Olive Oyl

Olive Oyl in Little Swee' Pea (1936).

Olive Oyl is a cartoon character created by Elzie Crisler Segar in 1919 for his comic strip Thimble Theater. Thimble Theater later became Popeye after the sailor character became the most popular member of the comic strip's cast. Olive Oyl was a character in the strip for 10 years before the first appearance of Popeye in 1929.

Fictional character biography

In the strip as written by Segar, Olive was something of a coy flapper whose extremely thin build lent itself well to the fashions of the time; her long black hair was usually rolled in a neat bun, like her mother's. She was the more or less fiancée of Ham Gravy, a "lounge lizard" or slacker type who did as little work as possible and was always borrowing money. His attraction to other women -- particularly if they were rich -- naturally incensed Olive, and she once succumbed to a fit of "lunaphobia" -- a kind of angry madness -- over one of his amours. (When she recovered, she continued to pretend to have the disorder to win him back.) She was not immune to flattery from other men, but remained committed to Ham until Popeye's appearance. The two did not fall in love at once (her first words to him were "Aw, shut up, you bilge rat!"), but instead fought bitterly (and hilariously) for weeks, before realizing they cared for one another.

The version of Olive Oyl most widely familiar is the version from the theatrical animated cartoons, first created by Fleischer Studios, and then produced by Famous Studios. Unlike most modern damsels in distress, Olive Oyl has short hair, is tall, skinny, with enormous feet and not particularly attractive. In the films and later television cartoons, Olive Oyl is Popeye's girlfriend. She constantly gets kidnapped by Bluto (aka Brutus), who is Popeye's rival for her affections but Popeye always rescues her.

Though Popeye and Bluto both were infatuated with her, Olive wasn't exactly a particularly attractive individual at times, both physically and personality-wise, as she would be extremely fickle depending on who could woo her the best, who had the flashier possessions, and was prone to get angry over the tiniest things. Yet she always ended up with Popeye at the end, showing that his good nature would always get the ladies' attention. In the cartoons, she helps to take care of a baby named Little Swee'Pea; it is not made clear if Swee'Pea is Olive Oyl's own son or an adopted foundling. In the comics, Swee'Pea is a foundling under Popeye's care. Later sources (mostly in the cartoon series) say that Swee'Pea is Olive Oyl's cousin that she has to take care of from time to time.

History

The voice for Olive Oyl was created by character actress Mae Questel (who also voiced Betty Boop and other characters); Questel styled Olive Oyl's voice after that of actress ZaSu Pitts; though the first two Popeye cartoons (Popeye The Sailor and I Yam What I Yam) featured Bonnie Poe as the voice of Olive Oyl. In 1938, Margie Hines took over as the voice of Olive Oyl, starting with the cartoon Bulldozing The Bull. Questel returned as the voice of Olive Oyl in 1944, starting with the cartoon The Anvil Courus Girl.

Olive Oyl is named after olive oil, used commonly in cooking or in salads. Segar's newspaper strips also featured a number of her relatives named after other oils, including her brother Castor Oyl, their mother Nana Oyl (after "banana oil", a mild slang phrase of the time used in the same way as "horsefeathers", i.e. "nonsense"), their father, Cole Oyl, and more recently, Olive's niece, Diesel Oyl (a pun on diesel oil) appears in the cartoons.

In the 1980 film version, Olive is played by Shelley Duvall. One reviewer called her performance "eerily perfect".

In July 2007, a live-animation TV commercial starring Olive Oyl aired as part of an advertising campaign for Campbell Soup Company’s Prego Italian sauces. Olive’s ad is one in a series of five different ads for Prego, which features Spice Girl Emma Bunton ("Baby Spice"), Olympic Silver Medalist Lea Ann Parsley, an average American couple named Rosemary and Herb and an Englishman named Basil. In each 15-second commercial, the "flavorful" characters wonder aloud about what spice to add to their simmering pot of sauce.

In 2006, King Features produced both a radio spot and industrial for the United States Power Squadron featuring Robyn Gryphe as Olive and Allen Enlow as Popeye.

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