Disney's Dogs Celebrates A Multitude of Animated Canine Companions

As a devotee of both Disney and dogs, I was delighted to discover Disney’s Dogs on a recent library excursion. At nearly 200 pages, this book looks more daunting than it actually is. Apart from a four-page index of illustrations, only seven pages feature any text to speak of. One is an introduction from Roy E. Disney, one is an acknowledgments page at the end of the book and the other five are introductions to each of the five main chapters. You could easily peruse the entirety of the book in less than an hour. However, while its size – 7.25 by 7.25 inches – makes it rather small for a coffee table book, the abundance of cheerful artwork renders it appropriate for prominent public placement.

Disney’s Dogs is essentially just a collection of artwork, from sketches and concept art to full-blown production stills, from Disney shorts and movies featuring dogs. The mix of media makes for more interesting “reading,” as does the fact that along with well-established characters like Pluto and Pongo, the editors sprinkle in more obscure pooches like the St. Bernard from the short Alpine Climbers and Dr. Doppler from the movie Treasure Planet. This is where the index, which lists the characters shown on each page and the movie or short in which they are featured, comes in especially handy.

In the first chapter, Old Dogs, New Tricks, we mostly find Pluto in a variety of scenarios, sometimes alongside characters like sweethearts Fifi and Dinah, pup Pluto Jr. and nemesis Butch. The introduction to this chapter mentions that Pluto appeared on nearly 50 military insignias during World War II, which I’d never heard before. Along with Pluto, we also get to see early Disney dogs like slobbery kitten babysitter Toliver from 1936’s More Kittens and enthusiastic Bowser from 1952’s Man’s Best Friend. Most of the artwork has a fairly rough or sketchy quality to it, with different types of media showing various sides of these furry fellows. My favorite is probably the first piece of artwork in this chapter, a drawing from 1936’s Mother Pluto in which a black-and-white penciled Pluto guards 19 fuzzy yellow chicks.

In Hot Dogs, we move into the movies, zeroing in on 101 Dalmatians, Lady and the Tramp, Oliver and Company and The Fox and the Hound. The artwork in this chapter is generally more involved than in the previous one. We have several full-blown production stills, including one from the spaghetti scene in Lady and the Tramp, widely regarded as one of the most romantic moments in all of film, animated or not. (This scene, incidentally, is one of two that appears later in the form of an 11-page flip book between the fifth chapter and the index. A cool idea, though the pages are too large to make for easy flipping, and there are too few of them to truly create the illusion of movement.) I also love the series of wobbly drawings preceding this still, especially the one in which a wide-eyed Tramp nearly chokes on his spaghetti after receiving an unexpected nuzzle from Lady. The most interesting artwork here, though, is the series of highly stylized paintings featuring Dalmatians Pongo and Perdita setting off across the snowy countryside in search of their pups. Also fascinating is the size comparison sheet showing all of the dogs and Oliver in relation to each other.

Their Bark Is Bigger Than Their Bite deals with dogs who go above and beyond the call of duty, acting in ways that are almost human. Nana, the enormous dog who serves as a nanny to the Darlings in Peter Pan, and Toby, the bloodhound who helps Basil and Dawson crack the case in The Great Mouse Detective, turn up here, with the latter looking especially endearing in a soft drawing that has Basil whispering in his ear. We also see exuberant sheepdog Max from The Little Mermaid and persnickety pug Percy from Pocahontas. This section includes a greater variety of individual dogs than the previous chapter, also featuring supporting canine players from Cinderella, The Aristocats, Mulan, The Sword in the Stone, Robin Hood, Home on the Range and Fantasia 2000.

Off the Leash features dogs who don’t quite fit the mold, whether because, like Goofy, they are basically humans with a few canine features or, like Stitch, they are merely posing as dogs. In this section, you will find the footstool from Beauty and the Beast, the brush-dog from Alice in Wonderland and Slinky Dog from Toy Story, among others. I think my favorite illustration here is the stately portrait of Treasure Planet’s sophisticated Dr. Doppler. In fact, it makes me want to see the movie again.

Speaking of which, the final chapter, the shortest of the bunch, focuses entirely upon Bolt, which had just been released when this book hit shelves. I enjoyed the movie, but it doesn’t seem to make much sense for this one dog to have a chapter all to himself. He’s not that big a deal. I get the idea that the main point of this chapter is to encourage people to go out and see the movie in theaters. Still, it’s a nice little section, and the two-page spread of Bolt, scraggly cat Mittens and hyper hamster Rhino is especially eye-catching.

Scattered throughout the book are quotes, most of them anonymous, about the joys of sharing one’s life with a dog. For instance, I love the anonymous “My goal in life is to be as good a person as my dog already thinks I am” and am amused by the query, “When a dog wags its tail and barks at the same time, how do you know which end to believe?” This is a nice addition for a book with very little text, and those who appreciate dogs enough to want this book will probably find the quotes a nice bonus.

“Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside a dog, it’s too dark to read,” Groucho Marx once quipped. Inside this book, you will find dozens of examples of man’s best friend of the furry variety, so make sure you have plenty of light by which to read. This is an outstanding collection for dog lovers and Disney fans of all ages.

Waking Sleeping Beauty Takes Fans Behind the Scenes of the Disney Renaissance

I grew up during a very exciting time for Disney fans. In second grade, The Little Mermaid hit theaters, and for the next few years, it was just a steady stream of masterpieces. I’ve heard a bit of Disney history here and there but never delved in too deeply behind the scenes, so it was fascinating for me to watch Waking Sleeping Beauty, the documentary that deals with Disney’s Renaissance in the 1980s and 1990s. Directed and narrated by Disney insider Don Hahn, it details some of the circumstances and personalities that came together to create the atmosphere in which Disney’s flagging animation department would suddenly find itself on top of the world again.

The movie focuses a lot of its attention upon Disney power players Roy Disney, Mike Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg, each of whom had an important impact upon the Disney legacy, though their contributions were not always appreciated at the time. For me growing up, Eisner was always the face that I associated most with Disney, aside from Walt himself, who was long gone. The movie even includes a clip of him introducing a featurette about the making of Beauty and the Beast which I remember vividly enough from nearly 20 years ago that I knew exactly what he was going to say next. Of course, Katzenberg and Roy Disney were familiar names too, and it was interesting to see how they interacted with each other and with the crew of animators working with them. Sometimes, it was a bit disheartening as well.

The documentary is filled with archive footage of interviews with people involved in the making of various Disney movies, sketches and storyboards, voice recording sessions, news clips, behind-the-scenes glimpses of the studio, rejected film footage and all kinds of other goodies. One thing we see a lot of is caricatures of the various bosses, usually quite unflattering. There’s a lot of eyes bugging out and mouths spewing fire and that type of thing. Disney may be the most magical place on Earth, but its animation department comes across as a very stressful work environment, with constant pressure from the higher-ups as well as the animators pushing themselves to give 110 percent every day. They often seem frustrated, but at the same time, we get a definite sense of their passion for the work.

Throughout the film, dozens of personalities come into play. We get to know Frank Wells, who came in with Eisner and was credited with being the peacemaker among the bigwigs, keeping all those egos from erupting and poisoning the task at hand. There’s Katzenberg, who was put in charge of Disney’s motion picture division around the time Eisner became CEO, and Don Bluth, who devastated the animation department by walking off with half the artists in 1979. I feel a twinge of guilt for loving Bluth’s movies, especially An American Tail, The Land Before Time and Anastasia, so much, but maybe if he hadn’t taken off when he did, it wouldn’t have paved the way for one of the most exciting eras in Disney’s history.

It’s funny to catch glimpses of not-yet-famous people like Tim Burton, who on a trip through the studio sits morosely at his animation desk, too absorbed in his work to muster a smile for the camera. It’s also neat to see how the media reacted to various developments, and interviews with journalists like Diane Sawyer and a coy Jeopardy reference to a contentious Disney decision are fascinating. For me, though, the most riveting portion of the movie involved lyricist Howard Ashman. I hadn’t realized just how integral he was to the development of the movies he worked on. His enthusiasm was infectious, particularly in the scene in which he describes his vision for the song Under the Sea, and it’s apparent just how deep his love for these stories and characters really was. Watching him pour out his soul into these songs, it occurred to me that when it comes to dream jobs, Disney lyricist would have to be right near the top of my list. Getting into these fantastic characters’ heads with warmth and witty wordplay and crafting moments that would become among the most memorable in the Disney canon? Yeah, that sounds pretty good to me.

Of course, Ashman’s story is also deeply tragic, as he was ravaged by AIDS just a few short years after joining the Disney family, and he never got to see the complete version of his greatest triumph, the Best Picture-nominated Beauty and the Beast. The documentary poignantly discusses the disconnect between the adrenaline rush of receiving a standing ovation in response to the film, which at that point included several stretches with only rough animation, and the cold horror of visiting Ashman in his hospital room afterward and finding him shriveled away to a mere 80 pounds. Beauty and the Beast was a project that Walt Disney himself had wanted to tackle, and it had just never worked out. Even this time around, the first attempt to pin the movie down was a flop, as we see in the strange footage of a scrapped draft that bears no resemblance whatsoever to the finished film. Somehow, though, everyone rallied to create a perfect piece of cinema with gorgeous animation, a heroine Disney is unlikely ever to top and songs that reveal character in an especially brilliant way. The eloquent dedication to Ashman at the conclusion of Beauty and the Beast is a testament to his total immersion in the movie and the respect and affection he garnered from all those who worked on it with him, and the documentary uses the classic’s most heartbreaking scenes to express the communal sorrow at losing this incredible talent.

I knew the basics of how Ashman’s life ended coming into the movie, so while I found the time spent on him especially moving, I knew what was coming. But I never really knew anything about Wells, and I honestly don’t remember a thing about the helicopter crash that cut his life sadly short, effectively ending that golden era of Disney. That’s not to say that Disney – particularly in collaborations with Pixar – hasn’t produced anything worthwhile since then, but after The Lion King, a certain something just wasn’t quite there anymore. It’s sad to learn of all the disharmony at play in this company designed to turn dreams into reality. I am glad that Hahn decided to reveal this chapter of Disney history and introduce us to people like Wells and animator Joe Ranft, who, like Ashman, died very young. The documentary is dedicated to those three, along with Roy Disney, who died after the film was completed but was added to the dedication. So much of what happens at Disney is totally out of the public eye, and it’s nice to get to know some of these people who were so integral to the company’s success.

The movie runs about an hour and a half in length, and if you watch all the special features, that’s gotta be close to another hour and a half. I was especially interested in the featurette about the making of the documentary and the tours of the animation department in three different years, with lots of peeks at a zany, highly creative crew that seemed to have a lot of bitterness bubbling under the surface.

The best bit, though, was the series of deleted scenes, most of which primarily involved Ashman. It was moving to hear the others talk about the pain of losing him and of cutting his intensely personal Proud of Your Boy from Aladdin and neat to watch him coach Jodi Benson on how to properly convey the emotion of Part of Your World (which, astonishingly, was nearly cut from The Little Mermaid after the sequence failed to connect with children for whom it was screened). But this aspiring lyricist (who signed up every year in high school for a History of Musical Theater class that was always cancelled due to lack of interest) was most fascinated by the 12-minute-long clip of his lecture on the role of music in movies and the correlation between Broadway and animated musicals. Totally absorbing.

Different people will no doubt be drawn to different aspects of this documentary. For me, it was Ashman who most captured my imagination, but I loved getting to see all of those little tidbits from within the Disney vaults and hearing these insiders reminisce about such an exhilarating time. If you find Disney as irresistible as I do, you might want to have a look at Waking Sleeping Beauty yourself.