The Pied Piper of Basin Street

In this swing version of the famous tale, a small town is overrun with rats. The mayor (caricature of Lou Costello) is in a quandary. His phones are busy with demands to do something. He hears a voice say: "what you need is a Pied Piper." Looking up, he sees a young man with a trombone (Jimmy Durante) who claims that he can run every rat out of town for a fee. The mayor makes a deal with him, and the trombone player goes to work leading the rats out of town with the playing of his trombone, and he locks them in a cage. Returning to the mayor's office, he's handed a bag of peanuts and thrown out. Unable to get the reward promised, the Pied Piper puts on his "Hank Swoonatra" (Frank Sinatra) suit croons to the girls. He leads them aboard a swinging showboat and opens the cage full of rats and they return to town, where only the mayor is left. The rats swarm the mayor's office and give him a bad time for his treatment of the pied piper. Production Number: D-10 A Swing Symphony cartoon.

Directed by Shamus Culhane, The Pied Piper of Basin Street leans on a strong ensemble — Harry Lang, GeGe Pearson, Dick Nelson — to carry a story that balances spectacle with character.

The film landed with audiences for its craft and performances, and remains one of the most talked-about animation titles of 1945.