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the Art of

!

"

from Mickey Mouse to the Magic Kingdoms

CHRISTOPHER FINCH

NEW CONCISE EDITION

IT n

Walt Disney's

rise to

can success story. west, he

made

his

A

fame is a classic Ameripoor boy from the Midto the top with a

way

com-

bination of hard work, practical know-how,

and ingenuity. What makes

enterprise,

success story different from fact that his

the rest

this

is

the

unique imagination touched off a

shock of recognition of people

all

all

in

the minds of millions

over the world. The characters

Disney brought to the screen— Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, Pluto, Goofy, the Seven Dwarfs. Jiminy Cricket, Dumbo, and the others— have a universal appeal. Movies as diverse in idiom as Fantasia and

Mary Poppins

illustrate the

range of his inven-

and he has also left us, beyond his film successes, two extraordinary entertainment complexes— Disneyland and Walt Disney tions,

World. At the beginning of

his career,

Disney took a

humble branch of the motion picture mdustry— the animated cartoon and, within a do/en years, transformed it into a new art form capable of sustaining complex and sub-

—

tle ideas.

The

first

cartoon with synchronized

color, and the first animated feature were all produced by Walt Disney. His genius and sure intuition created a framework that supported the talents of many

sound, the

first in full

gifted

individuals,

cussed

in

many of whom are Above all, however,

these pages.

disthis

one man's imagination. This account of Disney's career benefits from free access to the Walt Disney archives. The author conducted dozens of interviews with past and present Disney employees and selected a great number of previously unpublished drawings, paintings, and photographs is

a record of

for

inclusion

in

this

book. The basic tech-

niques of animation are explained, and vari-

ous examples of story sketches, layouts, anidrawings, and background paintings—all the elements that go into the making

mation

of an animated

film— are

illustrated.

Many

and documentary photographs enrich the story, and we learn how film-making skills were adapted to aid in the design of the parks, bringing to life unexpected combinafilm

stills

and electronics. Christopher Finch, the author, was formerly on the curatorial staff of the Walker Art

tions of nostalgia

Center

in

Minneapolis. His previous books

in-

clude studies of Pop Art and contemporary English painting.

251 illustrations, including

Copyright k> 1988 by Wall Disney

1

Company

70 plates in full color

THE ART OF WALT DISNEY

For Sarah and Justin, for

Nai Y. Chang, Inns

I

Vice-President, Design

Hochmann,

Margaret

L.

Jenny and Emily, and for Felix and Georgia

and Production

Executive Editor

Kaplan. Managing Editor

Barbara Lyons,

Director,

Photo Department Rights and Reproduct

Michael Sonino, Abridgment

Librur\ of Congress Cataloging

in

Publication Data

Finch. Christopher

The

art

of Walt Disnc\

This 1988 edition published by Portland House, a division of dilithium Press, Ltd.,

Bibliography: p I.

distributed by

Disney. Walt. 1901

Productions.

1.

1966.

2.

Disney (Walt)

New

Title.

NC1766.U52D533

1975

Crown

Publisher. Inc.

225 Park Avenue South York.

NY

10003

79l\092'4 74-8435

By arrangement with Harry N. Abrams,

Inc.

Produced by Twin Books 15

Library of Congress Catalogue Card Number: 74-8435

Copyright

©

1988 by Walt Disney

All righls reserved.

No

CT 06830

Printed and

bound

Company

part of the contents of this

book may be reproduced without the written permission of

Sherwood Place

Greenwich.

WALT DISNEY COMPANY

Burbank. California

ISBN

0-517-66474-7

hgfedeba

in the

United States of America

Contents

Introduction

PART

I

A NEW ART FORM Early Enterprises

19

2

Mickey Mouse and

Silly

3

Six Cartoon Classics

4

Hyperion Days

1

PART

II

III

27

54

•

5

Snow White: The

6

Pinocchio

7

Fantasia:

8

Dumbo

9

Interruptions and Innovations

First Feature

69

79

The Great Experiment

and Bambi

Later Animation

•

92

103 109

118

LIVE ACTION FILMS 11

12

PART IV

Symphonies

43

FEATURE ANIMATION

10

PART

11

Actors and Animals

127

Davy Crockett. Other Heroes, and Mary Poppins

135

THE MAGIC KINGDOMS 13

Beyond Film: Disneyland and Walt Disney World

145

Introduction By the time he was thirty years old, Walt Disney had become a As the creator of Mickey Mouse, his remarks— both

public figure.

casual and considered— were translated into dozens of languages

and

could

likeness

his

be

newspapers and magazines.

found on the pages of countless

A

trim mustache and a ready smile

gave him a Clark Gable-ish charm which was shared by

young Americans of

was

the period (as

many other

his taste for sporty jackets

and boldly patterned sweaters). What distinguished him from the rest, and made his face memorable, was a sense of determination and purpose which was apparent even later years

in his

most relaxed poses. In

he entered our living rooms and addressed us from the

television screen. By that time his face and frame had broadened and he had begun to favor conservatively cut suits and sober neckties. The mustache and the smile remained, however, as did

the evident purpose

By

some of Disney's

after talking with sible to

there

and determination.

definition, public figures are

to

everyone;

escape the conclusion that nobody really

was some aspect of

He was

a

abilities,

project

known

closest associates,

his personality that

man who believed absolutely artist who would go to any

knew him. Always

own

had conceived

surrounded himself with talents of every kind, but

was

in

complete control. The master plan was

head and remained unknowable

instincts

and

lengths to ensure that a

he

as

even

impos-

was just out of reach.

in his

an

was carried out exactly

yet, is

it

until, piece

in

at all

it.

He

times he

Walt Disney's

by piece,

it

was given

concrete form and grafted onto the mythology of our century.

At the outset of his career Disney was often underestimated by his rivals.

They were aware of

the caliber of the talents he

surrounded himself with and assumed that lured away, the Disney Studio

apparent that the one

would at

collapse.

any

had

these talents could be It

soon became

man who made Walt Disney

uniquely successful was not available In later years

if

Productions

price.

Disney has been underestimated

in

other ways.

Since the values expressed in his movies are essentially the simple values of the cartoon and the fairy story,

many

people have been

tempted into presenting simplistic pictures of Disney the man, and of what he stood

for.

Some have chosen

to portray

him

as a naive

genius, while others— dazzled by the success of his varied enter-

11

prises— prefer to see him as just another business tycoon. These versions of Disney bear

relationship to any aseertainable

little

Everyone who worked closely with him admits that money

truth.

was important

to

better movies,

improve

the future.

cheap

Disney only insofar as

He was

it

enabled him

to

produce

his parks, or (in later years) plan the city

of

and perfection did not come

a perfectionist

these fields.

in

The notion

that

Disney was a naive genius

movies, right

ing. In his

is

right

and wrong

is

is

equally mislead-

wrong, but— given

background and the audience he knew himself

be

to

his

touch

in

with— this should not surprise anyone and. although he remained faithful to uncomplicated values, he was by no means a simple man. There was much more intuition.

He knew

implemented, and that analysis the

to his success

that for intuition to this

demanded

than a blind faith

mean anything a

with

whom

had

in

be

to

combination of stringent

and sheer hard work, backed up by the

artists

it

practical talents of

he surrounded himself. Improving the

product seems to have occupied his mind night and day. After hours and on weekends he would prowl the studio— familiarizing himself with the development of every project.

source of expertise, and there

sometimes mulled over ideas to

is

He

subjected each

upon every available

decision to intensive discussion, drawing

ample evidence

he

to suggest that

for years before they

were permitted

reach this stage.

Having received to great lengths to

relatively

little

formal schooling. Disney went

educate himself and his

artists (at times, the

old

Avenue must have seemed more like the art department of some progressive university than a productive component of the motion picture industry). Disney started in the studio on Hyperion

field

of animated films determined to be better than anyone

Achieving "plus*"

his

this rather quickly,

else.

he embarked on a lifelong quest to

own accomplishments

("plus." used as a verb,

is

a

word with old hands at the Studio). Throughout the thirties and into the forties, amazing progress was made in the development of the animated film. The Disney Studio gave to the world favorite

painted characters

who

moved but seemed

not only

to think for

themselves. By the time of Pinocchio and Fantasia. Disney had

brought

to a spectacular

maturity an art form that had been

in its

infancy just a dozen years earlier.

Disney himself was not pretended to be one.

He was

a

great draftsman,

always the

about 1926, he did not contribute

first to

a single

and he never

admit

drawing

to

that, after

any of

his

cartoons. His great abilities lay in the area of ideas— conceiving

them, developing them, and seeing them through to a successful conclusion. Ideas were commodities that he was never short of

he ever had a problem with ideas

many

12

to give

them

all

it

was

that he

(if

sometimes had too

the attention that they deserved).

A

superb

story editor,

Disney worked with

movie

ing the structure of a

phrasing and rephras-

his artists,

every minute action, each

until

nuance of character contributed

last

development of the plot. This was a skill that he acquired while making the short cartoons of the early and middle thirties, cartoons which— since they ran from minutes each— demanded the greatest economy of

just six to eight

When

action.

to the

he

turned

making

to

feature

principles were applied, so that nothing that

of the story ever found

telling

way onto

its

same

the

films,

was not

essential to the

the screen.

It

was

Disney's intense involvement with plot development and character,

along with his uncanny grasp of technical possibilities, that gave his best movies the tightness of structure that has enabled

survive so well in our collective

He was failures

of course,

a few that

were the ones

The point by

not,

and even

films

is

his best

He

infallible.

were outright

any other

work and he was,

and innovative film-makers

Animated movies depend on movement

did produce mediocre

failures (usually the worst

artist,

at his best,

deserves to be judged

one of the most vigorous of the cinema.

in the entire history

are difficult to illustrate adequately.

nately, the final setup that

link in

model

shot by the camera

is

making of an animated

film.

not the only art in fact, the

It is,

an elaborate chain that includes character studies,

sheets, story continuity sketches, layouts,

produced

Fortu-

lifeless.

is

background paint-

animation drawings, color models, and the

ings,

who

in the

They

achieve their effect, and a single image

to

taken from a cartoon will often seem static and

last

to

that did not sustain his personal interest).

that Disney, like

work involved

them

memory.

at various

of these stages

is

The work The artists

like.

often very lively.

are concerned with story

and layout, for example, have to sell and the producer (in most instances they would be dealing with Walt Disney himself) and attempt to get into their ideas to their director

their

drawings the "feel" of what

Mickey should receive chair, the story artist

single

event,

take the

appear on screen. Thus,

him

as a

same

book

illustrator

would

is

do).

if

his

fall in

The

a

layout

map

out the entire action. Either of

more of

a sense of

eventually seen on screen than does a single frame from the

movie. Happily,

we

from

scene, provide a detailed context for the

and diagrammatically

these representations does, in most cases, give

what

to fall

must suggest both the shock and the

drawing (much

artist will

will

a shock that causes

many

are able to use

of these drawings have been preserved and

them

here.

Not only do they

effectively

convey

the "feel" of what eventually appeared on screen; they are often

very beautiful in their

own

right.

Some

appeal because of their

spontaneity, others because of their attention to detail; and, that,

they

tell

us

much about

the

way

in

beyond

which an animated film

is

conceived and executed.

Each of these drawings contains some clues

to the secret

of

13

Disney's success, since every one of them was touched by his influence.

Each drawing

aware that

it

reflects his taste, for the artist

was subject

uncritical). Literally

to his scrutiny

hundreds of

was always

(which was far from

artists figure in this story,

but

all

of them functioned within the governing structure elaborated by Disney's imagination. In later years he less

control

became

his reputation rests,

was complete.

14

was unavoidable.

so diversified that this

on which

may perhaps have

exercised

over some aspects of the operation— his interests In the productions

however, Walt Disney's involvement

i

m fr

_

*

" ^

1.

A new (Wit fawn.

1

Early Enterprises

Walter Elias Disney was born into a modest Chicago household on December 5, 1901. His father, Elias Disney, was Canadian born

and of Anglo-Irish descent. Elias was a building contractor, and we may judge the success of that operation by the fact that Walt later

mother sometimes went out to the building site with the men, sawing and hammering planks. At the time of Walt's birth, there were already three children in the family-Herbert, Raymond, and Roy. Walt was to develop an especially close relationship with Roy, who was nearest to him in age, a relationship

described

was

that

how

his

be of great importance

to

daughter-Ruth-was added

to

"in 1906, Elias Disney decided to pull

and moved

both of them. Later a

to the family.

his family to a forty-eight-acre

up his roots once again farm outside Marceline,

Missouri. Small farms, then as now, did not offer an easy route to prosperity. Herbert and Raymond, both in their teens, had devellife and soon returned to Chicago. Walt and expected to help their parents with the farm course, of Roy were, later chores. It was an extremely hard life, but one which Walt

oped

a taste for city

remembered with considerable affection. We may be sure It was on the farm that he began to draw. make the this was not encouraged by his parents, but he did tentative steps toward

operation was

his eventual career.

first

Meanwhile, the farm

1910, Elias sold the

in trouble. In

that

farm with

all its

livestock and moved the family once again-this time to Kansas newspaper City, ninety-five miles southwest. There Elias bought a

Roy were co-opted into and found themselves getting up at 3:30 Star. Despite in the morning to meet the trucks of the Kansas City as did a this hard work, Walt's interest in drawing persisted,

delivery business. Naturally, Walt and

contributing their services

growing

taste

theatrical

for

expression.

In

a

rare

gesture

of

indulgence, Elias Disney allowed Walt to enroll for Saturday morning classes at the Kansas City Art Institute (the elder Disney justified this al").

Thus,

formal

on the grounds

at the

that the classes

would be "education-

age of fourteen, Walt acquired a smattering of

art training.

In

1917, Elias decided

returned to factory.

upon another move. This time he

Chicago, where he purchased a part share

Walt remained

in

Kansas City

in a small

to finish out his school year

19

(Roy was

there,

still

summer as

working

bank

as a

teller):

then he spent the

news butcher on the Santa Fe Railroad (news butchers

a

hawked newspapers, enabled him

candy, and soft drinks), a job which more of the country while feeding his trains— an enthusiasm which would provide him fruit,

to see a little

enthusiasm for

with an important outlet later in

life.

In the

fall,

he joined the

McKinley High School. Here he school paper and managed to get some

family in Chicago and enrolled at

contributed drawings to the

newspaper cartoonist named Leroy and on June 22, 1917. Roy the Navy. Walt had dreams of enlisting too, but

further art instruction from a

Gossett.

World War

Disney enlisted

in

He

he was under age.

I

was

in progress

discovered that one had to be only seventeen

become a Red Cross ambulance driver and, though still sixteen, managed to join up (his mother, probably relieved that he would be driving an ambulance rather than handling a rifle, allowed him to to

date on the application). He was sent to a staging Sound Beach, Connecticut, but the Armistice was signed before he got any further. There was still, however, a need for drivers in Europe and he eventually found himself in France, assigned to a military canteen in Neufchateau, where he soon falsify his birth

post at

Walt Disney's birthplace at 1249 Tripp Avenue. Chicago, built by his father. Elias Disney

established himself as the unit's unofficial

artist,

earning a few

medals onto

extra francs with such enterprises as painting fake

leather jackets

and camouflaging captured German helmets so

that

they could be passed off as snipers' helmets.

Disney returned

United States

to the

in 1919.

job waiting for him. but Walt was determined

He headed local studio where he made "Ub" Iwerks, a young man

commercial

the

art.

for

and

it

His father had a

make

a career in

Kansas City and found work

friends with another employee.

of Dutch descent

most important associate of

talented draftsman,

to

who was

his early career.

soon occurred

to

to

at a

Ubbe

become

Iwerks was a

them

to

get

into

They acquired desk space at the offices of Restaurant News and immediately achieved

business for themselves. a publication called

some modest success. But then Disney saw a newspaper advertisement for a job with an organization called Kansas City Slide Company (soon changed to Kansas City Film Ad). This company made what we would now call commercials for display in local movie theaters. They were, in fact, producing crude animated films. This new medium and the salary offered— forty dollars a

week— appealed

to

Disney.

He

applied for the job and got

it.

Iwerks

took over the business they had started, but within a few months he, too,

joined Kansas City Film Ad.

The animation produced at Kansas City Film Ad consisted mainly of stop-action photography of jointed cardboard figures-a technique that precluded any serious effort toward naturalism. Nonetheless,

it

provided Disney,

still

just eighteen years old,

and

Iwerks with the basic training they needed. Before long. Disney

20

borrowed result

a

was a

camera and little

reel

tried

some animation on

of topical gags— reminiscent

newspaper cartoons— which he managed Theater, a local movie house.

and

illustrated

shorter skirts

for the theater.

character of

to sell to the

A number

Newman

of short "commercials"

jokes— known collectively as the

o-Grams— were made

own. The

his in

They

Newman

Laugh-

dealt with such topics as

and police corruption. Technically they were very

competent by the standards of the day, and, encouraged by Disney managed

this

enough capital to leave Kansas City Film Ad and set up on his own, retaining Laugho-Grams as the company's name. It might be assumed that a young man just emerging from his teens would have been content to stick initial success,

with

familiar material,

to raise

least

at

a

for

while,

but Disney was

ambitious and immediately started work on a series of updated fairy tales. Six Elias

and Flora Disnev

in

1913

of Bremen,

of these were made: Cinderella, The Four Musicians

Goldie Locks and the

Beanstalk, Little

Three Bears, Jack and the

Red Riding Hood, and Puss

The Disney

in Boots.

archives have prints of The Four Musicians of Bremen and Puss in

and they provide clear evidence

Boots,

overestimating his ability tender age. Puss

in Boots, for

example,

the story displays a nice sense of is

updated so

that,

for

that

Disney was not

when he entered production is

humor

instance,

the

at

rather well animated,

atmosphere

(the fairy-tale

King

around

rides

this

and in

a

chauffeur-driven convertible). In the course of to build

up an able

producing these short cartoons, Disney began staff

which soon included, besides Iwerks,

Hugh and Walker Harman. Carmen "Max" Maxwell, and Red Lyon. Unfortunately, the Laugh-o-Grams were not selling (one sale was made but the purchaser went bankrupt after making a Rudolf

Ising,

$100 deposit), and the Disney production team was always looking income. They worked on a live-action short Martha and, sponsored by a local dentist, even made a film on dental hygiene which combined live action and animation to get its didactic message across. Max Fleischer had been using this same combination in his Out of the Inkwell series, and it had the advantage that the live-action sections of the movies were relatively inexpensive to produce. At some time in 1923, Disney decided to try to save his Laugh-o-Grams venture by making just such a movie, in which a human heroine could cavort with cartoon for alternate sources of

called Walt Disney

at

nine months

characters. Rather than simply imitating Fleischer's technique,

Disney

hit

live action

The

on the idea of reversing the basic principle would be introduced into the cartoon.

effect

of blending the

real

Alice

characters was achieved by photographing a

with little

so that the

the girl

cartoon

named

Virginia Davis against a white background and then combining this film,

in

the printing process, with another strip

on which the

animation was shot. The technique worked well, but Alice's

Walt Disney

at the

age of twelve

21

Poster for an Alice

Comedy

with

the original Alice. Virginia Davis

Wonderland exhausted Disney's remaining credit and he was forced to close the studio.

He was

not,

however, the type

to

be put off by a setback of this

and immediately planned to restart his career. In the summer of 1923 Walt Disney, aged twenty-one, took a train to California, carrying Alice 's Wonderland with him as a sample. His brother Roy was already in the West, recuperating in a Veteran's hospital from a kind,

bout with tuberculosis.

On

moved

in

with his uncle

4406 Kingswell Avenue. Walt began

look for a

at

job and,

spare time, used his uncle's garage to build a stand

for the

22

arriving in Los Angeles, Disney

Robert Disney in his

animation camera that he had purchased

(this

to

would have

A

later Alice,

Margie Gay, seen

here with animated friends and with director

Walt Disney

been a conventional movie camera converted

to

shoot stop-ac-

tion).

to be made to accommodate the success made in Hollywood, and one new employee was an Idaho girl named Lillian Bounds. She often worked nights, and Walt would sometimes drive her home in his car. A romance blossomed and, in July, 1925, the pair were married. Roy Disney had meanwhile married Edna Francis, his Kansas City sweet-

Additions

to the staff

new

Alice films

of six

had

heart.

became evident that they had to find a replacement Comedies if the Studio was to remain in a healthy economic state. They were by then approaching their sixtieth episode in the series, and evidently could not keep it going much By

1927,

it

for the Alice

longer.

Apart from anything

else, the

use of live action placed

them and Walt was anxious to get back to full animation. They began work on a new series which was to be based on the adventures of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.

severe restrictions on

Most business

crises are

brought on by incompetence. The near

catastrophe that the Disneys faced in 1927 resulted from the very

The new cartoon series turned out to be very successful, making Oswald the Lucky Rabbit a desirable property. There was just one snag. Disney had signed a one-year contract with Charles Mintz, who had married the distributor of

opposite.

Disney Films, Margaret Winkler,

now

in

1924 (their distribution outlet

tied in with Universal Pictures).

The

advertising

announced

"Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, created by Walt Disney," but-and proved

to

belonged the

first

to

be the

fatal

the

in

contract— Oswald's

Mintz (who had, apparently, picked

year of the series

Disney and

flaw

his wife

moved

embarked

for

it

this

name

out of a hat).

to a successful conclusion,

New York, where

As

Walt

he expected to

23

of cartoons Disney built around Oswald the Lucky Rabbit was successful enough to attract merchandising tie-ins. The model sheet below shows that Oswald anticipated some of the physical characteristics of Mickey Mouse. The page of story continuity sketches, on the right, illustrates how cartoon stories were worked out in this period

The

series

€* &TJ®