May 17 - Ralph Wright

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On this day, in 1908, Ralph Waldo Wright was born in Grants Pass, Oregon. Beyond his place of birth, there is no information on Ralph’s life until he shows up in Burbank, California in 1940 and starts working at the Walt Disney Studio in the story department.  His fellow artists sometimes poked fun at his appearance, calling his too-short pants and suspender ensembles country bumpkinish, but no one doubted his ability to come up with seemingly infinite variations on every gag in a picture. His first project with the studio was Goofy’s Glider, the very first How To… short starring Goofy. Ralph is generally credited with creating the format of the would-be hero comedically failing at something over and over. The Disney Studio itself would use the formula many times, especially with Goofy, but the highly successful trope spilled over into other studios, most notably at Warner Brothers with their Roadrunner shorts, and is still in use today.

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Over the next two and a half decades, Ralph quietly added elements to (or flat out wrote) the stories for all sorts of films at the studio. His feature credits include Bambi, Saludos Amigos, The Three Caballeros, Peter Pan, Song of the South, Sleeping Beauty and Lady and the Tramp. His other credits include the Oscar nominated shorts Donald’s Crime and Lambert the Sheepish Lion, several more How To Goofy shorts and a number of Donald Duck and Pluto shorts. And, of course, when the studio started getting into television in the Fifties, it was all hands on deck and Ralph did his share, writing several episodes of The Wonderful World of Disney anthology show.

Image courtesy wikipedia.com

Ralph was no stranger to freelance work during this period either. In the late Forties he wrote for Gaumont British Animation, working with former Disney animator David Hand on his Animaland series. In the early Sixties, he dabbled in writing episodes of different cartoon series that began popping up on all the networks, including Popeye the Sailor, Mr. Magoo, The Dick Tracy Show, and Snuffy Smith and Barney Google. He even contributed dialog to Warner Brother’s first animated feature, Gay Purr-ee, which starred Judy Garland (in her only animated role) and Robert Goulet (in his first feature film).

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In the mid Sixties, the time for Ralph to do things quietly came to an end. As the studio was developing its first Winnie the Pooh short, the team of writers (which included Ralph) began modeling one of my favorite characters, Eeyore, the old gray donkey, on the pleasantly gloomy guy with the deep voice in the Story Department whose name was… Ralph Wright. As the time came to assemble the voice cast, director Wolfgang Reitherman asked Ralph to make a test recording for Eeyore. Ralph was brilliant at it and got the part. When Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree debuted in 1966, his voice became synonymous with the beloved sad sack of the Hundred Acre Wood.  Ralph would reprise the role he was born to play for 1968’s Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day, the 1977 feature The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh and 1983’s Winnie the Pooh and a Day for Eeyore (his final project).

Image courtesy wikipedia.com

Following his triumphant turn as Eeyore, Ralph didn’t let all that fame go to his head. He saved the drama for the recording booth and continued making the stories Disney told as funny and as heartwarming as he could. He nabbed several more story credits over the remaining years of his career, adding his touch to The Aristocats, The Jungle Book and Bedknobs and Broomsticks. As the Seventies came to a close, Ralph retired from Disney to spend more time with his wife and play with his grandchildren. On December 31, 1983, he suffered a fatal heart attack at his home in Los Osos, California. He was 75.