All the clucking about what a “box office bomb” the new SNOW WHITE is has me wondering. I once heard that the original cartoon released three or four times before it made a profit. My Google search came up dry, so does anyone on the Boards here know the details of when the original Disney version of the story broke even?
Snow White premiered at the Carthay Circle Theatre in Los Angeles, California, on December 21, 1937, and went into general release in the United States on February 4, 1938. Despite initial doubts from the film industry, it was a critical and commercial success, with international earnings of more than $8 million during its initial release against a $1.5 million production cost, becoming the highest-grossing film of 1938, and briefly holding the record of the highest-grossing sound film of all time. It was also the highest-grossing animated film for 55 years.
Note that also at that time Disney paid its animators not that well–although most people were also not making much money in the Depression:
Where Dreams Come True?: The Impacts of the 1941 Animators’ Strike
Maybe you’re thinking of Pinocchio which had a hard time making money because WW2 cut off the European and Asian markets?