Lady and the Tramp is a 1955 American animated romantic musical comedy film produced by Walt Disney and released to theaters on 22 June 1955 by Buena Vista Distribution. The 15th film in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series, it was the first animated feature filmed in the CinemaScope widescreen film process.[2] Based on Happy Dan, The Whistling Dog by Ward Greene, Lady and the Tramp tells the story of a female American Cocker Spaniel named Lady who lives with a refined, upper-middle-class family, and a male stray mutt named Tramp. When the two dogs meet, they embark on many romantic adventures. A direct-to-video sequel, Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp's Adventure, was released in 2001.
Plot[]
Production[]
Characters' development[]
Tramp[]
In early script versions, Tramp was first called Homer, then Rags and Bozo. However, in the finished film, Tramp never calls himself a proper name, although most of the film's canine cast refer to him as "the Tramp". Tramp has other names that are given to him by the families he weekly visits for food, such as Mike and Fritzi. However, he doesn't belong to a single family, so his name is never confirmed, although most comics and indeed the film's own sequel assume that he is also named Tramp by Jim Dear and Darling.
Aunt Sarah[]
The character that eventually became Aunt Sarah was softened for the movie, in comparison with earlier treatments. In the film, she is a well-meaning busybody aunt (revealed to be the sister of Darling's mother in the Greene novelization) who adores her cats. Earlier drafts had Aunt Sarah appear more as a stereotypical meddling and overbearing mother-in-law. While she is antagonistic towards Lady and Tramp at first, she sends them a box of dog biscuits for Christmas to make amends for having so badly misunderstood them.
Si and Am[]
Earlier versions of the storyline, drafted in 1943 during the war, had the two cats appear as secondary antagonists, suggesting the yellow peril. They were originally named Nip and Tuck. In Ward Greene's novelization, they tearfully express remorse over causing Tramp's impending execution by hiding the rat's body as a joke and then try to make amends, while in the film they do not partake of the climatic scene.
Jim Dear and Darling[]
In pre-production, Jim Dear was known as Jim Brown, and Darling was named Elizabeth. These were dropped to highlight Lady's point of view. In a very early version, published as a short story in a 1944 Disney children's anthology, Lady refers to them as "Mister" and "Missis". To maintain a dog's perspective, Darling and Jim's faces are rarely shown. The background artists made models of the interiors of Jim Dear and Darling's house and shot photos and film at a low perspective as a reference to maintain a dog's view.
The film's opening sequence, in which Darling unwraps a hat box on Christmas morning and finds Lady inside, is based upon an actual incident in Walt Disney's life when he presented his wife Lillian with a Chow puppy as a gift in a hat box.
Beaver[]
The beaver in this film is similar to the character of Gopher in Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree, down to the speech pattern: a whistling noise when he makes the "S" sound. This voice was created by Stan Freberg, who has an extensive background in commercial and comedy recordings. On the Lady and the Tramp Platinum Edition DVD, he demonstrates how the effect was done, and that a whistle was eventually used because it was difficult to maintain the effect.
Rat[]
The rat, a somewhat comical character in some early sketches, became a great deal more frightening, due to the need to raise dramatic tension.