Mickey's Mellerdrammer Mellerdrammer", Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Goofy (known then as Dippy Dawg) and others present their own low budget light-hearted rendition of the 19th century Tom Shows for a crowd in a barn converted into a theater for the occasion. Horace Horsecollar plays the white slave owner Simon Legree. Minnie plays the young white girl, Eva. Mickey plays old Uncle Tom with cotton around his ears and chin, and the young slave girl Topsy. Clarabelle Cow plays the slave woman Eliza. Goofy plays the production stage hand. The cartoon opens with Mickey and Clarabelle Cow in their dressing rooms applying blackface
Cartoon physics a cliff, gravity has no effect until the character notices. In words attributed to Art Babbitt, an animator with the Walt Disney Studios: "Animation follows the laws of physics—unless it is funnier otherwise." Specific reference to "cartoon physics" extends back at least to June 1980, when an article "O'Donnell's Laws of Cartoon Motion" appeared in "Esquire". A version printed in V.18 No. 7 p. 12, 1994 by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers in its journal helped spread the word among the technical crowd, which has expanded and refined the idea. These laws are outlined on dozens of websites.