The Wise Little Hen is a Silly Symphony short released on June 9, 1934. It marks the theatrical debut of Donald Duck and is based on the fairy tale The Little Red Hen.
The Wise Little Hen lived with her chicks. When they were running low on food, the worried Hen decided to plant some corn. So they set off to Peter Pig's house. He greeted her, and she asked him if he would help her plant corn, ("Help Me Plant My Corn") but sadly Peter complained of having a belly ache and snorted off. The Hen realized that he would not help her, so she skipped off to Donald Duck's house to ask him for help. Donald did not help her either, as he also faked a belly ache and quacked off. The Hen decided to plant the corn herself. As soon as the corn had grown, the Hen asked Peter and Donald again if they would help her. They faked belly aches again and went into the club house they owned. Peter banged the door so hard the wall broke, but the Pig and the Duck were shaking hands without noticing the wall at all. The Hen saw through their trick and agreed with her chicks to not let them eat any corn when it's done. So they harvested and cooked the corn themselves for their dinner. When they were done, the Hen decided to ask Peter and Donald if they wanted corn. They agreed and came rushing over to grab the basket full of corn. They fought over it but then decided to dig in. To their surprise, it was castor oil for belly aches! The Hen and the chicks enjoyed their meal, while Peter and Donald kicked each other in the rear.
Clarence Nash had been a performer in Chautauqua and vaudeville during the 1920s and later met Wilfred Jackson who wanted Nash to provide bird sounds for a cartoon. During the call, Nash performed a rendition of "Mary Had a Little Lamb" as a duck, and Jackson sent the music into Walt Disney's office. Disney himself proclaimed "[t]hat's our talking duck. The short was animated by Art Babbitt, Dick Huemer, Clyde Geronimi, Louie Schmitt, and Frenchy de Tremaudan (with assistance from a group of junior animators headed by Ben Sharpsteen) and directed by Wilfred Jackson. Animation on the hen was done by Wolfgang Reitherman and supervised by Ben Sharpsteen. Art Babbitt worked on Peter Pig and Donald Duck. Ward Kimball worked as an inbetweener on this short. The song featured in the short, "Help Me Plant My Corn" was written by Leigh Harline.
Trivia[]
This was Donald Duck's only color appearance until the release of The Band Concert in 1935, as Mickey Mouse cartoons from 1928 to 1935 were in black-and-white.
All of the characters' speeches are hard to interpret due to mixing in animal sounds.
This was what led to Donald to have his trademark quack-like speech.
Despite the character theatrically debuting in 1934, Donald Duck earlier appeared in the Disney book The Adventures of Mickey Mouse in 1931.
The Finnish, Italian, Norwegian, European Portuguese, and European Spanish audio tracks are PAL-pitched on Disney+.
