For the 2021 Christmas special episode of the podcast, Chris and Alex turn to the short Mickey’s Christmas Carol (Burny Mattinson, 1983), the Walt Disney Studio’s cel-animated retelling of the Charles Dickens masterpiece directed and produced by longtime Disney storyboard artist Burny Mattinson. Joining them to discuss Disney’s cultural relationship to Christmas and its longstanding history of festive-themed productions starring its most beloved characters is Dr. Amy M. Davis, Lecturer in Film Studies at the University of Hull. Amy is the author of numerous books, articles and chapters on Disney and animation, including the monographs Good Girls & Wicked Witches: Women in Disney’s Feature Animation (2006) and Handsome Heroes & Vile Villains: Men in Disney’s Feature Animation (2013), and the recent edited anthology Discussing Disney (2019). Listen as they discuss Disney’s synergistic company strategies when it comes to representing Christmas across its multimedia products; animated adaptations and what it means to ‘cast’ fantastical cartoon stars in recognisable roles; Disney, Dickens and even Mickey Mouse himself as master storytellers; the consistency of vocal performance across different iterations and phases of animated characters; the themeable nature of Mickey as he is ‘recostumed’ across time and space; and how Mickey’s Christmas Carol parallels the Mouse House’s relationship to the vault as an audiovisual archive given the cartoon’s heightened reflexivity and engagement with the audience’s media memory.
**Fantasy/Animation theme tune composed by Francisca Araujo**
Footnote #20 - Christmas
The Snowman (1982) (with James Walters)
Footnote #19 - Morphing
Willow (Ron Howard, 1988)
Footnote #18 - Studio Ghibli (with Susan Napier)
Spirited Away (2001) (with Susan Napier)
Footnote #17 - Metaphor
Inside Out (2015) (with Eric Herhuth)
Footnote #16 - Dual Address (with Noel Brown)
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) (with Noel Brown)
Footnote #15 - Motion Capture
In Conversation with Nancy Beiman
Footnote #14 - Thinning
Speed Racer (2008) (with Tim Robey)
Footnote #13 - Folklore and Folkloric
Flee (2021) (with Cristina Formenti)
Footnote #12 - The Lightning Sketch (with Malcolm Cook)
Mothra (1961) (with Alex Davidson)
Footnote #11 - Society for Animation Studies (with Chris Pallant)
Osmosis Jones (2001) (with Tom Sito)
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