Friday, 9 June 2006
Disneywar
I’m reading Disneywar by James B. Stewart, finally, having purchased it as a gift for my wife. Since she had yet to turn a page, I picked it up instead.
Prior to my life as an internationally known blogger, Java code monkey, and Linux/web/server admin, I worked in film and tv as a location manager, scout, and producer; it’s also where I met my wife, hence my presupposition that Disneywar would be of great interest.
Freelance film work is brutal by the way. Long hours, long weeks, and high-stress; and location management can be a balancing act of doing the right thing by your employer and the people you’re working with on any given shoot day. The Simpsons episode where Radioactive Man comes to Springfield, is spot-on satire of what a location production is like.
Burnout is common, hence, in part, my departure. Notwithstanding that I was a geek at heart, exploiting some of the first, and expensive, laptops to manage the reams of paper and data produced by a location manager.
Anyway, by way of that background, I wanted to say that Disneywar is good reading and I highly recommend it. While the stories told are generally common knowledge to anyone that goes to the theaters, how Eisner’s Disney ever found it’s stride and produced anything of mention is amazing. Stewart’s telling is described as Shakespearean, and I will concur, adding that it is shaping up to be both a comedy and a tragedy.
If you should get Disneywar, consider also Final Cut : Dreams and Disasters in the Making of Heaven’s Gate by Steven Bach. Apparently, Final Cut has been republished as Final Cut: Art, Money and Ego in the Making of Heaven’s Gate, the Film That Sank United Artists. I read the first printing, and admit curiousity about how this new edition expands on the original, and great, story.
