December 16 - Roy Edward Disney

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On this day, in 2009, Roy Edward Disney, son of Roy O. and nephew of Walt, passed away in Newport Beach, California. Born January 10, 1930, Roy would end up being the last member of the Disney family to take an active part in the company his father and uncle created. He graduated from Pomona College, long considered to be the premier liberal arts college on the West Coast, in 1951 and began working in Hollywood, initially as an assistant editor when Dragnet made the move from radio to television. By 1954, he’d joined the family business as an assistant director and producer on the Tru-Life Adventure series. Six years later, Roy would earn an Oscar nomination for a short film he penned, Mysteries of the Deep.

After Walt’s death, Roy was elected to the company’s board of directors, a position he would hold off and on for the next few decades. Fiercely loyal to the ideals of the elder Disneys and staunchly supportive of all things animation, Roy would often have a cantankerous relationship with the company leaders who came after both founders passed away. In 1977, he resigned his position within Walt Disney Productions in protest over the direction the company’s entertainment division had been taking. He knew the string of mediocre-at-best live action movies the company had been throwing out, coupled with the fact that all the old school animators were disappearing without, in his opinion, being adequately replaced, were hurting the company. The Black Cauldron was still a few years away but Roy could see it coming. He retained his position on the board however and several years later, when the company faced a hostile takeover crisis, he stepped up to the plate to save the company.

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One of the first things Roy had to do in 1984 was create a group of investors large enough to keep the company together. In order to effectively do this, he resigned from his seat on the board. Once he had the necessary funding in place, he then set about forcing the current company president, Ron Miller, out. I’m sure this move made for some awkward moments at family reunions from that point on as Ron was married to Roy’s cousin (and Walt’s daughter), Dianne Disney. He then was instrumental in getting Frank Wells and Michael Eisner hired as president and CEO. When the dust settled, Roy came back to the company as vice chairman of The Walt Disney Company and chairman of the animation branch. Since Michael and Frank were like the second coming of Walt and Roy O, Roy E was heralded as a savior who put loyalty to the company over personal considerations.

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Throughout the remainder of the Eighties and well into the Nineties, the Walt Disney Company experienced a rebirth. Animation hits like The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King flowed out of the studio. All seemed rosy for the company, but tensions brewed behind closed doors. Roy clearly didn’t care for the new studio head, Jeffrey Katzenberg. He felt that Jeffrey took too much credit for recent successes and frequently overstepped his place in the scheme of things. When Frank Wells died in a helicopter accident in 1994, Jeffrey demanded a promotion. Roy told Eisner that he would start a proxy war if that happened. Roy would win this round. Jeffrey would leave the company (albeit with a large monetary payout) but his relationship with Eisner would slowly deteriorate over the next decade. This was partly due to the fact that, rather than replace Frank, Eisner simply took on the financial duties of the company (which was not a good move) and partly because the creative juices seemed to be drying up. Again, Home on the Range was a couple years off, but Roy saw it coming.

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During this cooling off period between Roy and Eisner, a couple of bright spots did occur. In 1998, Roy was surprised when he was made an official Disney Legend. Then in December of 1999, Roy’s pet project, Fantasia 2000, was finally released to theaters. The film had been in production for nine years and was meant to fulfill his uncle’s dream of making the 1940 movie Fantasia an on-going, ever evolving picture. Like its predecessor, Fantasia 2000 combined classical music with high quality animation and mostly inventive story lines. And, like its predecessor, it didn’t do terribly well at the box office.

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By 2003, Roy’s relationship with Eisner had not only gone completely south but his influence within the company was evaporating as well, as most of the executives now owed their positions to Eisner. Roy once again resigned his positions with the company and began a second campaign to remove someone he saw as ruining the company from the top spot. Part smear campaign against Eisner, part rally-to-my-last-name-boys bravado, Roy’s efforts eventually worked after he managed to put together a coalition of 43% of shareholders that voted against Eisner at the 2004 meeting. It would take another 18 months of bitter pressure before Eisner would finally resign, but in the end, Roy won that round, too (sort of, Eisner’s second in command, Bob Iger, took the helm). He rejoined the board as Director Emeritus, a non-voting position (although he still retained 1% of all shares) and remained in that position until his death.

In 2008, Roy was diagnosed with stomach cancer, a disease he would battle for over a year before finally succumbing. His passing was truly the end of an era. Other Disneys of his generation were still around, but none of them took an active interest in the company that bears the family name and now even they are gone.