Mickey Mouse Brave Little Tailor Animation Drawing

By Nick

Back in the mid 90's I worked for an animation gallery in Philadelphia part time. I would trade my time, and artistic abilities, painting backgrounds for animation collectors to display their cels over, for credit towards animation sketches, production drawings, and production cels.The cels are from the non-Disney animated film, "Watership Down," one of my favorite movies of all time. Due to the exorbitant prices that Disney animation art demanded in the 1990's, I only have a few Disney production drawings, and this one sketch of Mickey Mouse:

Each piece I have has a story, and this one is very interesting. Apparently it came from a collection given to a grandson by his grandmother who worked at the Disney Studios as a cleaning person.
She would pick out discarded drawings from the trash, bring them home, cut them out, and paste them in a book.
I was drawn to this because, while I have no way of knowing absolutely, it sure looks like a Brave Little Tailor Mickey, to me.

He appears to be sporting a tunic and those floppy moccasins he wears in my favorite Mickey animated short. Regardless, it's a Mickey from my favorite era of Disney animation, and I'm thrilled to own it.

Disney Animation Collection 2: The Three Little Pigs

I confess, I was never a big Three Little Pigs fan. I knew the song of course, what Disney fan hasn't heard "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf'? But I never got it. Well, I thought I didn't. Then I read a terrific article in D23 magazine, which prompted me to watch it on YouTube. Then I downloaded it from iTunes!

This classic Academy Award winning Silly Symphony released in 1933 is one of the most famous Disney cartoons, and a leap forward for character development.

Watching it brought back a wave of nostalgia. I had seen this as a child, and the scenes with the Wolf blowing down Fifer and Fiddler Pig's homes was especially vivid.

On the right, the Wolf about to blow the house down. 

Photo taken at The Walt Disney Family Museum.

There are some edgier little visual gags, such as the picture of "Father" as a link of sausages, which hangs in Practical Pig's house, and the Wolf's disguises are especially funny.

I was happy to discover the Disney Animation Collection 2, available on Netflix, not only features the The Three Little Pigs, but 2 of it's 3 sequels (I'm not sure why all 3 aren't on this) along with 4 other shorts.

Following the Three Little Pigs is it's 1934 sequel, The Big Bad Wolf, which adds Little Red Riding Hood and her Grandma into the mix.
While this isn't as strong as a whole, I feel the animation is better. The edginess continues, with the Wolf dressing as Grandma and breaking the 4th wall by asking how he's doing at one point. There is even a moment which "dates" this, when the Wolf imitates Jimmy Durante at one point.

This is followed by another sequel, Three Little Wolves, from 1936. By now I started wondering why Practical Pig continued saving his ungrateful and lazy brothers. But save them he does with his "Wolf Pacifier". This is even edgier, and, well, a bit odd, when at one point the Wolf dressed as Little Bo Peep, locks Fifer and Fiddler in behind him, to which the Pigs reply with a blush, "Why, Bo Peep!"
It's interesting to see the progression in the skill of the animators from one short to the next, and while this is the weakest of the 3 cartoons, it's the strongest animation.

The next cartoon is a wonderful short from 1952, which I featured here on Disney Musings in the past, Lambert the Sheepish Lion about a lion cub who is mistakenly left with a flock of sheep by a stork.

I've used the word edgy several times in this post, and this next animated short is the edgiest of the bunch, if not one of the edgiest cartoons by Disney ever! Chicken Little, released in 1943, is obviously an allegory for World War II, and has a very dark, disturbing, and cautionary ending.

The next cartoon is a Silly Symphony I'd never seen, The Three Blind Mousketeers, from 1936, which takes the 3 blind mice and makes them swashbuckling Musketeers, fighting a tyrannical cat trying to keep them from feasting. It starts rather slow, but gets more enjoyable as it goes on.

Rounding out the set is another Silly Symophony I'd never a seen, even though I've seen the star several times. Elmer Elephant, from 1936, is invited to Tillie Tiger's birthday party. Tillie loves Elmer, but the other animals incessant teasing drives him off, until an emergency flares up, and Elmer saves the day, and Tillie reveals her love for our hero. This is a very sweet cartoon, and a nice way to end the set.

"Bambi's" Thumper Limited Edition Sericel

I bought this Sericel of Thumper, titled "They Call Me Thumper" back in the early 90's, but can't remember where from. I worked at an Animation Gallery in Philadelphia, and a Disney Store part time concurrently, so I imagine it was from either of those.

From the card that came with it:

Energetic bunny Thumper introduces himself to the newborn Prince of the Forest, Bambi, by demonstrating the percussive trademark thump of his hind foot.
From the film Bambi (1942)
Edition Size 5,000

The  Certificate of Authenticity goes on to explain the scene this is from as well as the Sericel process in more detail.