Disney Shorts - 2000 Index

The Walt Disney Company has recently announced the creation of a new series to be called "Mouseworks." This new series would feature the classic Disney characters, but would try to take them back to the original spirit of the classic short subjects. As a reference, consider Chip 'n' Dale. In the "Rescue Rangers" series, they almost seem like completely different characters than the lovable scamps who made Donald Ducks's life such misery. Hopefully, this new series will take them back to their roots, so to speak.

The following comments and stories are courtesy of Rich Bellacera, creator of the D-Zone and caretaker of the Disney Hoo-Zoo.

"OTTOmatic" by Dan Persons

"Fans will soon hear [Penn (Penn & Teller) Jillette's] booming voice as Pluto's evil conscience in the animated short Pluto's Kitten's, set to air in January as part of a TV series called MouseWorks." (Disney News Magazine, Fall 1998, page 60).

"The Mouse Is Back!" by Michael Swanigan and Michelle Klein-Hass

For the first time in years Mickey Mouse will be animated in a new cartoon series by Walt Disney Television Animation. Disney's Toronto Studio is launching production of a new series called Mouseworks, which will package new cartoons featuring Mickey, Donald Duck, Daisy, Goofy and Pluto, into weekly 22-minute episodes scheduled for release in January 1999. In the development of the show. (Toon Magazine, Vol.4, no.1, Spring).

"Mickey's Television Return" by Buzz McClain

When MouseWorks debuts in January 1999, Mickey Mouse will star in an ongoing animated series for the first time since his long line of theatrical cartoons ceased with The Simple Things in 1953. Now in production, the weekly half-hour television program (which will probably air on the Disney Channel) reunites Disney Studio's best known characters -- Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Daisy, Goofy, and Pluto -- in their original cartoon forms.

"This will get [the characters] back to being cartoons again," says Robert Gannaway who, along with Tony Craig, will serve as executive producer for the show.

"Recent generations have grown up familiar with Mickey Mouse and friends as company icons and licensed entities rather than as cartoon heroes. Millions of today's Disney fans missed this historical connection to the characters. The new show will "define their personalities again," says Gannaway. For instance, as Mickey's loyal pet dog, Pluto always comes through for his master. Their relationship will be illustrated in a sequence of shorts where Pluto fetches the mouse's morning newspaper despite being swept up by the street sweeper or abducted by aliens. In another series of back-to-basics cartoon adventures, Mickey, Donald, and Goofy perform wacky odd jobs like painting roller coasters and delivering pipe organs.

Which isn't to say there aren't any new twists, says Gannaway. The new stories may mix characters that rarely, if ever, associated before. "We could have a Minnie and Daisy episode] or one with Donald and Von Drake."

The program will contain gag, character, and story cartoons ranging from 90 seconds to 12 minutes, and will be true to the past, even in some technological ways. In their effort to create "new classics" for the vintage characters, the producers will compose the musical scores for the cartoons before the animation begins. "In the old cartoons, the timing was musically driven. That's been lost these days because cartoons are scored after the fact," says Gannaway. "When you set it to music, you can make an ordinary action fun to watch because if the musical timing."

With Mickey coming back to TV, is there a chance he'll return to theaters, as Goofy did in A Goofy Movie in 1995?

"I don't know about a movie yet," says Barry Blumberg, the Disney senior vice president for television animation. "But I'm not saying it's something we would rule out." * (SPRING 1998, "Disney News Magazine")

* Rumor has it that originally the Classic characters were going to make their latest film debut originally for the theaters in a movie entitled "Joy." This production was shelved in favor of the new "MouseWorks" series. However, a new Goofy movie, entitled "Another Goofy Movie" is currently in production.

Previously: The Associated Press:

LOS ANGELES (AP) - After a 40-year break, Mickey Mouse is going back to work in television.

"MouseWorks," a weekly half-hour series debuting in January 1999, will feature the first regularly produced new TV footage of the Disney cartoon icon since the original 1955-59 run of "The Mickey Mouse Club."

Mickey will be joined by pals Donald Duck, Minnie Mouse, Goofy, Pluto and Daisy in the new series, the Walt Disney Co. said Tuesday.

Each episode will feature a mixture of shorter "gag" cartoons and longer "story" cartoons up to 12 minutes in length. Although all original, some themes and elements from older cartoons may be used.

The new series will feature voices matching those of the original characters.

"We're going to do whatever it takes to make this as good as it can possibly be," said Barry Blumberg, senior vice president of Walt Disney Television Animation.

Roy E. Disney, vice chairman of the board for Disney, made the announcement in honor of Mickey's 69th birthday. The mouse made a few movie appearances in recent years, in the 1995 short "Runaway Brain" and in 1983's "Mickey's Christmas Carol."

A decision has yet to be made whether to air "MouseWorks" on Disney-owned ABC, in syndication or on cable's Disney Channel. (AP-NY-11-19-97 1812EST)

Below are excerpts from E! News announcing that Mickey is going back to work in a cartoon series. Not bad for someone that's 69 years old!

[begin excerpts]

Disney announced Tuesday that work will begin on a new Mickey Mouse animated TV series--the first to star the vaunted Mousketeer leader since the 1950s.

MouseWorks is set to debut in January 1999. Still undecided is exactly where the weekly show will air: It'll be either cable's Disney Channel or the Disney-owned ABC network -- maybe both, according to one report. Look for longtime gal-pal Minnie Mouse to costar, as well as the Old School likes of Donald Duck, Goofy and Pluto.

"This is more than a return to our company's root--it's the restoration of a staple of cartoon entertainment for people around the globe," company vice chairman Roy E. Disney said, in a statement.

In Wednesday's Daily Variety, Disney promised that the Mick and friends will be going back to their roots, as well. "The characters will revert to the look they had in the '30s, '40s, '50s," he told the paper. "We will go back to the old way of animating. They will be all hand-drawn and hand-painted, with the backgrounds as well."

Roy Disney is the first to concede that Mickey has become more of a "corporate figure" rather than a "cartoon figure" in recent years. As the company's empire expanded in the 1950s into theme parks, TV shows, lunch boxes and a million other assorted sundries, the Mouse began to retreat from the 'toon medium that launched his career. [end quote]

From the L. A. Times, October 2, 1998:

Disney's 'MouseWorks' Costs May Set Animation Record

The studio plans new episodes of Mickey Mouse and friends at an estimated $1 million each.

By BRIAN LOWRY

While CBS has emphasized frugality in its children's lineup, Disney, the big cheese in animation, is about to launch what industry sources call the most expensive and ambitious project ever produced for children's television: "MouseWorks," the first new made-for-TV Mickey Mouse cartoons in 40 years.

The buzz among animation executives is that Disney is spending as much as $1 million for each half-hour of the program, substantially more than the most costly animated children's series, including Disney's new "Hercules" and Warner Bros.' "Superman." (Certain prime-time shows, such as Fox's "The Simpsons," cost more, due largely to years of raises and the high price paid to producers and vocal talent.)

Walt Disney Television President Charles Hirschhorn wouldn't comment specifically about the budget but did say Disney is "producing these at an extraordinary level of quality" and that it's "fair to say that it's at a significant premium."

Featuring Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy and Pluto in animated shorts ranging from 90 seconds to seven or eight minutes, "MouseWorks" will join ABC's Saturday morning lineup early next year. Some of the cartoons may air on the Disney Channel as well, and there's talk about premiering a few theatrically--as adjuncts to Disney feature films--during the holidays.

Animators say the investment in "MouseWorks" demonstrates the rising stakes in that field as well as the project's importance to higher-ups at Disney.

"They've got to figure they're going to get it back through revitalized merchandising and international [sales]," said one TV executive, who described the marching orders at the studio as "Do whatever it takes to make this great. It's Mickey Mouse, for God's sake."

Beyond the heightened budget, producers have been afforded extra time to work on the series--providing them the luxury of creating original music and then animating to it, for example, as opposed to laying in the musical score after the fact.

According to Hirschhorn, "We said if we're going to go back and do [original Mickey Mouse cartoons], it's worth the effort and the time to do it right."