello-How Am I
- It's the Natural Thing to Do
- Never Sock a Baby
- The Barnyard Brat
- The Fresh Vegetable Mystery
- Gulliver's Travels
1940:
- Pinocchio
- Gabby
- Shakespearean Spinach
- Females Is Fickle
- Stealin Aint Honest
- Me Feelins Is Hurt
- Onion Pacific
- Shakespearean Spinach
- Females Is Fickle
- Stealin Aint Honest
- Me Feelins Is Hurt
- Onion Pacific
- Wimmin Is a Myskery
- Nurse-Mates
- Fightin' Pals
- Doing Impossikible Stunts
- Wimmin Hadn't Oughta Drive
- Puttin on the Act
- Popeye Meets William Tell
- My Pop, My Pop
- With Poopdeck Pappy
- Popeye Presents Eugene, the Jeep
1941:
- Dumbo
- Mr. Bug Goes to Town
- Superman
- Problem Pappy
- Quiet! Pleeze
- Olive's Sweepstakes Ticket
- Child Psykolojiky
- I'll Never Crow Again
- Nix on Hypnotricks
- Mr. Bug Goes to Town'
- Flies Ain't Human
- Popeye Meets Rip Van Winkle
- Olive's Boithday Presink
- Pest Pilot
- I'll Never Crow Again
- The Mighty Navy
- Nix on Hypnotricks
1942:
- Kickin' the Conga 'Round
- Olive Oyl and Water Don't Mix
- Many Tanks
- Baby Wants a Bottleship
- Alona on the Sarong Seas
- Ration Fer the Duration
- Happy Birthdaze
- Cartoons Ain't Human
- The Marry-Go-Round
- You're a Sap, Mr. Jap
- Alona on the Sarong Seas
- A Hull of a Mess
- Scrap the Japs
- Me Musical Nephews
1943:
- Spinach Fer Britain
- Seein' Red, White 'N' Blue
- Too Weak to Work
- Ration Fer the Duration
- Happy Birthdaze
- Cartoons Ain't Human
- The Marry-Go-Round
1944:
- W'ere on Our Way to Rio
- The Anvil Chorus Girl
- Spinach Packin' Popeye
- Puppet Love
- Pitchin' Woo at the Zoo
- Moving Aweigh
- She-Sick Sailors
1945:
- Tops in the Big Top
- Shape Ahoy
- For Better or Nurse
- Mess Production
1945:
- Tops in the Big Top
- Shape Ahoy
- For Better or Nurse
- Mess Production
1946:
- House Tricks?
- Service with a Guile
- Klondike Casanova
- Peep in the Deep
- Rocket to Mars
- Rodeo Romeo
- The Fistic Mystic
- The Island Fling
1947:
- Abusement Park
- I'll Be Skiing Ya
- Popeye and the Pirates
- The Royal Four-Flusher
- Wotta Night
- Safari So Good
- All's Fair at the Fair
1948:
- Olive Oyl for President
- Wigwam Whoopee
- Pre-Hysterical Man
- Popeye Meets Hercules
- A Wolf in Sheik's Clothing
- Spinach vs Hamburgers
- Snow Place Like Home
- Robin Hood-Winked
- Symphony in Spinach
1949:
- Popeye's Premiere
- Lumberjack and Jill
- Hot Air Aces
- A Balmy Swami
- Tar with a Star
- Silly Hillbilly
- Barking Dogs Don't Fite
1950:
- Gym Jam
- Beach Peach
- Jitterbug Jive
- Popeye Makes a Movie
- Baby Wants Spinach
- Quick on the Vigor
- The Farmer and the Belle
1952
- Lunch with a Punch
- Swimmer Take All
1953:
- Ancient Fistory
- Popeye's Mirthday
- Toreadorable
- Baby Wants a Battle
- Firemen's Brawl
- Shaving Muggs
1954:
- Floor Flusher
- Popeye's 20th Anniversary
- Taxi-Turvy
- Bride and Gloom
- Fright to the Finish
- Private Eye Popeye
1955:
- Cookin' with Gags
- Nurse to Meet Ya
- Beaus Will Be Beaus
- Car-azy Drivers
- Mister and Mistletoe
- Cops Is Tops
- A Job for a Gob
1956:
- Hill-billing and Cooing
- Popeye for President
- Out to Punch
- Assault and Flattery
- Parlez Vous Woo
- I Don't Scare
- A Haul in One
1957:
- Nearlyweds
- The Crystal Brawl
- Spooky Swabs
1960:
- Hits and Missiles
- Barbecue for Two
- Muskels Schmuskels
- Hoppy Jalopy
- Dead-Eye Popeye
- Mueller's Mad Monster
- Caveman Capers
- Bullfighter Bully
- Ace of Space
- College of Hard Knocks
- Abdominal Snowman
- Ski-Jump Chump
- Irate Pirate
- Foola-Foola Bird
- Uranium on the Cranium
- Two-Faced Paleface
- Childhood Daze
- Sheepish Sheep-Herder
- Track Meet Cheat
- Crystal Ball Brawl
- Interrupted Lullaby
- Sea No Evil
- From Way Out
- Seeing Double
- Swee'pea Soup
- Hag Way Robbery
- The Lost City of Bubble-Lon
- There's No Space Like Home
- Potent Lotion
- Astro-Nut
- Where There's a Will
- Take It Easel
- I Bin Sculped
- Fleas a Crowd
- Popeye's Junior Headache
- Egypt Us
- The Big Sneeze
- The Last Resort
- Jeopardy Sheriff
- Baby Phase
- Goon with the Wind
- Insultin' the Sultan
- Dog-Gone Dog-Catcher
- Voice from the Deep or See Here, Sea Hag
- Matinee Idol Popeye
- Beaver or Not
- Battery Up
- Deserted Desert
- Skinned Divers
- Popeye's Service Station
- Coffee House
- Popeye's Pep-Up Emporium
- Bird Watcher Popeye
- Time Marches Backwards
- Popeye's Pet Store
- Ballet de Spinach
- Sea Hagracy
- Spinach Shortage
- Popeye and the Dragon
- Popeye the Fireman
- Popeye's Pizza Palace
- Down the Hatch
- Lighthouse Keeping
- Popeye and the Phantom
- Popeye's Picnic
- Out of This World
- Madam Salami
- Timber Toppers
- Skyscraper Capers
- Private Eye Popeye
- Little Olive Riding Hood
- Popeye's Hypnotic Glance
- Popeye's Trojan Horse
- Frozen Feuds
- Popeye's Corn-Certo
- Westward Ho-Ho
- Popeye's Cool Pool
- Jeep Jeep
- Popeye's Museum Piece
- Golf Brawl
- Wimpy's Lunch Wagon
- Weather Watchers
- Popeye and the Giant
- Hill Billy Dilly
- Popeye and the Magic Hat
- Pest of the Pecos
- The Blubbering Whaler
- Popeye and the Spinach Stalk
- Shoot the Chutes
- Tiger Burger
- Bottom Gun
- Olive Drab and the Seven Sweapeas
- Blinkin Beacon
- Azteck Wreck
- The Green Dancin' Shoes
- Spare Dat Tree
- The Glad Gladiator
- The Golden Touch
- Hamburger Fishing
- Popeye the Popular Mechanic
- Popeye's Folly
- Popeye's Used Car
- Spinachonara
- Popeye and the Polite Dragon
- Popeye the Ugly Ducklin.
- Popeye's Tea Party
- The Troll Wot Got Gruff
- Popeye the Lifeguard
- Popeye in the Woods
- After the Ball Went Over
- Popeye and Buddy Brutus
- Popeye's Car Wash
- Camel Aires
- Plumbers Pipe Dream
- Popeye and the Herring Snatcher
- Invisible Popeye
- The Square Egg
- Old Salt Tale
- Jeep Tale
- The Super Duper Market
- Golden-Type Fleece
- Popeye the White Collar Man
- Sweapea Thru the Looking Glass
- The Black Knight
- Jingle Jangle Jungle
- The Day Silky Went Blozo
- Rip Van Popeye
- Mississippi Sissy
- Double Cross Country Feet Race
- Fashion Fotography
- I Yam Wot I Yamnesia
- Paper Pasting Pandemonium
- Coach Popeye
- Popeyed Columbus
- Popeye Revere
- Popeye in Haweye
- Forever Ambergris
- Popeye De Leon
- Popeyed Fisherman
- Popeye in the Grand Steeple Chase
- Uncivil War
- Popeye the Piano Mover
- Popeye's Testimonial Dinner
- Around the World in Eighty Ways
- Popeye's Fixit Shop
- Bell Hop Popeye
- The Ghost Host
- Strikes, Spares, an' Spinach
- Jeep Is Jeep
- The Spinach Scholar
- Psychiatricks
- Rags to Riches to Rags
- Hair Cut-Ups
- Poppa Popeye
- Quick Change Olie
- The Valley of the Goons
- Me Quest for Poopdeck Pappy
- Moby Hick
- Mirror Magic
- It Only Hurts When They Laugh
- Wimpy the Moocher
- Voo-Doo to You Too
- Popeye Goes Sale-ing
- Popeye's Travels
- Incident at Missile City
- Dog Catcher Popeye
- What's News
- Spinach Greetings
- The Baby Contest
1961:
- Oil's Well That Ends Well
- Motor Knocks
- Amusement Park
- Duel to the Finish
- Gem Jam
- The Bathing Beasts
- The Rain Breaker
- Messin' Up the Mississippi
- Love Birds
- Sea Serpent
- Boardering on Trouble
- Aladdin's Lamp
- Butler Up
- The Leprechaun
- County Fair
- Hamburgers Aweigh
- Popeye's Double Trouble
- Kiddie Kapers
- The Mark of Zero
- Myskery Melody
- Scairdy Cat
- Operation Ice-Tickle
- The Cure
- William Won't Tell
- Pop Goes the Whistle
- Autographically Yours
- A Poil for Olive Oyl
- My Fair Olive
- Giddy Gold
- Strange Things Are Happening
- The Medicine Man
- A Mite of Trouble
- Who's Kidding Zoo
- Robot Popeye
- Sneaking Peeking
- Seer-ring Is Believer-ring
- The Wiffle Bird's Revenge
- Going Going Gone
- Popeye Thumb
- The Billionaire
- Model Muddle
- Which Is Witch
- Disguise the Limit
- Spoil Sport
1961:
- Oil's Well That Ends Well
- Motor Knocks
- Amusement Park
- Duel to the Finish
- Gem Jam
- The Bathing Beasts
- The Rain Breaker
- Messin' Up the Mississippi
- Love Birds
- Sea Serpent
- Boardering on Trouble
- Aladdin's Lamp
- Butler Up
- The Leprechaun
- County Fair
- Hamburgers Aweigh
- Popeye's Double Trouble
- Kiddie Kapers
- The Mark of Zero
- Myskery Melody
- Scairdy Cat
- Operation Ice-Tickle
- The Cure
- William Won't Tell
- Pop Goes the Whistle
- Autographically Yours
- A Poil for Olive Oyl
- My Fair Olive
- Giddy Gold
- Strange Things Are Happening
- The Medicine Man
- A Mite of Trouble
- Who's Kidding Zoo
- Robot Popeye
- Sneaking Peeking
- Seer-ring Is Believer-ring
- The Wiffle Bird's Revenge
- Going Going Gone
- Popeye Thumb
- The Billionaire
- Model Muddle
- Which Is Witch
- Disguise the Limit
- Spoil Sport
- Have Time Will Travel
- Intellectual Interlude
- Partial Post
- Weight for Me
1962:
- Canine Caprice
- Roger
- Tooth Be or Not Tooth Be
1972:
- Popeye Meets the Man Who Hated Laughter
1978:
- The All-New Popeye Hour
1979:
- The Popeye Valentine Special: Sweethearts at Sea
- The All-New Popeye Hour
1980:
Trivia
- Mercer was married to the voice of Betty Boop and Olive Oyl (Margie Hines) from 1939 to 1944, the two were later divorced. Mercer went on to marry a woman by the name of Virginia.
- After his death, Maurice LaMarche and Billy West performed the voice of Popeye.
- He was also regularly cast with Pinto Colvig.
- Mercer also wrote hundreds of scripts for various cartoon series, including a number of Popeye episodes, animated cartoons produced for Paramount Pictures, Deputy Dawg and Milton the Monster.
- He portrayed Popeye one final time in the 1980 live-action film Popeye during the opening animated sequence. In the film, Popeye was portrayed in person by Robin Williams.