Tinker Belles and Evil Queens: The Walt Disney Company From the Inside Out by Sean Griffin Page A
Authors: Sean Griffin
Tags: Gay Studies, Social Science
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feature film and run the short again to appease the crowd.109
Disney animators in the 1940s tried to answer the challenge that Avery and the other animation factories had created by inserting more violence and more sexuality into their work. The influence of these other studios can be seen in the slapstick and violent humor of the 1940s series of Goofy cartoons comically demonstrating different sports ( The M I C K E Y ’ S M O N A S T E RY
41
Art of Skiing [1941], How to Play Football [1944], Hockey Homicide [1945]).
Mickey Mouse’s sweet persona appeared less and less on screen in favor of the angry antics of Donald Duck, who seemed to more suit the challenge posed by Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. It is also more understandable why Disney would have Donald chasing Latin lovelies around in feature films when Avery’s wolf was hooting at Red’s bumps and grinds.
Unfortunately, Disney and his studio’s public relations department had already staked out an image for itself as wholesome and family oriented, and such displays of sexual aggressiveness (although no more suggestive than Mickey in his early period) were not appreciated. Disney could speak overtly of the female body in manifestly pedagogical texts such as The Story of Menstruation, but audiences did not approve of such things in the studio’s theatrical product. The studio eventually learned this lesson, and 1950 saw a full-scale return to the fairy-tale format that audiences wanted from Disney. Cinderella was the biggest animated success the studio had had since Dumbo and gained a sizable profit due to the cutbacks and “cheats” that kept the cost of the production low. (Disney animators admit to using more rotoscoping, or tracing live-action figures, on this film than in any other.)110 Sexual imagery was again submerged into images of patriarchal heterosexual romance—dancing, walking in the moonlight and a chaste kiss in the wedding carriage.111 Throughout the rest of the decade, the studio would continue animating famous children’s tales ( Alice in Wonderland
[1951], Peter Pan [1953], Sleeping Beauty [1959]). In adapting the familiar stories, contemporary concepts of gender and sexuality are conveyed more benignly than in the educational shorts of the 1940s. For example, Alice is made less willful and independent than in the original texts. On the other hand, Disney’s Peter Pan is one of the most masculine versions of the character, a definite attempt to downplay the gender bending that traditionally occurs when actresses play the title role on stage.
Donald Crafton’s analysis of the film points out how the text attempts to teach young children the roles of masculinity and femininity as conceived in postwar America, even linking the pedagogical methods of The Story of Menstruation to Peter Pan. 112 Whether or not the studio consciously used its research for The Story of Menstruation in preparation for Peter Pan, the studio definitely found more financial success by presenting its messages about motherhood under the guise of Barrie’s classic tale than in the more explicit lecturing on “the change of life.”
42
M I C K E Y ’ S M O N A S T E RY
The move into 16 mm educational films turned out to be more
minor than the studio seemed to anticipate, and, after 1951, official production seems to have stopped.113 The profit margin for these films was slim, since schools or libraries would buy one print of the film and then own it outright, often lending out the prints to other schools or institutions. As Carl Nater, head of the Educational Division for twenty years, explained, “Frankly, there was just not enough money to even get the cost [of production] back.”114 Yet, an outgrowth of Disney’s educational productions during the war did result in a lucrative new direction for the studio in the late 1940s. A production made for the CIAA entitled The Amazon Awakens (1944) put the studio in contact with documentary filmmakers. By the end of
Disney animators in the 1940s tried to answer the challenge that Avery and the other animation factories had created by inserting more violence and more sexuality into their work. The influence of these other studios can be seen in the slapstick and violent humor of the 1940s series of Goofy cartoons comically demonstrating different sports ( The M I C K E Y ’ S M O N A S T E RY
41
Art of Skiing [1941], How to Play Football [1944], Hockey Homicide [1945]).
Mickey Mouse’s sweet persona appeared less and less on screen in favor of the angry antics of Donald Duck, who seemed to more suit the challenge posed by Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. It is also more understandable why Disney would have Donald chasing Latin lovelies around in feature films when Avery’s wolf was hooting at Red’s bumps and grinds.
Unfortunately, Disney and his studio’s public relations department had already staked out an image for itself as wholesome and family oriented, and such displays of sexual aggressiveness (although no more suggestive than Mickey in his early period) were not appreciated. Disney could speak overtly of the female body in manifestly pedagogical texts such as The Story of Menstruation, but audiences did not approve of such things in the studio’s theatrical product. The studio eventually learned this lesson, and 1950 saw a full-scale return to the fairy-tale format that audiences wanted from Disney. Cinderella was the biggest animated success the studio had had since Dumbo and gained a sizable profit due to the cutbacks and “cheats” that kept the cost of the production low. (Disney animators admit to using more rotoscoping, or tracing live-action figures, on this film than in any other.)110 Sexual imagery was again submerged into images of patriarchal heterosexual romance—dancing, walking in the moonlight and a chaste kiss in the wedding carriage.111 Throughout the rest of the decade, the studio would continue animating famous children’s tales ( Alice in Wonderland
[1951], Peter Pan [1953], Sleeping Beauty [1959]). In adapting the familiar stories, contemporary concepts of gender and sexuality are conveyed more benignly than in the educational shorts of the 1940s. For example, Alice is made less willful and independent than in the original texts. On the other hand, Disney’s Peter Pan is one of the most masculine versions of the character, a definite attempt to downplay the gender bending that traditionally occurs when actresses play the title role on stage.
Donald Crafton’s analysis of the film points out how the text attempts to teach young children the roles of masculinity and femininity as conceived in postwar America, even linking the pedagogical methods of The Story of Menstruation to Peter Pan. 112 Whether or not the studio consciously used its research for The Story of Menstruation in preparation for Peter Pan, the studio definitely found more financial success by presenting its messages about motherhood under the guise of Barrie’s classic tale than in the more explicit lecturing on “the change of life.”
42
M I C K E Y ’ S M O N A S T E RY
The move into 16 mm educational films turned out to be more
minor than the studio seemed to anticipate, and, after 1951, official production seems to have stopped.113 The profit margin for these films was slim, since schools or libraries would buy one print of the film and then own it outright, often lending out the prints to other schools or institutions. As Carl Nater, head of the Educational Division for twenty years, explained, “Frankly, there was just not enough money to even get the cost [of production] back.”114 Yet, an outgrowth of Disney’s educational productions during the war did result in a lucrative new direction for the studio in the late 1940s. A production made for the CIAA entitled The Amazon Awakens (1944) put the studio in contact with documentary filmmakers. By the end of
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