Tomorrow morning, all eyes will be on Gobbler’s Knob. To see if Punxsutawney Phil, the world’s most famous groundhog, actually sees his shadow when he emerges from his burrow. Thereby determining whether or not we’re in for another six weeks of winter.
Now what’s kind of funny about all this is that — this year — Burbank has its own unique variation on this February 2nd tradition. Though, in this case, it involves Sharon Morrill (I.E. The president of DisneyToon Studios) sticking her head out of the Frank G. Wells building. To see if John Lasseter & Ed Catmull will then allow Disney’s video premiere operation to remain in business for another year or two.
Photo by Nancy Stadler
Certainly the signs right now don’t look all that promising. After all, Lasseter is the guy who just shut down production of “Toy Story III.” And Steve Jobs (I.E. Now the Walt Disney Company’s largest individual shareholder as well as being the man who’s said to be the leading candidate to replace George Mitchell as Chairman of the corporation) was quoted in February of 2004 as saying:
“We feel sick about Disney doing sequels … If you look at the quality of their sequels, such as ‘Lion King 1’ and (the Peter Pan sequel ‘Return to Neverland’), it’s pretty embarrassing.”
Of course, what’s really not helping Sharon’s situation here is that it’s a number of years since DisneyToon Studios last rolled out a genuine smash hit. Oh, sure. There was “Lion King 1 1/2” back in 2004. Which earned over $141 million once you combine both this video premiere’s VHS & DVD sales. But — since that sequel hit store shelves nearly two years ago — this division of Disney Feature Animation hasn’t really served up any new home runs. Only doubles (“Mulan II,” $61 million), singles (“Tarzan II,” $47.1 million) and bunts (“Kronk’s New Groove,” $24.2 million).
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Mind you, if you were to talk to the folks over at DisneyToon about this, they’ll tell you that there are a number of factors that have been contributing to the steadily slumping sales of Disney’s video premieres. These factors include that the DVD market is now severely glutted. That there are far too many titles out there right now for consumers to chose from and not nearly enough shelf space to display all these DVDs on. Then there are the big boxes’ aggressive new stocking policies, which make it incredibly difficult for a title to develop legs anymore. To sell a significant number of additional units after those first two weeks on an endcap.
But — were you to go off the record with these very same people — these DisneyToon employees would then start singing a very different tune. They’d admit that their most recent video premieres haven’t been selling all that well because … Well, to be honest, the Walt Disney Company has been producing sequels to films that weren’t all that popular to begin with.
As one DisneyToon insider told me just the other day:
“Back when we were making sequels to ‘The Little Mermaid’ and ‘Aladdin,’ the money just rolled in. But that was because we were producing follow-ups to films that people really enjoyed, featuring characters that consumers genuinely cared about. That’s why so many of those video premieres sold in huge numbers back then.
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But we’ve been producing video premieres for nearly 12 years now. And consumers no longer consider our sequels to be all that special anymore.
What’s worse is that we’re running out of things to sequelize. Which is why we’re reduced to producing follow-ups to films like ‘Fox and the Hound’ and ‘Brother Bear,” or just making sequels to earlier sequels. Like “Little Mermaid III” or “Cinderella III.”
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That’s why we’ve pinning our hopes on this new ‘Tinkerbell’ project. To see if an all-CG Disney video premiere might be special enough to stop the slide, drive up Disney’s DVD sales numbers back up again.”
Mind you, “The Tinkerbell Movie” (Which — FYI — is supposed to be the first of four video premieres built around the “Disney Fairies” product line) and “Cinderella III” aren’t due to hit store shelves ’til sometime in 2007. In the meantime, Ms. Morrill needs to put together a bold new battle plan for DisneyToon Studios. One that will allow the company’s video premiere operation to fit into John Lasseter’s new (Disney) world view. Which (in a nutshell) states that — from here on — the Mouse will make no more mediocre movies and/or theme park attractions.
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Which is why I’d now like to offer a suggestion to Sharon that she consider returning to DisneyToon’s original battle plan. Which called for what-was-then-known as Walt Disney Television Animation to — in addition to cranking out direct-to-video sequels like “The Return of Jafar” and “Lady & the Tramp II: Scamp’s Adventure” — to also produce original films.
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Now I know that may sound somewhat strange. But you have to understand that this was actually part of WDTA’s original business plan. ‘Way back in 1996, I recall seeing some internal documents from Mattel that talked up two rather unusual video premiere titles that Disney then had in active development: An animated version of “Beowulf” as well as a cartoon version of “Frankenstein.”
Now producing an animated version of “Beowulf” isn’t really an option anymore. Given that Robert Zemeckis is already hard at work on his own CG version of this epic Old English poem. This Sony Pictures release (which will make use of the same performance capture system that Zemeckis used on “The Polar Express” and the forthcoming “Monster House“) will hit theaters sometime in 2007.
And as for an animated “Frankenstein” … Well, while there were rumors back in the late 1990s that Universal was working with ILM to use computer animation to resurrect this classic movie monster as he originally appeared back in the 1930s (You know? Back when Boris Karloff used to play this role?). But that rather ambitious project was suddenly shelved so that Stephen Sommers would then be free to use Frankenstein’s monster in his $160 million mis-fire, “Van Helsing.” So — currently — the idea of doing a new animated film that’s based on Mary Shelley ‘s classic story seems to be up for grabs again.
So if Ms. Morrill wants to truly impress Feature Animation’s new Big Cheese (and possibly prolong her own employment as well as provide job security for the rest of her DisneyToon team), she might want to consider doing something really risky right about now. Like maybe proposing that — in addition to completing all of those video premieres that are already in DT’s production pipeline — that DisneyToon tackle something like this long-forgotten Frankenstein project.
I mean, what’s the worst that could happen? Given that Lasseter is already rumored to be looking for ways to wean the Walt Disney Company off of its far-too-many-unnecessary-sequels habit. Which — to John’s way of thinking — have seriously diluted the value of the Disney brand. Making the studio’s new animated features seem a whole less special to modern movie-goers.
So if Sharon were to suggest that DisneyToon produce a picture that’s not a sequel, something that’s kind of an out-of-left-field choice for her studio … Well, that might just be enough to get Lasseter to back off for a while. Give Disney’s video premiere operation a little more breathing space. Keep that studio off the chopping block for at least a few more months anyway …
Well, that’s my take on the situation. But what do you folks think? Would you actually buy a DisneyToon video premiere that wasn’t a sequel to a previously existing property? Or do you think it’s wiser that Ms. Morrill and her team stick with the more tried & true stuff?
Your thoughts?
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