As I said before. Bill Peet is nothing short of the most amazing story guy to ever live.
The
interview that I found and have been going over some of the quotes, is
a fun read. As I said, it shows a guy that loved what he did, And didn't care what people thought about him. Which is refreshing as all git out. A very far cry from the 'clickiness' of today's
animation crowd. But what the interview also showed was the foundations
of what I call the 'animation civil war'. Its a resentment, sometimes
loud, sometimes quiet. But definitely present- between the story departments and the animation departments.
For those of you who aren't in the animation industry, the resentment felt is from 'story' people who don't
feel as if they get enough credit for the films. The feel as if the
glory goes primarily to the animators. And well...their right.
Much of the glory and credit DOES go to the animators. BUT...there is also a down side to this. If a film does absolutely awful,
the first thing to get the blame IS the fact that its...ANIMATED. Not
that its the same mediocre story done by the same mindless drones for
the past 15 years. So while they get little CREDIT, they also get very
little BLAME. Therefore very little consequence as well. Which is in
the end...just not good for thisart form called...Animation.
But Handel. All of this is exxxxxtreeeeeeemelly interesting and I'm utterly RIVETED, but what prey tell does this have to do with Billy (ponchito) Peet? Well drop your trousers, pull up your socks and read on lil punkins.
PEET WHEN ASKED ABOUT THE AMAZING ANIMATOR, BILL TYTLA
"People were always amazed at Bill Tytla,
that he could draw the giant devil for "Night On Bald Mountain," and
the giant in "Brave Little Tailor;" these ponderous, muscled
characters, and then do this little elephant. After he got his first
scene on Dumbo, he passed me in the hall and said, "Y'know, Bill, I can't draw these goddamned little elephants. If I send Nick [his assistant] up with the scene, would you see if you could work it out?
...
Nick brought up this stack of drawings, Bill's scene where the
elephants first appear was just a mess. So I went over every one of
them, probably a couple of hundred drawings, every damned frame in the
picture, and redrew the whole scene. They shot the pencil test and
showed it to Walt. He was ecstatic! Nick came up and told me, "Walt
loved that thing, and I want to shake your hand!" Well, Bill never
bothered to thank me, Walt either."
I entered the quote in its entirety, because I thought that it was important to do so, to get the full 'feel' of his mindset.
first of all, Let me see if I have this straight. Bill Tytla, one of the all time greatest animators COULDN'T draw an elephant. Yeah...I'm a'buying that. So Bill Peet, a really really great story guy went over the drawings. "redrew" the entire scene.
Let me tell ya, if a story guy (unless it was someone like Ed Gombert or Glen Keane that IS ALSO an animator) went over ANY scene that I did, I would have to put a blackwing
pencil right through his left temple. Its not just a matter of drawing
'A' DRAWING. First off, the drawings have to RELATE to one another. In
some scenes, the slightest little tweak can ruin an entire 'FEEL' of
the scene. PLUS the drawings have to also LOOK good. Now I know thatPeet is a wonderful artist. But the art and draughtsmanship for a good finished ANIMATED scene is much MUCH different for a finished board. So..I don't buy that Peet "REDREW" the entire scene. And the reason Tytla never thanked you Mr. Peet, was simply because....It never happened.
PEET ON FREDDIE MOORE:
INTERVIEWER: " Fred Moore is often
described as the boy genius of the studio."
PEET:
"There's nobody that good. He was a great Mickey Mouse artist. Freddy
just couldn't draw a mouse that didn't look like Mickey. It was so
ingrained in him after drawing just thousands of them. The nose was too
round, so I went over Freddy's things including the storyboards. Freddy
did a fine animation job on it, but I refined his drawings so they
looked like Timothy. That was the last thing he ever did and it turned
out to be one of his best jobs."
Again...sounds pretty silly. As if each drawing is supposed to stand on its own in animation. That's the way it is in illustration. That's the way it is with boards. That's NOT the way it is in A N I M A T I O N.
OOOOH if only Bill Tytla and Freddie Moore knew how to draw. If only...indeed.
INTERVIEWER: "What kind of relationship
did you have with the "Nine Old Men"?
PEET:"That name has always bugged me because it gives people the idea that
there were only nine animators and that they did everything. There sure
weren't nine oldstory men because it's the most precarious job in the
business. When I left the studio, I was the only one left from the
story department from Pinocchio.
Yet the Nine Old Men were
there the entire time and they could do no wrong. They knew Walt wasn't
going to fire them because of some piece of animation that didn't work.
But astory man was only as good as his last story. Walt always figured he could get a story man
, but he respected the animators and didn't want to mess with them. He
figured they were the special talents. They had been there the longest,
but that didn't mean they were great. There were two or three that were
pretty mediocre, but they carried the load on the features. Thestory men
aren't given any credit or seen as being important in any of the Disney
books. They never gave me any credit for any of my work on The Jungle
Book."
Again, I thought that the entire paragraph should be quoted. Remember what I said at the beginning of this post. About the 'animation civil war'.
The
"story man was only as good as
his last story"? Well.....Duh! One has to go back and look
at the history of the Great Disney classics. Yes we love them and they
are truly incredible works. But if the audience for WHATEVER reason isn't embracing the story and ISN'T going to the shows...What else is the boss of a studio to think? I mean really! It isn't
the ANIMATION that is flawed. Ironically, its the animation that drew
the audiences into the theater.They (the audience)would cast aside anything and all
things NOT Disney in the 90's and early 2000's, KEEP going back to the
Disney feature only to leaveEXTREMELY disappointed . And return in
fewer and fewer numbers. Until Animation just about went under. We are
STILL at a low point because of that. But I do digress.
"They were there the longest and could do no wrong..."
This is another thing that underlines why I think that hes full of poo when he says that he 'redrew' Tytla's and Moores scenes. He has NO idea about what it is that these 'Nine Old Men' actually DID for animation the art form. The very "PRINCIPALS OF ANIMATION" that are always in the back of our minds.
Obviously they weren't
the ONLY animators. But, boy were they THE nine kings of animation. And
when we as animators of today, with all of our technology and all of
our youth and energy, can still not produce anything that even comes
close to a Kahl or Thomas or Johnston quality and STILL study those scenes...well.....thats saying something about those Nine Old Men.
""They had been there the longest, but
that didn't mean they were great. There were two or three that were
pretty mediocre,..""
Who? WHICH of the nine was
mediocre? MEDIOCRE? Wow....In what way? I assume that he's talking
about the animation because for any story guy to criticize draughtsmanship would be downright HILARIOUS. So which of the Nine old Men's animation was 'mediocre'.
I'll let you the audience ponder this question. And reel at both the absurdity AND the stupidity of it.
Forward....
INTERVIEWER:
"Marc Davis has personally
described you to me as the best story man in the business."
PEET:
"Well, that's OK, but I wish he would tell someone else. All the
publicity went to those people. The biggest problem for me was that I
was so creative, and other people would grab hold of my stuff. When
Illusion of Life came out, I called Ollie [Johnston] and gave him hell.
I told him it seems strange to me that he never mentioned that there's
astory man and a creative end to this thing.
The public
probably thinks the animators sits down and starts doing it from
scratch. I did storyboards, thousands of them, and character design; I
would direct the voice recordings.
Then guys like Marc Davis, Ken Anderson7 and Woolie Reitherman would take credit for my Cruella deVille
and all of the personalities. Those personalities were delineated in
drawings, and believe me - I can draw them as well or better than any
of them.
HILARIOUS!! 'Marc Davis says your the greatest story guy ever!' and Peet says "I draw better than him"??
Too funny. Sorry Mr Peet. I've seen your boards for Cruella. You draw great boards. But you do not draw better than Marc Davis. Not even close.
For Peet to get angry at Ollie Johnston
about the title "Illusion Of Life" is a bit on the petty side. Its a
book about ANIMATION. The animated character, and moving him to a point
where you believe its a real being. Written by TWO ANIMATORS!!! You
want a book about story guys? WRITE ONE.
Truly, I would love to see it. WRITE ONE.
Unfortunately Peet
passed away a few years back. And did NOT write a book about story and
story guys, apparently content to merely bitch about it instead.
There was more, but that's pretty much the gist of it. Look....again, I can understand that there are sooo many good people in animation, that don't get the acknowledgment that they deserve. Way more so in Peets day than now. But to let it drive you to the point of ego craziness is just sad. It is great though that he left to do children's
books. A place where he could be the Walt Disney of his own world. He
truly is one of the legends. And the animation world has greatly benefited for having him.
BILL PEET. Thanks for the story's.
The link to the interview:
http://cagle.msnbc.com/hogan/interviews/peet.asp
