Walt Disney: Hollywood's Dark Prince (?)

[Mr.ToadWildRider]

So I just bought this biography, Walt Disney: Hollywood's Dark Prince, at a book fair last week. I've read about 1/4 of it and the thing is clearly slanted towards attacking Disney and appears to be a hatchet job type piece, but there's been some stuff that's thought provoking and seemingly coroborated through documents. Has anyone else read it/heard anything about it? I was really intrigued because in the Message to the Reader into, the author thanks a number of sources, including Marc Davis. I thought that would mean some really enlightening info coming from Davis that I would put a lot of stock into, but then when I got the book home (paid $1 for it btw) I flipped to the index and Davis is mentioned once in the whole book- flipping to that page it was little more than Davis recalling Disney first hiring him w/ nothing negative associated with it. I kind of felt like the author knew Davis' name would seem to give credibility to his biography and thanked him first in the thank you's even though there was extremely little information, at least only a little attributed to him, in the entire book.

[mindflipper]

Sounds like the author comes from the Kitty Kelly school of biography writers (or to those who love Harry Potter, the Rita Skeeters of the Muggle world). Every person out there is a sinner and a saint, but these writers delight in tearing down the saint and exaggerating the sinner. And the best part is do it on someone who's dead because they can't take you to court (the estate can perhaps, but it is far more difficult to disprove). Oliver Stone did the same thing with Nixon after he died. And I expect in less than 4 months from now we'll start seeing the daming tell-all biography of Elizabeth Taylor hitting the bookshelves. Beware of these kind of biographies and treat them with great skepticism.

[Mr.ToadWildRider]

Well certainly any biography (or autobiography for that matter) will always have some bias to them, either by gilding the lilly/overlooking flaws or alternatively focusing on negatives/exaggerating the significance of negatives. But in either case I would generally venture that some of the material is based on reality. In this book there seem to be documents that indicate Disney was actually working for Hoover to uncover "subversives" (i.e. labor organizers). It's something I'd never heard before. There's a lot of stuff in it though that the author does a very poor job sourcing, such as Walt never actually drawing Mickey Mouse ever, but rather an associate named Ub Iwerks created Mickey and Disney essentially stole him and bought Iwerks out for $200.00 in stock that would now be valued at just shy of $500 million. The two sources he references are Ub Iwerks' son who presumably has no first hand knowledge and a whole lot of motivation for his claim, and a quote Disney gave in reference to a boy asking if he draws Mickey Mouse.

Just wondering if anyone else read it and if so what their thoughts are.

[theBIGyowski]

From what documentaries and books I have seen/read...I thought Walt created Mortimer while riding a train back from (NYC?) after having Oswald stolen from him. Lilian then told Walt to name him Mickey instead of Mortimer...and Walt gave the drawing to Ub to clean up.

So...Walt create him...Ub cleaned him up into the version we saw in Plane Crazy and forward.

[Mr.ToadWildRider]

From what documentaries and books I have seen/read...I thought Walt created Mortimer while riding a train back from (NYC?) after having Oswald stolen from him. Lilian then told Walt to name him Mickey instead of Mortimer...and Walt gave the drawing to Ub to clean up.

So...Walt create him...Ub cleaned him up into the version we saw in Plane Crazy and forward.

Well this book references that and references a quote that Walt provided that seems to imply the "train story" is a nice story he liked to tell but that's not actually what happened. It very well could be the case that the train story (which I know is the one they recount in One Man's Dream) is very accurate but the book implies that Walt was standing behind Ub brainstorming with Ub and it was Ub who actually first drew Mickey. not cleaned him up. I'll have to re-read that section but I got the impression the main source cited was Ub's son which as I said I don't really find that credible necessarily. That's the problem I have with the book though, while some negative stuff about Walt is documented to some extent, some of the real haymakers thrown have little support, or support from less than credible sources (i.e. Ub's son who would be at the very least recounting knowledge 3rd party [hearsay] and have only to gain from the claim).

[Wizzard419]

That wouldn't surprise me, the story helped endear the character more by saying he was the last minute fix and so forth. Do they have the part where he testified before the House Unamerican Activites Comitte?

[Jacca5660]

Sounds like a hack job (IMHO). I'm just guessing that the author used a creative license to write this. I'm curious if the author talked about how Walt would use the the term "WE'D did a great job" referring to his initials. I'm not gonna put a lot of stock in this book. I don't think at this late stage that someone is going to come up with any great revelations about Walt. Let's face it there are a lot of people out there they have looked and would have loved to come up with a book full of WED detraction's!!

[Wizzard419]

Since it's been out for almost 20 years, did the estate file any suit or attempt to supress it's publication/buy every copy (the Pentagon did this last year)?

[mindflipper]

The problem with these kind of biographies is that they cherry-pick which facts they want to use in order to create the "character" and the "story" that they see. Those facts that don't fit don't get used. I wonder if these people write history textbooks for public school system.

[Jacca5660]

The problem with these kind of biographies is that they cherry-pick which facts they want to use in order to create the "character" and the "story" that they see. Those facts that don't fit don't get used. I wonder if these people write history textbooks for public school system.

I don't know?? In Virginia the history books don't have to have facts the fit anything!!

[mindflipper]

Since it's been out for almost 20 years, did the estate file any suit or attempt to supress it's publication/buy every copy (the Pentagon did this last year)?

Without having the person being alive to refute it personally, the lawsuits are harder to win. That's why they wait until the person dies first before publication. "Don't speak ill of the dead" obviously doesn't include print.

[Jacca5660]

Since it's been out for almost 20 years, did the estate file any suit or attempt to supress it's publication/buy every copy (the Pentagon did this last year)?

Without having the person being alive to refute it personally, the lawsuits are harder to win. That's why they wait until the person dies first before publication. "Don't speak ill of the dead" obviously doesn't include print.

Ferengi Rules Of Acquisition 212: Don't speak ill of the dead, unless it's for a profit.

[Wizzard419]

Since it's been out for almost 20 years, did the estate file any suit or attempt to supress it's publication/buy every copy (the Pentagon did this last year)?

Without having the person being alive to refute it personally, the lawsuits are harder to win. That's why they wait until the person dies first before publication. "Don't speak ill of the dead" obviously doesn't include print.

Nah, the estate can (and does) file suit. I really wouldn't be terribly shocked if every word were true though. It isn't like you would stop buying anything even if the company comes out and says "Yeah, Walt would slap on a swastika armband and drive about the studio in a golfcart yelling at everyone". Look at Ford, their founder was a major Anti-semite and was awarded the grand cross of the german eagle by the germans. No one is batting an eye at that. The worst thing Disney, Ford, Mercedes Benz, Porche, Audi, etc. can do is even talk about it.

[theBIGyowski]

My question is...if Walt was racist, sexist, and anti-semitic...why was he so fond of those same people? He had animators and Imagineers who fit into all of those categories that will say he was nothing but a loving and caring boss who was more of an "uncle" than a boss. Was he stern and very demanding? Yes. But to paint him with such a broad brush is terrible.

As the Bible says..."you will know them by their fruits"...and we can see Walt's many fruits today.

[Wizzard419]

Are you going from personal experience or from the Walt you see on tv (token people don't count)? They can be two very different people. Again, doesn't really matter since they don't repeat his views (esp. since he was hard right wing and now the company is considered liberal).