The Beginning of a Brilliant Career (Book Excerpt)

Animation veteran and CG pioneer Bill Kroyer recalls the early days of his career and a memorable job interview at Disney in 1975.

So, I began my odyssey of visiting every existing animation studio in Los Angeles. The good news was that I met almost everybody in charge of what then was a rather small business community. The bad news was that I was being rejected everywhere.

In the middle of this crusade, it occurred to me that since I was interviewing with everyone else, I might as well go for the top of the mountain. I called the Disney Studio and was quite shocked when they gave me a meeting time.

I wore my best clothes (corduroy pants and a long-sleeve collared shirt), tried to minimize the look of my shoulder-length hair by tying it into a tight ponytail, and headed to Burbank. I can hardly express the thrill of driving my beaten-up Ford van through that main gate on Buena Vista Street. I could not believe I was about to enter the hallowed halls of Disney Animation.

I was directed to the office of the head of recruitment. A very distinguished gray-haired gentleman showed me the brand new recruiting brochure the company was beginning to distribute to art schools. It was a very official and impressive, and seemed serious — until you got to that last phrase: “If you are interested, contact Donald Duckwall.” DONALD DUCKwall!?

But Don was real person, and here he sat, starting the process that Disney had been avoiding for 40 years — recruiting young talent to replace the veteran animators. The word “veteran” doesn’t really do justice to these men. The group included the legendary Nine Old Men, the nine animators that Walt had considered the foundation upon which he built his empire (the nickname came from FDR’s reference to the Supreme Court).

These men started with the company before Snow White, and had animated on every feature film since then. They were geniuses, and had done what was unquestionably some of the greatest work the animated medium would produce. They had remained at their drawing boards for decades because Disney was still the only place that gave an artist the time and resources to do the very best work.

Over the years, production requirements did require the studio to hire some newcomers, but the rumor was that the Old Men were rough on them. Perhaps they didn’t want to train their own replacements.

Remarkably, Don Duckwall took me on a personal walking tour of the animation department. That shows you how few people they were interviewing! It was mostly hallways with framed artwork, but we did visit the suite of Mel Shaw, Disney’s preeminent development artist. A development artist does the first visual exploration on a film. They are free to paint and draw any imagery that they think might work for the story. Mel was drawing small pastel color pictures for a fantasy film that was still years away from production. It was tentatively titled The Black Cauldron.

We ended the tour in the office of Ed Hansen, the Animation Department Manager. Ed handed my “portfolio” (manilla envelope) to his assistant, Joanne, for her to look at. If the idea of a clerical worker, sweet as she might be, acting as the review committee for the world’s greatest animation department seems odd to you, you are not alone. Years later, John Musker, the great director and supreme caricaturist, would memorialize this process by picturing Joanne critically dissecting the portfolio of a bearded, robed Leonardo Da Vinci (“These drawings are just so darn cute … but they’re not what we’re looking for …”).

Walt had died eight years earlier, and the problem with the department was that they did not want to deviate from his legacy. They were terrified of changing anything. That made for an interesting visit, because I was seeing the department exactly as it was when Walt was around. But it did not bode well for future innovation.

Ed showed me some layouts for the film currently in production, The Rescuers. A “layout” is a pencil drawing of the environment. It is the image the animators use to animate over, and it will eventually be turned into a color painting for final photography. This particular layout showed an alley with laundry strung from clotheslines. It was here that I made the comment that sealed my doom.

This looks a lot like the alley in the spaghetti scene in Lady and the Tramp, I said.

In fact, it was probably the very same layout, or a slightly modified copy.

Ed gave me a rather icy look. “We do what we do best,” he replied. In other words, we will continue to do exactly what Walt pre-approved.

Ed handed me my manila envelope. I did not have the necessary artwork for the committee to review. The portfolio must have “life drawings” (sketches of live models) and “quick action sketches” of people and animals in action, to indicate that I understood anatomy applied to motion. He told me to come back when I had those. And with that, Disney joined my list of rejections.

Never having attended art school, or even taken an art class, I was concerned about my ability to assemble the portfolio they were expecting. Besides, it would take time to do that, and I was running out of money. I had run through the list of studios to apply to. Maybe it was time to get back in the van and forget Hollywood.

The next morning I got a phone call from an animation producer named Ray Thursby. “You were in here the other day looking for work. I may have something. Are you interested?”

“Absolutely!” I said.

“Just one question,” said Ray. “How cheap will you work?”

I thought for about one second. “I’ll work for anything,” I said.

“Great,” Ray said. “Come to Spungbuggy tomorrow morning at nine. We’ll pay you four bucks an hour to do in-betweens.”

“GREAT! See you then!” I hung up the phone, elated. “What’s an in-between?” I wondered!

The above piece is an excerpt from Bill Kroyer’s charming new memoir Mr. In-Between: My Life in the Middle of the Animation Revolution (CRC Press, $35.99).

Kroyer has worked as a storyboard artist, animation director and director and CG consultant on numerous animated shorts, titles, TV series and features over the past 45 years, including Disney’s TRON (1982) and FernGully: The Last Rainforest. He is the Director of Digital Arts at Chapman University’s Dodge College of Film and Media Arts. Kroyer is also a Governor of the Short Films and Feature Animation Branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and serves as Co-Chair of the Academy’s Science & Technology Council.

Visit mrinbetween.org for supplemental images, videos, information and to order the book.