The Ever Shifting Story
Rhett Wickham reviews the Art Of book for Disney’s upcoming BROTHER BEAR

©The Walt Disney Company

Readers and animation fans rejoice! H. Clark Wakabayashi’s BROTHER BEAR: A Transformation Tale is one of the best books on the creation of an animated feature films since John Canemaker’s The Animated Raggedy Ann and Andy. Wakabayashi may not detail the development of individual performances or give any real insight into the work of character supervisors, but he makes up for it by focusing on something under-addressed (and often totally unaddressed) in other books - the pitfalls and hurdles of story development in animation.

If you want to know anything at all about the struggles of this critical process, then BROTHER BEAR: A Transformation Tale will give you the most insightful accounting that you are likely to find. Break open the piggy bank. Max out the credit card. Take up a collection if you must, but buy this book and read it carefully from cover to cover. (In actuality, it’s very affordable cover-price of $19.95 makes it a bargain. Smartly cloth-bound and sporting a stunning embossed cover complete with lovely art by Richie Chavez - who thankfully escaped DreamWorks to put his talent to work on this film - it would be cheap at twice the price.)

Be very careful, however, to scrutinize everything you read. Wakabayashi has not only drafted a step by step account of what directors, story artists and writers experience in the development of an animated story, he also (I hope unintentionally) given credence to some major figures who have nearly murdered feature animation at Disney. Therein lays the paradox of this otherwise solidly crafted and beautifully designed book (also the work of the author): it manages to say as much if not more in-between the lines than within them. Whether intentional or not, the text gives us a look at how the most dangerous practices of the Schumacher dynasty controlled the division via an atmosphere of fear and patronizing authority. For example, Schumacher (now thankfully departed as President of the division) groomed and grew his Creative Affairs department to epic proportions and built their reputation as his fiercest deputies. The enigmatic Pam Coats, chief of this group (and curiously passed over to replace Schumacher) recounts the break-down in communication between story artists and the directors as follows:

Now there’s something to be proud of, don’t you know! Fear breeds respect, after all. *sigh* Schumacher more than anyone else can’t seem to avoid sounding condescending. Witness how he would like to imagine himself as describe in this passage recounting how the very gifted Aaron Blaise was wavering on the decision to pursue the role of director on this project:

How patently absurd for same executives who wasted millions of dollars on the ill-conceived WILD LIFE and who drilled holes a-plenty into TREASURE PLANET, assuring a leaky launch, to presume themselves as the steady and wise Ward and June Clever of Disney Animation, making plans for the Beaver to go to Harvard. Perhaps without realizing it, the author teeters precariously between objective accounting and fawning, in spite of attempts to portray it all so matter-of-fact. It’s doubtless exactly what some hoped would be the way this Disney Editions tome would tell their tale. Thankfully, in reality, the curtain wasn’t big enough to hide the real gears and levers that were being pulled, at least by Schumacher. Having conveniently escaped almost a year ago, via the proper use of plenty of hot air, let’s hope he really can’t come back since it’s obvious that he doesn’t know how it works.