1956-01-14 — Page 5

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THE CHINA MAIL, SATURDAY, JANUARY 14, 1956.

"Mac

Sergeant says how do you spell this. 'Hogmanay'?"

MICKEY

F

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-(London Express Service).

and

Disney's first productions were "Alice In Cartoonland” and "Oswald the Rabbit." But because he didn't own the copyright on them, he decided to invent a new character, And that is the little fellow on the left perhaps the

famous most

perssonality in the world.

animals any case, In 1952 he launched "Robin Hood." an entirely action" #im. And that "live

marked a sharp turn away from The ensuing Alms, the and including

potted-history no- Roy," brought

wrotu the scripts, drew the in the face. jealous

tucted pictures anci

where green.

wrote and Lillian necessary.

With sound and colour came letters and bundled the finished the "Silly Symphonies" — Dis- products into parcels. The re-ney's first attemot to visualise animation.

came to down sult was an economy of produc- muale. The attempt tion probably never achieved fruition in 1940 with "Fantasia," hackneyed

"Hob sull munce

down the crilics' wrath.

before or since. The early "Alice" pictures cost little over a shilling a foot to produce, against £40 foul for White."

A

production which making money.

19

Disney realised that there "Snow more than Bound

Music almost invariably

MOUSE

to

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It may have been that some #

of the Alms were bad. But the music. evokes

eritics were enraged simply

WAS

BORN IN A TRAIN

ROM Toluen, Dlinois, 1 La Junta, Colorado, the ruil- WHY run straight and flu through the grass. lands that lie between the Industrial Midwest and the Rockies. $1 is I undis- tinguished strelch of rail way; but it may leserve a place in history.

I

For it was in a train between Toluca and Junta that Mickey Mouse was born.

And Mickey is the mouse that made a man, an art, and an industry.

By LES

ARMOUR

for a time and studied the Chicago Academy Fine Arts.

at

of

World War

I look bim To Frutice As an ambulance driver with thy American Experi- tionary Forve He returned to Kansas City at the end of the to war, hired a garage und set work combining his training in art with :1 new interest in photography.

The result was the animated cartoon-one of the first, His productions were

to

Hire

As Oswald progressed, Disney became rich enough artists--and ambitious enough 10 want to experiment. His share of the sale price wasn't big enough to give him

funds

}

for research, so he headed east to New York to try to persuade the distributors to give him

The distributors ex- bigger cul. plained neidly that he didn't even own the copyright "Oswald" and that, so far they were concerned, was that.

Great Demand

дэ

for

Disney cought a train Hollywood alter an acrimonious clear gene in which it became that the distributors would not the

sign a new contract when good enough

current one гол out in six Nor would they months' time. release the copyright on it could seil "Oswald" so he somewhere else.

went bankrunt before

to attract the interest of a dis- It is tru that Disney created Mickey Mouse; but the fem

tributing firm in New York. But

it is just

true that Disney 218

could even pay off his modest Investments. Mickey crented Disney.

Walter Elias Disney was born on December 5, 1901. in Chicago. But his first

eight years were spent on

To Hollywood

He decided to move to Holly-

It was on that train journey back that Disney made the first Mickey Mouse drawings.

That was 1928, and sound had come to the movies. Disney reallsed that he must have his father's undersized farm wood. To raise the cash he

sound to survive. He raced in Missouri. He records, took his movie camera up and perhaps significantly,

the streets of Kansas round Hollywood trying to bcg, that down

unit. City's suburbs

in borrow or buy a sound photographing

He had no luck.

That way

those years were spent hundreds of infants. among "horses, cows, dogs, he made enough to buy tickets rabbits, pigs, cats, ants, to Hollywood' for himself and brother Roy. A kindly skunks, grasshoppers, mice his and other interesting per- uncle lent him another $500. Bons," ile has always be- lleved that the most inter- esting people are animals.

Chose To Draw

Apart

from that his only

was

But he couldn't take the prairies, which rose higher advice: he lacked the train fare. and whiter and brighter by So he and his brother struggled where the day. He got up at 6 a.m. on, eating in cafeterias

Walt would buy some meat some veget-

In the end he set up his own sound studio, and Mickey Mouse was launched with Disney himself as the voice.

Just

An Avalanche

Waltor (Walt) Elias Disney

ho did it.

It was just two years later

SAW Disney's assets were the cartoons he had that a Hollywood producer comimages in its hearers' minds because they managed to salvage from the plained:

"You spend a million indeed, much greater musle has talent going to waste on some- bankrupt firm in New York.

been written expressly to evoke thing any second-rate director on an epic and the public sits ages. "Fantasia" was his at- could have done equally well,

it told through In Hollywood he

sce Mickey to eco the Mo

Mouse." flatly that he had come to

The demand for the tempt to make concrete music's

Actually, Disney was prob- insatiable. When other dimension.

breath. ably just catching bis place: wrong

the distributing mouse whe

followed hima frans, after all, were in Now Disney

wildIt was that, as much as any And making a neat profit while Thereafter, he spent his Yorkt. Producers advised him Donald Duck, Pluto, and Goofy, thing, which Won him the the demand rose from tremen- appinuse of the serious critics youth in Kansas City-the to take the nose train east. dous to unbelievable.

His next serious move WOB and the plaudits of the learned bustling metropolis of the

world. Surprisingly, "Fantasia" the production of his "True The was his first and last serious Life" series, including

Desert" Living

and

The attempt in a new field.

Vanishing Prairie," Perhaps, by then his mind to deliver the morning while Roy bought

Probably no one since the . Almost overnight Disney was taken up with other things. papers, and rushed home ables. For the sake of their

Two years before "Fantasia" Ancient Grocko-who believed they traded half por- passed from a chronic staat of he had produced "Snow White," that matter was wive, anyhow from school in the after- health,

near-bankruptcy to a situation

It has managed to bring nature noon to deliver evening tiona

in which it was sometimes dim- ils first full-length Bim.

cost

Somo £250,000, occupied 870 to life with such forec The hours in be- papers.

achieved First they produced "Alice in cult to count the money as fast

mode who

250,000 of Disney's effect is tween were hours of baffle- Cartoonland," a combination of as it came in. It was Mickey artists

trick-camera by

work. But Motige who livo

started the separate drawings for it."

most of it is the application of ment for both Disney and animated cartoon

actors: Allee began to sell, and avalancha; and Mickey Mouse

Since then, "Snow While on Intultivo understanding (he bid teachers.

within three months Disney was continued for 20 years to be the

of the power. Each now generation of working and purpose of nature. One thought he could rich enough to hire a secretary, principal moving force behind has carned eight times Hs cost. Is no scientist)

Lillian Bounds, who later be the Dimey empire,

children insists on seeing 1. draw. Another thought he came Mrs Disney.

Since then "Davy Crockett" Mickey Mous and Bound might make an actor.

All***

Disney was never very happy came together. Colour followed "Snow White" was followed has appeared The, here in the "Pinocchio" "Ditmbo," coonskinap: has swept the were agreed that he would with the "Alice" series, and after a few years and, Disney's by

"Bambi," and the The spacemen all but out of business after 00 short cartoons he riches multipliext again, Colour Reluctant Dragon all success In America, and seems to be

witched to "Orwald the for Disney was more than de Disney chose to draw, and stabbit..

coration: it became an integral ful, but none quiis so succeful helping Ester Ketauver (who hen the the original "Snow White, adopted the coonkin cap) to spent his evenings taking

His brother... Roy noted na Big Bad Wolf blow On

never make a scholar,

and

part of his stories. When it may have been that Disney Set: elected President of the Tessons from a cartoonist. cameraman, business manager Little Pig's house, his face went saw himself in the grip of a United States

He moved back to Chicago and spare producer, while Wait bire. Byll animals turned black law of diminishing returns, IA

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