Reliving Fond Memories: A Test Pilot from the Man Village: Phil Harris
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Alice Faye and Phil Harris

A Test Pilot from the Man Village
Phil Harris

The other night I watched my laser disk of The Jungle Book (Laserdisc? How old fashioned! ;)). Baloo the Bear captivated me yet again. The most famous blue bear in movies. The animation is assured, smooth and energetic, but what makes the character convincing is that voice. The sly rolling cadences, a voice as warm and familiar as your best friend’s. Disney always made great choices for vocal talent, but Phil Harris’ performance as Baloo set a high water mark for any voice talent to follow.

The Disney studio (as well as other animation factories) exploited the fountain of phenomenal voice talent from the golden age of radio. Bill Thompson, Jerry Colona, Ed Wynn, Hans Conreid and Verna Felton were just some of the distinct personas that completed the magic formula of great drawing and expressive voices. These two forces came together to create unforgettable characters in the Disney Pantheon.

Phil Harris, who completely "owned" the characters he portrayed, did this when he was semi-retired. He had actually enjoyed a long and rewarding career before the famous Disney voices.

Delving into Phil’s long career to understand the man and entertainer is a revelation. Phil’s voice work filled with a richer, deeper meaning as I discovered the man behind the bear. I felt I was seeing the characters of Baloo, O’Malley and Little John fresh again, infused with new life. Phil had a very distinct personality and mannerisms, and the animators channeled his energy into the very graphite on the paper. I gained new appreciation for the subtle artistry of the Disney storytellers.

Phil Harris was born in Linton, Indiana, in 1906. In the 1920’s he formed his own big band. He was a drummer but discovered his charismatic persona along with the music was what the people wanted to see. His was a novelty swing band, and they toured all around the country. The bouncy rhythms and his outgoing personality provided an upbeat countercharge to the Depression.

His first foray into radio was the broadcasts from the Coconut Grove nightclub in Los Angeles. His voice and music was infectious, and he rapidly became a radio celebrity.

Starting in 1933, he made America laugh as the cavalier besotted bandleader on "The Jack Benny Show". It was there he polished up his considerable comic instincts as a good-natured loopy musician of questionable talent. His egotism was only matched by his love of a good time. He was always coming back from a party, or on his way to one. He was blithely ignorant of his uneducated faux paus. He was vain, a braggart, but always quick with a new joke. He would make his entrances loudly with a perfectly timed "Hiya Jackson!" It was doubted whether he or his band could read music, much less play their instruments. He was a natural antithesis to Benny's brittle, tightwad character, and the two played marvelously off each other, as part of a group of inventive characters including Mary Livingston, Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, Dennis Day and Don Wilson.

"Ah Harris, if they bottled your charm you’d make millions!" He would enthuse over himself after telling a particularly corny joke.

In 1941, Phil met and married Alice Faye, gorgeous musical star for 20th Century Fox. In 1953 they began their own radio show, "The Phil Harris/Alice Faye Show", sponsored first by Fitch shampoo, then Rexall Drugs. The new show was kind of a sequel to the Benny show. It followed Phil's adventures at home with his long-suffering wife and his hard livin’, low life bum of a guitar player named Frank Remley ("What’s a Rexall?" He asks sardonically). Both musicians were ne’er-do-wells, but the audience loved them for it. Also in the cast were Jeanine Roos and Ann Whitfield as Phil's daughters Baby Alice and Phyllis (his real daughters were too young to perform. They were on the set and were friends with their radio counterparts) Rounding out the cast was Walter Tetley as the delivery boy Julius Abbruzio (Walter was an adult who specialized in wise guy kids. Cartoon fans remember him as Sherman in the Jay Ward cartoon "Mr. Peabody and his boy Sherman". He was in his 50's by then!)