I was
re-watching “Waking Sleeping Beauty” the other day, the 2009 documentary about
the Disney renaissance, and heard Peter Schneider proclaim: ‘ever since Walt’s
death, the country has demanded “who is the next Walt Disney, the country
demands a central charismatic figure”’ The answer is a bit of an enigma really,
for despite their being plenty of candidates, there is really no one who
embodies completely what Walt represented, but the good news is that there are
plenty of plausible men who embody, at least part of what Walt Disney stood
for.
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| Walt Disney |
Michael
Eisner seems like a good place to start, seeing as he was chairman of the
company, like Walt was, and was CEO during Peter Schneider’s tenure, Eisner,
despite being a fantastic businessman, isn’t the visionary that Walt Disney
was. During the nineties the Walt Disney Company experienced a period of
unprecedented growth, animation experienced a renaissance, theme parks were
built in Tokyo, Paris, Florida and California, and Disney acquired ESPN and
ABC. Eisner transformed the company from a film studio making movies for
children into a multi-national corporation selling movies, music, merchandise
and amusement parks, Eisner coined the Disney Decade, ten years of
unprecedented growth for the company. Eisner is often unfairly criticized for
the way he ran the company by fans, however I feel we need to start recognizing
his achievements, without Michael Eisner having helmed the company for 15 years
the Walt Disney company wouldn’t be what it is today. Despite Eisner making a
huge success of the company, and the animation department especially, Eisner
wasn’t the visionary that Walt Disney was, he’s a businessman, always watching
the purse strings, and never attempting the unreachable, in this sense he is
the opposite of what Walt was, for Walt often made financial gambles, most of
which fortunately paid off. So Eisner, despite being fantastic for the Walt
Disney Company and a charismatic leader, isn’t the visionary risk taker that
Walt Disney was, and thus is simply not “the next Walt Disney”.
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| Michael Eisner |
The other
possible candidate, from the same era is Jeffrey Katzenberg, despite Katzenberg
being very out-front on the films of the renaissance era, just isn’t a
visionary. While yes, the animation department at Disney was very successful during
his tenure there, it is debatable how much if this is due to him, Jeffrey
Katzenberg subsequently left Disney, and is now running Dreamworks, helping to
turn that animation studio into a true financial success. Despite Dreamworks
Animation Studio being a success financially, they have yet to produce a real
critical, and few of their films have endured the test of time. Only Shrek,
which won the first Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, and which was
subsequently ruined by its numerous disappointing sequels, showed any promise,
and it was downhill from there. Dreamworks mostly produces films that are okay,
without being original or intelligent, and without having any kind of beauty.
What separates Walt Disney from Jeffrey Katzenberg is that Disney took huge
risks, and made films that might not have huge commercial potential, if they
were great art. The most obvious example of this is Fantasia which was a
commercial failure, but a huge critical success, and which has gone on to be
one of the most beloved Disney films. Fantasia is the kind of film which would
never have been green-lit under Jeffrey Katzenberg, as it was too much of a
gamble, Dreamworks have never made an experimental animated movie, and is
highly reliant on sequels to bring in the money. The one way in which Jeffrey
Katzenberg is highly similar to Walt Disney is in behavior and showmanship,
like Walt Disney, Jeffrey Katzenberg was incredibly strong in promoting Disney
movies (and himself), and eh was often found to be taking credit for the most
successful Disney films, even claiming to have come up with the idea for The
Lion King (only after the movie was successful of course, before the films
release he told all the animators that the most successful film of that period
would be Pocahontas, which went on to be the renaissance’s only real flop).
Overall despite being hugely charismatic and incredibly out-front, Jeffrey
Katzenberg isn’t the risk taking, visionary artist that Walt Disney was.
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| Jeffrey Katzenberg |
Current
Disney CEO Robert Iger is a bit of a disappointment really, he’s a bean counter
and a caretaker at best. The Disney company’s animation department is currently
experiencing a revival, but it really isn’t due to Iger at all, it’s due to the
people he hired and the acquisitions he made, Iger oversaw the buying of PIXAR,
Marvel and Star Wars which despite costing the company each in excess of 7
billion dollars, paid off over time. But Iger, like Eisner, is a businessman,
and like all businessmen, Iger refuses to take risks, and will only give if assured of a solid rate of return
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| Bob Iger |
This is not
a post without an answer, and I do have an idea, of who embodies Walt Disney
the most completely. John Lasseter started, during the nineties, a small
computer graphics firm which was then hired by Disney to produce CAPS, a system
for coloring animated films using computer software which was subsequently used
on the film “Rescuers Down Under”. The firm was called “PIXAR”. After Disney’s
acquisition of PIXAR in 2007, John Lasseter was hired as the head of the
animation department of The Walt Disney Studios, and is largely responsible for
the revival Disney animation is experiencing. John Lasseter is nothing short of
a genius, he transformed PIXAR from a small company to an animation powerhouse
producing a string of unprecedented critical and commercial original hits, he
then transformed Walt Disney animation. John Lasseter, despite not being the
charismatic showman that Walt Disney was, transformed animation with the
production of Toy Story. Lasseter took risks at PIXAR, and most of their films are
original stories, similarly at Disney, Lasseter took risks, producing a mixture
of hand drawn and computer animated films, most of which were critical and
commercial successes. John Lasseter, despite not being the showman that Walt
Disney was, is nonetheless the new messiah of animation, a man who seems to
turn to gold all that he touches, and who has revitalized Disney animation a
second time.
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| John Lasseter |
I know that
this post might seem like a bit of an indulgence, and I don’t pretend that any
of this is anything other than opinion and waffle, but I honestly do believe that
John Lasseter is the only person who can possibly carry on the flame left
behind by Walt Disney, a true genius, who revolutionized the field of animation
once again.
“All our dreams can come true if we have the courage to pursue them.” Walt Disney
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