Disney – Page 5 – artdiamondblog.com

Disney Used Money from His Cartoons to Fund the “Audacious” Breakthrough Snow White

(p. C2) The 1920s were no doubt a time much like our own, full of people who could see ways to advance and exploit new technologies, and Disney was one of those. But plenty of people have ideas; only a few manage to make them reality. Like many an Internet entrepreneur, Disney was able to do so because of a combination of serendipity and tenacity. You can read a lot into that sketch of a mouse he came up with.
“He doesn’t have the financial backing to support what it is he’s doing,” Carmenita Higginbotham, an art historian who teaches at the University of Virginia, says of his early career. “He wants to be a bigger voice than he is. And it’s a perfect metaphor, him being this small mouse, this seemingly insignificant figure or individual within this big industry that he wants to break into.”
The parallel to the Internet age is also evident in the speed of his ascension. His “Steamboat Willie” cartoon featuring Mickey Mouse in effect went viral after its premiere at the Colony Theater in New York in 1928, propelled by its innovative merging of image and sound.
That gave him enough credibility and money to try something audacious: “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs,” a project that, we’re told, he outlined to his staff in 1934 by calling a meeting and enacting all the parts himself.
“What Disney was proposing had never been done, never even been tried: a feature-length, story-driven cartoon,” says the narration, read by Oliver Platt. There followed a typical Hollywood story of cost overruns and jeopardized deadlines — the animation technique used required more than 200,000 separate drawings.

For the full review, see:
NEIL GENZLINGER. “The Mind that Built the House of Mouse.” The New York Times (Sat., SEPT. 12, 2015): C1-C2.
(Note: the online version of the review has the date SEPT. 11, 2015, and has the title “Review: PBS’s ‘Walt Disney’ Explores a Complex Legacy.”)
(Note: Genzlinger is reviewing the two part documentary on “Walt Disney” that aired on the “American Experience” series of PBS on Mon., Sept. 7 and Tues., Sept. 8, 2015.)

Workers May Prefer to Have More Workcations than Fewer Vacations

(p. B6) . . . for various reasons, people might choose or need to work from remote destinations, and logging in from the beach may be more relaxing than clocking into the office.
Adds Kenneth Matos, senior director of research at the Families and Work Institute: “Is the workcation detracting from the vacation you were going to have, or is it enabling the vacation you otherwise wouldn’t have had?”
. . .
For Bill Raymond, Disney World proved an ideal workcation destination. In February, Mr. Raymond and his wife flew from their suburban Boston home to Orlando, where they spent a couple of days touring the theme park.
For the next two days, Mr. Raymond, a solutions architect at enterprise search firm Voyager Search, clocked full workdays from the Orlando resort, hunkering down with his laptop and taking sales calls by the pool.
Mr. Raymond even wrote a post on his personal blog with tips on how to be a productive “workcationer” at Disney, pinpointing locations at the resort that offer fewer distractions. (Among his top picks were the pool at the Disney Port Orleans French Quarter resort, which he says wasn’t “overrun with kids being kids.”)
Brian Goldin, Voyager’s chief executive and Mr. Raymond’s boss, was “totally fine” with the arrangement. “The idea of the traditional office environment doesn’t really exist that much,” Mr. Goldin says.
. . .
The working vacation kept Ms. Granzella Larssen, 32 years old, current with her email; she also felt more productive in a tropical setting because she wasn’t being pulled into impromptu meetings. And despite being by the beach, “I felt completely plugged in.”

For the full commentary, see:
RACHEL EMMA SILVERMAN. “This Summer, How About a Workcation?” The Wall Street Journal (Weds., June 24, 2015): B1 & B6.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date June 23, 2015, has the title “This Summer, How About a Workcation?”)

Disneyland Started as a “Nightmare” and “Fiasco”

(p. C12) Sixty years ago, on July 18, 1955, the “Happiest Place on Earth,” better known as Disneyland, opened to the public. But on that day, the former orange grove in Anaheim, Calif., was one of the most miserable places in America. A heat wave caused the park’s new asphalt to stick to people’s shoes. A gas leak forced parts of the site to close, a plumbers strike led to a water shortage, and lax security resulted in dangerous overcrowding.
Reviewing the $17.5 million theme park, a journalist wrote in a local newspaper, “Walt’s dream is a nightmare…a fiasco the like of which I cannot recall in 30 years of show life.”
Undeterred, Walt Disney added ever more attractions and innovations, transforming mass leisure from its violent origins in the ancient world to today’s amusement-park industry, with $12 billion of annual revenue in the U.S.

For the full commentary, see:
AMANDA FOREMAN. “HISTORICALLY SPEAKING; From Gladiators to Mickey Mouse: Disneyland Turns 60.” The Wall Street Journal (Sat., July 18, 2014): C12.
(Note: ellipsis in original.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date July 15, 2015, an has the title “HISTORICALLY SPEAKING; From Gladiators to Mickey Mouse: Disneyland Turns 60.”)

Disneyland “Immersed the Viewer in the Story Itself”

(p. A11) On July 17, 1955, about 28,000 people (roughly half of whom had been sold counterfeit tickets) walked, for the first time, through the gates of Disneyland and into history. To say it didn’t go smoothly would be an understatement: The temperature was 101 degrees (hot, even for Southern California) and difficulties with both the plumbing system and the labor unions made it impossible for anyone to get a drink. Only a handful of the rides and attractions were open at all, and most of those were continually breaking down and closing. Even the animals–the horses and mules in the Wild West attractions–refused to cooperate. That walk may have been historic, but it was made even more difficult by all the asphalt–poured only a few hours earlier–that kept sticking to everyone’s shoes.
. . .
With Disneyland, Walt Disney took the concept of narrative to the extreme: Rather than merely showing the viewer a story, even with the heightened naturalism of sound, color and a combination of cartoon characters and real actors, the theme park actually immersed the viewer in the story itself.
. . .
Walt Disney–who famously said, “Disneyland will never be completed. It will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world”–would be pleased that in the half century since his death, his creation has been constantly tinkered with. Although very little remains of the park that opened in 1955, he would still recognize it, and love it.

For the full commentary, see:
WILL FRIEDWALD. “CULTURAL COMMENTARY; Finding Disneyland; Celebrating 60 Years of Disneyland, a Park that Was ahead of Its Time.” The Wall Street Journal (Sat., July 15, 2015): D5.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date July 14, 2015, and has the title “CULTURAL COMMENTARY; Celebrating 60 Years of Disneyland; In honor of Disneyland’s 60th birthday, a look back at a park that was ahead of its time.”)

Fate of Plays Is Decided by Seven Middle-Aged Critics “Who Hated Mickey Mouse When They Were Kids”

(p. B1) Some playgoers don’t care for theatrical inside baseball, but if, like me, you love to peer through a peephole at the craziness of show folk, you’ll find “Light Up the Sky” hard to resist.
. . .
I especially like this sideswipe at drama critics: “What do I need with the theater–a cockamamie business where you get one roll of the dice from seven middle-aged men on the aisle who hated Mickey Mouse when they were kids.”

For the full review, see:
TERRY TEACHOUT. “‘Why So Serious?” The Wall Street Journal (Fri., MAY 29, 2015): D7.
(Note: the date of the online version of the review is May 27, 2015, and has the title “‘Light Up the Sky’ Review: Why So Serious?”)

Ezra Pound, a Major Literary Figure of the 20th Century, “Loved the Movies of Walt Disney”

(p. C5) “Mussolini asked,” in A. David Moody ‘s retelling, “what was his aim in writing The Cantos, and Pound replied, ‘to put my ideas in order’; and Mussolini said, ‘What do you want to do that for?’ ” When the poet turned from this dismissal to economic policy, which had lately become the central obsession of his life, the dictator was unimpressed by Pound’s list of 18 proposals, alighting particularly on his assertion that “in the Fascist state taxes were no longer necessary”: “Have to think about THAT,” Mussolini said and ended the interview. To the fascist dictator, Pound, by any measure one of the 20th century’s major literary figures, merited hardly more bother than a fly.
. . .
(p. C7) . . . he was not always an elitist. He loved the movies of Walt Disney, . . .

For the full review, see:
DAVID MASON. “The Makers of Modernism; Pound’s generous spirit looms over 20th-century literature, and in the early years his megalomania seemed harmless.” The Wall Street Journal (Sat., Dec. 6, 2014): C5 & C7.
(Note: ellipses added; italics in original.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date Dec. 5, 2014, and has the title “The Tragic Hero of Literary Modernism; Ezra Pound’s generous spirit looms over 20th-century literature, and in the early years his megalomania seemed harmless.” The first part of the title in the print version was intended to cover both the review of the Pound biography and an accompanying review of a biography of the writer and publisher James Laughlin.)

The book under review is:
Moody, A. David. Ezra Pound: Poet: Volume II: The Epic Years. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2014.

Trying to Inspire “Parents to Raise More Walts and Roys”

“A rendering of the Walt Disney Birthplace, a planned private museum in Chicago.” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited below.

(p. C3) LOS ANGELES — The on-again-off-again campaign to turn Walt Disney’s Chicago birthplace into an attraction has taken an unexpected new turn. And two theme park ride designers who mostly work for Disney rivals are at the wheel.
. . .
“We don’t want to disrupt the neighborhood with a big attraction,” Mr. Young said. “But we’re also not interested in just putting a plaque on a house.” Ms. Benadon added: “Our dream is that this house becomes a place that inspires creativity. We want to inspire parents to raise more Walts and Roys.”
The couple have worked on attractions like SeaWorld shows; Madagascar: A Crate Adventure, a water ride at Universal Studios Singapore; and theme parks in China that are seeking to compete with Shanghai Disneyland, which is under construction.
. . .
So far, . . . , they have not contacted the Walt Disney Company. “We wanted to do this ourselves,” Ms. Benadon said.
. . .
But Ms. Benadon and Mr. Young do have one important ally: Roy P. Disney, whose grandfather, Roy O. Disney, and great-uncle, Walt, founded the company. “On behalf of the Disney family,” Mr. Disney said in a statement, “we are so pleased to see Walt Disney’s historic birthplace and family home being restored to its humble origins.”

For the full story, see:
BROOKS BARNES. “A Chance to Step Into Disney’s Childhood.” The New York Times (Weds., December 4, 2013): C3.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date December 3, 2013.)

Diane Disney’s Museum Displays Walt Disney’s “Childlike Sense of Play”

“Walt Disney with his daughters Sharon, left, and Diane in 1941.” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited below.

(p. B16) Diane Disney Miller, Walt Disney’s last surviving child, who . . . co-founded a museum dedicated to the memory of her father as a human being rather than a brand, died on Tuesday [November 19, 2013] in Napa Valley, Calif., where she had a home. She was 79.
. . .
At her death, Mrs. Miller was president of the board of the Walt Disney Family Foundation, whose mission is to ensure that her father, and not just his company, is remembered.
“My kids have literally encountered people who didn’t know that my father was a person,” she told The Times in 2009. “They think he’s just some kind of corporate logo.”
She opened the Walt Disney Family Museum in 2009, financing it through the foundation.
“The Disney Museum is far from being an airbrushed portrait,” Edward Rothstein of The Times wrote in a review of the museum, adding, “The family movies on display show, at the very least, Disney’s childlike sense of play, particularly with his two young daughters.”

For the full obituary, see:
DANIEL E. SLOTNIK. “Diane Disney Miller, 79, Keeper of Walt’s Flame.” The New York Times (Thurs., November 21, 2013): B16.
(Note: ellipses, and bracketed date, added.)
(Note: the online version of the obituary has the date November 20, 2013, and has the title “Diane Disney Miller, 79, Keeper of Walt’s Flame, Dies.” The online version substitutes the word “co-founded” for the word “founded” that appeared in the first paragraph of the print version.)

Walt Disney’s “Job” Was to “Restore Order to the Chaos of Life”

“Emma Thompson and Tom Hanks in “Saving Mr. Banks,” directed by John Lee Hancock.” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited below.

I’m a fan of Disney the entrepreneur and I think that Hanks does a good job of showing that side of Disney. It’s a movie made by the Disney company, but has a darker, more adult-themed, side than most “Disney” movies. It’s not on my all-time-top-10-list. But we enjoyed it, overall. (Paul Giamatti is wonderful.)

(p. C8) “Saving Mr. Banks,” released by Disney, is a movie about the making of a Disney movie (“Mary Poppins”), in which Walt Disney himself (played by Tom Hanks) is a major character. It includes a visit to Disneyland and, if you look closely, a teaser for its companion theme park in Florida (as yet unbuilt, when the story takes place). A large Mickey Mouse plush toy appears from time to time to provide an extra touch of humor and warmth. But it would be unfair to dismiss this picture, directed by John Lee Hancock from a script by Kelly Marcel and Sue Smith, as an exercise in corporate self-promotion. It’s more of a mission statement.
. . .
. . . Walt is less a mogul than a kind and reliable daddy. He dotes on his intellectual properties (the mouse, the park, the picture) as if they were his children. He wants to adapt Mrs. Travers’s novel to keep a promise to his daughters.
. . .
. . . Walt, in a late, decisive conversation, explains that their job as storytellers is to “restore order” to the chaos of life and infuse bleak realities with bright, happy colors.

For the full review, see:
A. O. SCOTT. “An Unbeliever in Disney World.” The New York Times (Fri., December 13, 2013): C8.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date December 12, 2013.)

Real Entrepreneurs Do Not Launch a Startup in Order to Cash In and Move On

The following passage is Steve Jobs speaking, as quoted by Walter Isaacson.
I agree with the part about real entrepreneurs not going public quick in order to cash in. But I disagree that the real entrepreneurs are mainly interested in building a lasting company. I think that often they are mainly interested in getting a project, or a series of projects, done (and done reasonably well). Recall that when Walt Disney couldn’t convince Roy Disney to pursue the Disneyland project, Walt left the main Disney company to pursue the project through a secondary rump Disney company.

(p. 569) I hate it when people call themselves “entrepreneurs” when what they’re really trying to do is launch a startup and then sell or go public, so they can cash in and move on. They’re unwilling to do the work it takes to build a real company, which is the hardest work in business. That’s how you really make a contribution and add to the legacy of those who went before. You build a company that will still stand for something a generation or two from now. That’s what Walt Disney did, and Hewlett and Packard, and the people who built Intel. They created a company to last, not just to make money. That’s what I want Apple to be.

Source:
Isaacson, Walter. Steve Jobs. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011.

“It’s Kind of Fun to Do the Impossible”

(p. 284) “It’s kind of fun to do the impossible,” Walt Disney once said. That was the type of attitude that appealed to Jobs. He admired Disney’s obsession with detail and design, and he felt that there was a natural fit between Pixar and the movie studio that Disney had founded.

Source:
Isaacson, Walter. Steve Jobs. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011.