Great article! It's fascinating hearing about the conflicts behind the scenes of the Mouse. Wild to me that they were so disinterested in training up the next generation of animators. This fills in a big piece of the puzzle of how Don Bluth's films came to be and what his conflict with Disney was about.
It's honestly somewhat reassuring in a way that it took four years for Bluth and co to put together the skills to make a film, even on a solid background of drawing and animation knowledge. Makes me feel better about how long it's taking me ^^'
Thanks a ton! And absolutely -- four-plus years of Banjo, on top of the failed Piper film, on top of the initial experiments. It was 10 years between the start of the garage work and the release of NIMH, even though Bluth was the golden child of American animation and was learning directly from the masters. This stuff is hard.
As for the disinterest, the '70s were a really strange time for Disney -- it wasn't clear whether the studio could even survive without Walt. There were attempts to train a new generation (Woolie Reitherman was grooming Bluth to be a director), but figuring out how to pass on the team's knowledge was hard. So their efforts were very imperfect.
And yeah, once Bluth left, he and his group were branded as traitors by Disney management. There was a famous meeting afterward where a Disney suit described them as a "cancer" that'd been removed from the company. It seems like that view of Bluth as a Benedict Arnold figure contributed a lot to the long-running feud between him and Disney.
All that said, glad you enjoyed this one, and thanks again for the kind words!
This is a fascinating newsletter! I had no idea Don Bluth's animation career started in his garage. It's inspiring to hear about his dedication and the camaraderie that formed in that space. Thanks for sharing the newsbits too, especially about the unionization efforts and the rescued Soviet cartoons. Looking forward to the next edition!
o. m. g. EVERYTHING about this had me on the edge of my seat. Can we get a prestige drama series about bluth and disney? I would watch that!!! This was an absolutely amazing article and I will be reading it again and again! Thank you!
The Secret of NIMH is a classic. One of my favorite movies. A brilliant piece of work.
It really is a great film. We're hoping to cover it this year, too!
Great article! It's fascinating hearing about the conflicts behind the scenes of the Mouse. Wild to me that they were so disinterested in training up the next generation of animators. This fills in a big piece of the puzzle of how Don Bluth's films came to be and what his conflict with Disney was about.
It's honestly somewhat reassuring in a way that it took four years for Bluth and co to put together the skills to make a film, even on a solid background of drawing and animation knowledge. Makes me feel better about how long it's taking me ^^'
Thanks a ton! And absolutely -- four-plus years of Banjo, on top of the failed Piper film, on top of the initial experiments. It was 10 years between the start of the garage work and the release of NIMH, even though Bluth was the golden child of American animation and was learning directly from the masters. This stuff is hard.
As for the disinterest, the '70s were a really strange time for Disney -- it wasn't clear whether the studio could even survive without Walt. There were attempts to train a new generation (Woolie Reitherman was grooming Bluth to be a director), but figuring out how to pass on the team's knowledge was hard. So their efforts were very imperfect.
And yeah, once Bluth left, he and his group were branded as traitors by Disney management. There was a famous meeting afterward where a Disney suit described them as a "cancer" that'd been removed from the company. It seems like that view of Bluth as a Benedict Arnold figure contributed a lot to the long-running feud between him and Disney.
All that said, glad you enjoyed this one, and thanks again for the kind words!
This is a fascinating newsletter! I had no idea Don Bluth's animation career started in his garage. It's inspiring to hear about his dedication and the camaraderie that formed in that space. Thanks for sharing the newsbits too, especially about the unionization efforts and the rescued Soviet cartoons. Looking forward to the next edition!
Thank you very much! Glad you enjoyed.
o. m. g. EVERYTHING about this had me on the edge of my seat. Can we get a prestige drama series about bluth and disney? I would watch that!!! This was an absolutely amazing article and I will be reading it again and again! Thank you!
Ah, thank you so much! This is really fantastic to hear!
Loved getting to read through this!
Glad you liked it -- thank you!