Response to “Challenging Disney Myths” by Janet Wasko

Growing up, I heard the name Walt Disney from time to time, and I obviously saw the Walt Disney Pictures logo before watching any Disney film.  However, I never realized how influential he was as a person during his lifetime.  Not only did his company create massively successful animated films, but he also managed to gain popularity as a celebrity of his own, which is something that captivated me while reading the piece “Challenging Disney Myths” by Janet Wasko.  The author claims that Walt Disney, in reality, was not the easy going, nice guy that he painted himself to be, but instead was “authoritative, moody, and demanding,” and that he claimed complete credit for projects that he did not work on by himself.  This selfishness is even evident in the name Disney chose for his company.

Considering the way great advertisers and businessmen are able to create alternate personas, I have to wonder if Disney only created the persona of someone with a “perpetual positive attitude” because he knew it would positively impact his business, and not because it was the man he was or even the man he viewed himself as.  This would explain why he acted as if he spent much of his childhood years growing up on a farm in Missouri, and fantasized about life in small-town America, when in reality he spent much of his childhood in urban settings, like Kansas City and Chicago.  Another possibility is he was dreaming about a life he had never had.  Even though his father was physically abusive, his “fondness for warm and happy families” may stem from a longing deep down for a life he wishes he could have lived.  All of his stories, and Disney stories in general, tend have happy endings, something that was not always the case for him growing up, having to move several times due to financial insecurity.

Walt Disney’s role as a ruthless capitalist and in political issues also revealed a side of Disney that was new to me.  I was surprised, for example, that he played a role in the formation of the MPA, which for a time in the 1950’s, worked to weed out any communist threats in Hollywood.  Whether what he did was a good thing is still up for debate, but it is interesting so see that someone who spent much of his life making animated films for families also used his powers to further a political agenda.