Disney Renaissance Month - Pre-Renaissance Era: What Led to the Disney Renaissance?

        Hey guys, Chuck here, and it's February, which means it's finally Disney Renaissance Month. All throughout this month, we're talking about the legendary era known as the Disney Renaissance. An era in which Disney put out a string of box office hits from their Feature Animation Department, which we know today as Walt Disney Animation Studios. But what led to that? How did Disney get to that point? Well, to kick off Disney Renaissance Month, we'll be diving in to the series of events, from box office struggles to corporate shakeups within the Walt Disney Company, and see just how a major reorganization of Disney led to a phenomenal age of Disney Animated Feature Films. 

         Okay, so obviously the Disney Studio got its start with several animated shorts known as Silly Symphonies, which featured such characters as Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy, and so forth. As time went on, Walt Disney decided to make feature length movies that were completely animated, such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Dumbo, Cinderella, Peter Pan, Sleeping Beauty, and One Hundred and One Dalmatians. Unfortunately, Walt Disney would pass away shortly after completing production on The Jungle Book. Walt's older brother and studio President, Roy O. Disney, also passed away shortly after Walt. Without its core leadership, and its creative voice, the Disney company was in turmoil. 

            Under the predominantly disastrous leadership of Donn Tatum, Card Walker, and Ron Miller, Disney's animated features were less than stellar. Although some films like Robin Hood, The Rescuers, and The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh were decent enough, the movies put out during this time just weren't pulling the box office returns the studio needed. Further damage was done when, during production on The Fox and the Hound, longtime studio animator Don Bluth left Disney, and he took several animators with him. This blow to the animation department delayed production on The Fox and the Hound greatly. In addition, a string of new talent in the animation department, including named like John Lasseter, Tim Burton, Ron Clements, Henry Selick, and so forth were all seeking to cut their teeth in the animated department, but to not much avail. 

       It was during the '80s where Disney really faced serious animation competition, as well as their first major animated bomb with The Black Cauldron. Around this time, Don Bluth had set up his own animation studio, and he produces The Secret of Nimh, a film previously rejected at his time at Disney for being too frightening for children. But an animation deal with Universal and Amblin Entertainment sent Bluth into the stratosphere with such animated hits as An American Tale and The Land Before Time. 

      Back at Disney, the disastrous leadership of Tatum, Walker, and Miller led a major shareholder to make a play to remove all three men from their positions of power. Roy E. Disney, son of Roy O. Disney and nephew of Walt Disney, was a major shareholder and held major sway in the studio. After narrowly surviving a hostile takeover attempt by Saul Steiner, who planned to break apart assets of the Disney company and sell them to other buyers, Roy E. Disney launched the first ever "Save Disney" campaign to install new leadership at the top of the Disney company. He suggested that it would benefit the company to look at outside figures to take on the major leadership positions. 

       Enter Michael Eisner. Any Disney fan who grew up in either the '80s or the '90s will remember his name. Michael Eisner had been a high-level studio executive at Paramount Pictures before assuming the CEO position at Disney. Under his leadership, Paramount released such iconic films as Grease, Saturday Night Fever, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and of course the Star Trek movies. Joining him in making the leap from Paramount to Disney was Jeffrey Katzenberg, who would be put in charge of the Disney film studio. Alongside of Eisner and Katzenberg was Frank Wells, a former Warner Bros. executive, who would be named President of the Disney company. This trio of Eisner, Wells, and Katzenberg would start a series of moves to return the company to profitability. One of the first major decisions was to relaunch the previously successful Disney Sunday Movie, later rebranded as The Wonderful World of Disney, with Eisner himself as host. Eisner was definitely the right man to host, as it showed that Disney was no longer being run by the ghost of Walt. There was a real face in charge of the company, and Eisner was that face. 

        On top of that, Katzenberg really went to town as head of the studio by turning several failing assets around. One such asset, Touchstone Pictures, saw significant turnaround under Katzenberg's guidance, and would release such memorable classics as Splash, and of course Good Morning Vietnam. Even Disney Feature Animation would get some significant improvements with such films as The Great Mouse Detective and Oliver and Company, the latter of which was a passion project from Eisner and Katzenberg's time at Paramount. 

        And, let's not forget about the Disney Parks, either, with such iconic additions as a series of rides and attractions based on licensed franchises as The Muppets, Indiana Jones, and Star Wars. Yeah, the iconic attraction Star Tours was made possible because of Michael Eisner. And the expansion of various Disney parks overseas as well. Yeah, all of it was thanks to Eisner and Wells as a power duo overseeing Disney into a new golden age. 

       Another major field that Michael Eisner got Disney into was the home video market. You see, before Eisner, Disney would re-release their classic animated films theatrically every handful of years. However, that model was costly, and didn't yield much in terms of revenue due to the box office numbers being divided between the Cineplexes and the studios. However, Eisner pointed out that with home video releases, they could charge a set amount per movie on videotape, have it be a limited run through a program called the Disney Vault, and pull the movies from store shelves after that time has expired. This would increase profits on classic movies, and Disney could get a majority of the profit. Now, prior to the launch of Disney+, this was a practice that continued for years, including re-release like the "Gold Classic" Collection, the "Platinum" Collection, the "Diamond" Collection, and most recently the "Walt Disney Signature" Collection. And with each new format came a chance to re-release the classics with an updated look, including full HD restoration. But again, it all started with Michael Eisner. 

         But the biggest hit of this transitional time was Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Now, I talked about that movie in length back on Monday, so I won't go too into detail on it here. But, needless to say that it was the spark that the animation team needed as, well, let's just say what came next would shoot the Disney Animation studio into maximum overdrive. 

        Now, we'll talk about that on Friday when, as the first film review of Disney Renaissance Month, we take a look at the animated classic The Little Mermaid.