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Have you seen Toy Story 3 yet? I confess I haven’t. But as I write this article, the movie’s opening date is still nearly a week away, so I’ve got a good excuse. Yet with all the excitement surrounding the movie’s debut, it felt like an appropriate time to take a spin aboard Toy...

Welcome to Las Vegas. Where the 2010 Licensing International Expo is just winding down. Just like last year, before attendees could enter the Mandalay Bay Convention Center , they first had to walk through this gauntlet of colorful banners which trumpeted all of The Walt Disney Company’s key brands and...

First up, Mark K. writes to ask about WDW ’s Night Kingdom / Jungle Trek project: There was considerable talk several years back about a potential 5th park opening but I have heard no mention of it recently. Did the recession and the decision to remake fantasy land doom this project? Dear Mark K. – There...

Let’s start with the obvious question: Is Lee Unkrich concerned that he’s going to be the guy who breaks Pixar’s now-10-pictures-long winning streak? When I got to talk with the director of “ Toy Story 3 ” as part of a roundtable session at Comic-Con last year, Lee admitted that – with each new hit that...

Good God. Are we really already be up to Volume 9 in the “Walt’s People” series? I can recall when Disney Historian Didier Ghez initially proposed these books (which – if I’m remembering correctly – was sometime back during the Pleistocene Epoch) that would collect & then reprint the very best Mouse...

David Kracov remembers the night that he decided to quit working in animation. “A bunch of my friends took me out to Astroburger . And while we were eating, Brad Bird tried to talk me out of quitting. Brad said that he wanted me to come work with him on this new movie he wanted to make. Which was about...

Trina P. wrote in to say: Thanks for sharing those pictures from the Tim Burton exhibition at the MoMA . I’m a huge Burton fan and had wanted to get down to NYC while that exhibit was there, but never found the time. I noticed that you had a lot of pictures from Tim Burton movies that never got made...

By now, I'm sure that you're heard that Glen Keane is no longer the co-director of "Rapunzel." That he and Dean Wellins will be turning the reins over to Byron Howard & Nathan Greno , who were the co-director and head of story on " Bolt " respectively. To be honest, this change couldn't have come...

As far as Universal Studios Hollywood is considered, this was the Summer of the Simpsons. " The Simpsons Ride ," to be exact. Photo by Shelly Smith But now Autumn's on its way. Which typically means that this is the start of the slow season for Southern California's theme parks. A time when you push...

I wonder if you've ever had an experience like this: The other day, I was feeling blue. Alice had just gone home after spending almost the entire summer up here in New Hampshire. And I was missing my daughter something fierce. Which is why I decided that I'd try & cheer myself up by watching...

If you were to ask David A. Price when Pixar Animation Studios first came on his radar, he'd probably tell you about this tech conference that he attended in the late 1980s where the work-in-progress version of "Tin Toy" was shown. "Tinny had just gotten stuck in that box," Price recalled. "And as he...

"Maybe Tuesday will be my good news day ..." -- lyric from "The Man I Love" by George & Ira Gershwin Well, if you worked on the Miramax Films side of the Mouse House, Tuesday definitely was a "good news day." Disney's art house arm snagged Academy Award nominations for four of its most recent releases...

How many of you know the story of the blind men and the elephant ? I bring up this ancient Indian fable because ... Well ... I have to admit that I was highly amused by what happened last Wednesday. When the on-line animation community went completely bananas over those "Bolt" pre-release images . Copyright...

Everyone out there enjoying the day after Thanksgiving? Particularly all of those delicious leftovers that you've got stashed in the fridge? Not me. I mean, sure. I'll get to them eventually. But first ... I have to choke down a rather large portion of crow. By that I mean ... Have you seen the international...