Walt Disney Interview: Behind the Magic and the Visionary's Legacy!

He was an American entrepreneur, cartoonist, animator, pioneer, and visionary. He is widely regarded as a cultural icon. He's also a Hollywood business mogul. He's Walt Disney, and here are his top 10 rules for success.

On this program, a bit of magic. That's what the show is all about. You know, when I arrive at the studio in the morning, My desk is always nice and neat, but it doesn't take long for it to look like this. However, instead of bothering my busy secretaries with housecleaning problems, I tidy up myself. It's really quite easy. Watch. Now, here we go. A one, a two. That's it. One. Scripts, come on, get over there. Get over there where you belong. Correspondence, neat. Make a neat pile there. That's it. Pencils, come on. That's it. Now come on, paper clips, come on, get up. Saturday nights we would be in my grandmother's living room and there would come Walt Disney on the screen. It was something that you could share with everyone and it always gave you joy. The first thing I did when I got a little money to experiment, I put all my artists back in school. We, uh, the art schools that existed then didn't quite have enough for what we needed, so we set up our own art school. Well, you were inventing a new art anyway. Well, yes, but we were just going a little bit beyond what they were getting in the art school where they work with the static figure. Now we were dealing in motion, movement, and the flow of movement, the flow of things, you know, action, reaction, all of that. So we had to set up our own school, and out of that school have come the artists that now make up my staff here, and more than that, the artists that make up all the Most all of the cartoon outfits in Hollywood were directly or indirectly out of my school. I'm doing, I think, as much animated cartoon as I've ever done. The only thing is I diversified. I developed a lot of talent over the years and I couldn't use all of this talent for the cartoon, so I went into the nature films. And then just for the fun of it, we went in doing films with humans. And oh, it's just diversifying, you know, breaks the monotony of things. Welcome to a little bit of Florida here in California. This is where the early planning is taking place for our so-called, uh, Disney World project. Now, the purpose of this film is to bring you up to date about some of the plans for Disney World. But before I go into any of the details, I want to say just a word about the site of our Florida project. As you can see on this map, we have a perfect location in Florida, almost in the very center of the state. In fact, we selected this site because it's so easy for tourists and Florida residents to get here by automobile. Now, in larger scale on this map, our Florida land is located partly in Orange County and Osceola County, between the cities of Orlando and Kissimmee. And the important thing is that the Disney World is located just a few miles from the crossing point of Interstate 4 and Sunshine State Parkway, Florida's major highways carrying motorists east and west and north and south through the center of the state. The sketches and plans you will see today are simply a starting point, our first overall thinking about Disney World. Everything in this room may change time and time again as we move ahead, but the basic philosophy of what we're planning for Disney World is going to remain very much as it is right now. We know what our goals are. We know what we hope to accomplish. And believe me, it's the most exciting and challenging assignment we've ever tackled at Walt Disney Productions. The old saying, "These are the things that dreams are made of," might well apply to these scale models and the drawings and the Blueprints. At least when we dream up new ideas for Disneyland, they first take shape and form in such preliminary studies as this. Here at the studio, we get many letters from art students and from people who are just interested in art. Some of these letters ask questions that deserve a more detailed answer than could be given in a written reply, and so from time to time We're going to devote an entire program to answering a few of these questions. Mother! In our feature production of Bambi, the characters were developed by drawing from life. Our artists made thousands of action sketches, catching every pose and characteristic attitude. In the production of Lady and the Tramp, this technique of humanized animal characters reaches a point of near perfection. We first tried this approach to humanized animal animation in one of our early Silly Symphonies. For this project, we brought some kittens into the studio and let them play and roam about as they pleased while the artists made sketches and collected ideas for the kitten story. Meow! The result of this experiment was the Academy Award winner of the year 1935, The Three Orphan Kittens. EPCOT will take its cue from the new ideas and new technologies that are now emerging from the creative centers of American industry. It will be a community of tomorrow that will never be completed, but will always be introducing and testing and demonstrating new materials and new systems. And EPCOT will always be a showcase to the world for the ingenuity and imagination of American free enterprise. I don't believe there's a challenge anywhere in the world that's more important to people everywhere than finding solutions to the problems of our cities. But where do we begin? How do we start answering this great challenge? Well, we're convinced we must start with the public need. And the need is not just for curing the old ills of old cities. We think the need is for starting from scratch on virgin land and building a special kind of new community. So that's what EPCOT is: an experimental prototype community that will always be in a state of becoming. It will never cease to be a living blueprint of the future where people actually live a life they can't find anywhere else in the world. Well, it came about when my daughters were very young, and Saturday was always Daddy's Day with the two daughters. So we'd start out and try to go someplace with, you know, different things, and I would take them to the merry ground, and I took them different places. And as I'd sit there while they rode the merry ground, did all these things, sit on a bench, you know, eating peanuts. I felt that there should be something built, some kind of an amusement enterprise built where that the parents and the children could have fun together. In Tomorrowland, a monorail which started operations only 2 years ago has already outgrown its original circuit. Its new extension leaves the Tomorrowland area of the park to parallel a modern freeway. Along this stretch, the monorail's passengers can experience a practical application of transportation of the future. Appropriately called a highway in the sky, the new Disneyland monorail system covers 2.5 miles. Not only is the monorail system an entertainment attraction, but its new extension links the park with the Disneyland Hotel. It is not impractical to believe that such a monorail system could well be the answer to the growing traffic congestion in our cities. Well, I guess you could call it daydreaming, but that's the way Disneyland was conceived— a dream that grew into a reality. Well, I like them, but, uh, let's don't forget That darn cat. The title of the picture is the important thing. We gotta punch it.

Yeah?

Mr. Jack Benny is here to see you. Jack Benny? Send him in. Wonder what he wants. Well, I thought he was still mad at you for not using him in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Oh, I finally got through to him it was a cartoon.

Oh, Jack. Hi, Walt.

Good to see you.

Thank you.

Thank you. This is a real pleasant surprise, you know. You don't come around here very often. No.

What a beautiful studio you have here in this office and everything.

Well, I think after Mary Poppins, I can afford a redo.

Sit down.

Sit down.

Sit down.

Sit down. Esmeralda, be quiet. Okay, Walt. Everybody around here calls me Walt.

I know.

Jack, what's on your mind?

Well, Walt, you see, tomorrow I'm doing an hour television show with a large cast and crew, and I thought that instead of taking them to dinner after the show at the Bistro or Chasen's, that just for a change, I thought it'd be kind of nice if I took them through Disneyland. That is, if it's all right with you.

Oh, Jack, I think it's a wonderful idea. How many people are there?

110. That's not too many, is it? No, no.

In fact, we have a special department that handles large groups at a discount.

A discount?

Yeah, that means—

I know what it means. Look, Walt, I was thinking, you know, with a big show like mine, I wind up with practically nothing. 10 people, I mean, even with the, with a discount, it would really run into— and since you see the fact that you own the place, I thought maybe—

Come on in, Frank, behave yourself. Go ahead, Jack, pay no attention to him. We're all one big happy family here. Whatever you can say to me, you can say in front of him.

Well, Walt, as I was saying—

family, one big family.

Shut up. Now, Walt, as I was saying— nice pussycat. Walt, as I was saying— You see, 110— oh, incidentally, did you ever get those 4 complimentary tickets I sent you to one of my television shows?

Oh yes, Jack, thank you. You know, I almost forgotten. That was about 9 years ago, wasn't it? Yeah, just about.

Now I was saying, I'm taking 110 people to Disneyland. Oh, oh, Walt, I must tell you, I think it's It's just so wonderful the way you're always taking groups of poor, underprivileged children through Disneyland free of charge.

Well, Jack, we don't publicize that. How did you know?

My sister's kid went once. He had a wonderful time, you know. He brought me back some candy and everything. Now, Walt, It's silly to keep beating around the bush. What I was wondering was—

Wait a minute, Jack. I think I'm getting the idea. You want 110 free tickets. Well, I had no idea that's what you wanted. I didn't. I'm only a bird.

Certainly.

Well, see here. Wait a minute. Jack, I seem to recall that when Disneyland first opened, I gave you a 14-karat solid gold pass, lifetime pass to Disneyland.

Yes, you did give me a solid gold pass.

Well, where is it? Here.

I had a lot of—

Okay, 110 free tickets, and I hope you all have a wonderful time.

Thanks, thanks, Walt. And listen, you've been so nice to me, I'm going to do something for you.

Yeah, what's that?

Well, you know how important it is when a motion picture is publicized on a television show?

Oh yes, I certainly do. Well, now look at—

on my show tomorrow night, I have a beautiful foreign actress, and we're going to do a foreign film, you know, like they do in Italy, an Italian film. And I'm going to rewrite The whole thing, so that it has a sort of a Walt Disney approach.

But Jack, I don't know how you can possibly apply my moviemaking approach to a foreign film. I mean, every one I see seems to be so earthy, so full of basic raw emotions.

That's true, that's true, Walt, but don't worry about it.

It'll work out. Ah, but there's such short time. Won't it be a problem?

Not when you're as creative as I am.

He's living in the wonderful world of Benny.

Don't worry about a thing, it'll be great. And thanks so much for the ticket.

Always glad to help a friend in need, Jack. Goodbye.

I was just thinking, now you see, my wife Mary, she's not on my show, but she's never been to Disneyland.

And I was just thinking, my approach in an Italian movie, this we'll have to see, won't we, boys?

Thank you so much for watching. I made this video because Scott Pettigrew asked me to. So if there's a famous entrepreneur that you want me to profile next, Leave it in the comments below and I'll see what I can do. I'd also love to know which of Walt Disney's top 10 rules meant the most to you. Leave it in the comments. I'm going to join the discussion. Thank you so much for watching. Continue to believe, and I'll see you soon.