Don Bluth, Gary Goldman, John Pomeroy and nine other Disney animators left in 1979 to form Don Bluth Productions:
Bluth was disheartened with the way the Disney company was run. He wanted to revive the classical animation style of the studio’s early classics.
True, and I’m a big fan of Bluth’s “traditional” animations. But he and the other animators left because they didn’t like the way the studio was going and its drifting from old-style animation, not because they had a “falling out” with Walt (who had been dead for well over a decade by then), or even his successors.
I wouldn’t give anybody grief for leaving the Disney company in the 70s.
To paraphrase someone who had to deal with Disney in the 70s and early 80s, “They need a leader. They all go around asking what Walt would do, but he’s been dead for years and shows no sign of returning.”
IMHO, Michael Eisner is one of the very, very, very, few ‘Super CEO’s’ of the 80s/90s who truly earned the title. He took a moribund movie studio/theme park and turned that company into a prototypical growth machine, going from success to success since 1984. This streak has continued since his retirement in 2005, a truly rare feat for any organization which has lost such a leader.
Walt was a domineering personality and very set in his ways. I once had a conversation over dinner with the daughter of Ken Anderson, who was the Art Director and Production Designer on “One Hundred and One Dalmations,” and who worked as an animator on several Disney classics over many years. In making that film, Anderson used a more modern animation technique than had been used on previous Disney films. (Can’t recall what it was called but Xerography was involved.) When they showed the finished product to Walt, he hit the roof. Hated every single frame. He went on a tirade and said that film would never be released by his company and even threatened to have it destroyed. She said her father thought he would surely be fired and became so upset over the chewing-out Disney gave him he suffered a stroke. Fortunately some of the Disney execs took up for the film and convinced Walt that it was box office gold. Grudgingly, he allowed its release and it became one of the top attractions of the year…and for years thereafter.
Yes, xerography was used for HUndred and One Dalmations – they essentially photocopied the drawings direct to the cels, then colored them. It gave the film a very different look, closer to the original pencil sketches and less like the very polished style used in all prior Disney cartoons. I suppose that was why Walt hit the roof – it looked different from his expectations.
But it shouldn’t have come as such a complete surprise, unless they were deliberately hiding the end product from Walt. Ub Iwerks, mentioned in the OP, was instrumental in bringing xerography to Disney studios (as he was with so many technical innovations), and the process certainly didn’t happen overnight.
I hadn’t heard this story before. Thank you for telling it.
IMHO, the Goofy “How To…” shorts are some of the best stuff they did. So … sorry Pinto, but it worked out well while you were gone. 
As someone who worked at Disney (briefly) during Michael’s tenure, I would agree, but add that you forgot Jeffrey Katzenberg.
I never interacted with Michael, but Jeffrey attended meetings and screenings. He knew his shit. To me, his leaving to form Dreamworks was the end of the Disney renaissance.
(The very first sentence in the Disney new-employees’ handbook is (was?) “Call everyone by their first name.” And everyone did.)
Katzenberg and Frank Wells, yes, to your point. Part of being a good CEO is recognizing and attracting top-notch talent. There are many who think Wells was the secret behind Eisner’s success, and they may be right, but history tends to award prizes to just one person and Eisner just outlasted them all.
It’s not so much that Wells was the secret behind Eisner’s success, it was that he was effectively Roy to Eisner’s Walt. Eisner prior was able to concentrate his efforts and attention on creative development in a variety of areas. Once Wells was gone, Eisner tried to do that AND cover the more mundane corporate executive responsibilities like financials (while also alienating more and more creatives). For example, I doubt Wells would have overlooked how disastrous EuroDisney was likely to be. Michael had blinders on, and couldn’t stop himself.
I recommend DisneyWar by James B. Stewart for an inside look at the end of Eisner’s tenure.