Steve Speaks!

I was honored recently to be interviewed for The Tiara Talk Show, a podcast series created by Tammy Tuckey.  The show is about all things Disney, though it is not a Disney production.  Since its premiere in August of 2013, Tammy has done 103 interviews, with the likes of Debbie Reynolds, Ed Asner, Don Hahn, Jerry Rees, Gary Trousdale, and now me.  Slow news week, I guess.

Remembering EPCOT's Cranium Command - Both Versions

There are some great posts on The Disney Project blog about Jerry Rees'  work for Disney Imagineering, including EPCOT's Cranium Command, where you go inside the mind of a boy as he goes about his school day in real time.  An animatronic figure interacts with characters representing different parts of the body, which constantly react to what is being seen through the boy's eyes.  It was an extremely complex show, logistically.

Like many of Jerry's jobs for Imagineering, Cranium Command was a rescue mission.  As The Disney Project blog puts it, "The project, already halfway through production at Colossal Pictures, was unanimously loathed by everyone at Disney. Jerry was tasked with reviewing the project, assessing its weaknesses, and fixing them."

I, personally, have the unique distinction of being the only animator to have worked on both versions of this show.  In January of 1989, Colossal Pictures producer Heather Selick hired Vince Davis and me as sort of animators-in-residence at their San Francisco studio.  She put us up in apartments on Union St in North Beach, just below the Coit Tower and just two uphill blocks from an area full of blues bars, cafes, Italian restaurants, City Lights Bookstore, and  really old strip clubs with creepy guys in big suits trying to get passersby to go in.  Far out!