Mouse in Transition

<p>AN INSIDER'S LOOK AT DISNEY FEATURE ANIMATION</p><p></p><p>When Walt Disney died the studio went into a creative lockdown. The mantra What Would Walt Do comforted the old-timers but it shackled the up-and-comers who wanted to take big risks on new approaches to animation.</p><p></p><p>Into this sleepy studio walked Steve Hulett whose father Ralph had been an artist at the studio for nearly four decades. Hulett was hired as a storyman during a transitional time in the company's history when Walt's spirit was receding and Hollywood kingpins Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg were taking over.</p><p></p><p>Hulett takes you into the sometimes dark Disney heart of power politics and the cult of personality as he recalls:</p><p></p><p>  Helping Ken Anderson on the ill-fated feature Catfish Bend and how Anderson in return tried to get him fired</p><p></p><p>  Enduring intense marathon story meetings with Woolie Reithermann which Hulett recounts in colorful unexpurgated detail</p><p></p><p>  Working on such Disney features as The Fox and the Hound The Great Mouse Detective and The Black Cauldron</p><p></p><p>  Meeting Eisner and Katzenberg for the first time and the seismic shock their edicts sent through the Disney Studio</p><p></p><p>  Learning the ropes through candid conversations with such Disney luminaries as Ward Kimball Claude Coats and Eric Larson</p><p></p><p>Hulett's wit and dry humor coupled with his first-hand accounts of working side-by-side with Ken Anderson Woolie Reitherman John Lasseter and Little Mermaid co-director/writer John Musker (who wrote the foreword) provides unique and unprecedented insight into the rapidly changing Disney Studio of the 1970s and 1980s.</p><p></p>