Mickey’s Pupils
Freddie Moore was key to updating Mickey’s design back in the 40s and it was he who first noted to Walt that Mickey should have pupils as opposed to just black ovals.
The first film to feature Mickey with his new eyes was the legendary animated feature Fantasia (1940), but the first short to feature the redesigned eyes was in 1939’s The Pointer.
This, however, was not Mickey’s first appearance with them. Troublemaker Ward Kimball was assigned to draw Mickey on the cover of the program distributed to employees for the Snow White wrap-up party (of which I will not talk about). In order to show Mickey looking at a golf ball as well as the audience, Ward threw out the standard Mickey design and gave him pupils. Moore felt it gave Mickey more personality and soon suggested the change to Mickey’s then-voice.
Ward Kimball gave me this snapshot of Robert Crumb, the great underground cartoonist, when I interviewed him for the first time, at the Disney studio on June 6, 1969. The photo is dated December 1968, which I believe is when Ward first met Crumb, in San Francisco. I was publishing Funnyworld in those days, and Ward had written to me about Crumb in November 1968: “Have you seen Robert Crumb’s new comic book, ‘SNATCH’? I dare you to run reproductions from this pubic hair-raiser in ‘Funnyworld.’” (No, I didn’t take him up on that dare.)
pleave visit Michael Barrier’s fantastic website
http://www.michaelbarrier.com/Home%20Page/WhatsNewArchivesOct09.htm
