The Pink Phink
Original theatrical poster
Directed by	Friz Freleng Co-director: Hawley Pratt
Story by	John W. Dunn
Produced by	David H. DePatie Friz Freleng Mirisch-Geoffrey-DePatie-Freleng
Edited by	Lee Gunther
Music by	William Lava Theme song: Henry Mancini
Animation by	Don Williams Bob Matz Norman McCabe Laverne Harding
Layouts by	Dick Ung (uncredited)
Backgrounds by	Tom O'Loughlin
Production company	Mirisch-Geoffrey-DePatie-Freleng Productions
Distributed by	United Artists
Release date	December 18, 1964
Running time	6 minutes
Country	United States

The Pink Phink is a 1964 American animated short comedy film directed by Friz Freleng. It is the first animated short starring the Pink Panther.^[1] The short won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short at the 37th Academy Awards.

Plot

The Pink Panther and an unnamed painter (known as the "Little Man") compete over whether a house should be painted blue or pink. Each time the painter attempts to paint something blue, Pink thwarts him in a new way, and paints the object/area pink. At the end, the exasperated painter inadvertently turns the house and everything around it pink (first by repeatedly shooting at the elusive panther with a shotgun that Pink had poured pink paint into, and then by burying the panther's pink paint cans in the soil outside the house, where they "sprout" and grow pink grass and trees), and Pink moves in. But just before he moves in, he paints the white man completely pink. The painter bangs his head against the mailbox outside in frustration as Pink then walks into the house as the sun (also turned pink) sets to make the sky turn blue and the cartoon fades out.^[2]

Academy Award

The Pink Phink was the first Pink Panther animated short produced by DePatie–Freleng Enterprises and by winning the 1964 Academy Award for Animated Short Film, it marked the first time that a studio won an Academy Award with its first animated short. It is also both the only animated Pink Panther short and the only installment in the franchise to win the award.^[2]

Credits

• "The Pink Panther Theme": Henry Mancini
• Produced by: David H. DePatie, Friz Freleng
• Directed by: Friz Freleng
• Executive Producer: Walter Mirisch
• Co-Director: Hawley Pratt
• Story by: John W. Dunn
• Animation: Don Williams, Bob Matz, Norman McCabe, LaVerne Harding.
• Layout: Dick Ung (uncredited)
• Backgrounds: Tom O'Loughlin
• Film Editor: Lee Gunther
• Camera Operator: John Burton, Jr.
• Production Supervisor: Bill Orcutt
• Music Score: William Lava

Laugh track

A laugh track was added to the theatrical Pink Panther cartoons when they were broadcast as part of the Pink Panther Show aired on NBC,^[2] and this laugh track still appears when the show is aired on the Spanish language Boomerang TV channel, and the France Channel Gulli. Most American broadcasts currently air minus the laugh track. The Pink Phink can be viewed in its original form with full titles and sans laugh track on The Official Pink Panther channel on YouTube along with the MGM Television logo.^[3]

Popular culture

• An episode of the animated series Dexter's Laboratory entitled "A Silent Cartoon" is a homage to this short; the short features Dexter (filling the role of the painter) trying to construct a blue laboratory, while an all-pink version of his sister Dee Dee finds clever ways to turn the blue lab into a completely pink lab.
• In the 2010 series Pink Panther and Pals, a scene from "A Pinker Tomorrow" in which the Pink Panther tricks the Little Man (Big Nose) to cover the outside of the house in paint, is a homage to the original short, but in a futuristic environment.