First Time at the Studio - Disney On Parade...

     After that wonderful little detour deep into Mississippi, I headed west once again, stopping once more in Colorado to visit Mom and my fabulous Grandmothers and boy, did I have a great story to tell them.

     I arrived in California with plenty of time to find an apartment in Glendale a couple of miles from the Disney Studios, buy a slick new chocolate-colored 240-Z sports car, and a new pair of really good-looking production executive-type shoes.

     I was ready to rock!

     I have to admit, once again, that I got more than a little bit excited when I drove through the main gate on the Disney lot.

     This was the true center of the Disney universe, where all the magic happened, and where many, many very creative people worked doing great things and making great movies every day. I was truly excited to be there.

     My office was on the third floor of the famous Animation Building.

     There is a fabulous story about Walt going to the Bank of America many, many years ago to ask for a loan to build an animation studio on this very spot. The bank was highly skeptical that a company that made cartoons starring a mouse would ever make it big. So, the deal was, they would give Walt the money to build a building only if he would construct it so that it could be easily converted to a hospital when his cartoon business failed. The building was constructed with four wings on each of the three floors with a big desk-like structure placed at the entrance of each of the wings that could become a nurse’s station. Really. The rooms down the hallway of each of those wings could also be converted into patient rooms whenever Walt went bankrupt and had to give the building back to the bank.

     Well, we all know that the cartoon starring the mouse was just the beginning of what was to become an extremely successful artistic and world-wide entertainment empire. Walt Disney never had to give the building back.

     The land was, of course, zoned for a hospital, which was eventually built right across the street…St. Joseph’s Hospital, where our darling Leah was born. But, wait…I’m getting waaaaaaaay ahead of myself.

     Mike Grilikhes was yet another amazing boss. I was tasked with being his right-hand guy, which meant that I got to learn from one of the very best. Disney On Parade was a series of travelling arena shows (I knew a little bit about shows that travel, remember?) produced by Nawal Productions, a joint venture between NBC and Walt Disney Productions.

     The shows were primarily for children and featured famous Disney characters performing in various comedy and musical routines as well as condensed versions of famous Disney motion pictures. The shows toured all over, not just in America, but in Europe, South America, Australia and Japan.

     The first show premiered in Chicago in 1969, and ran for over three hours. It required 40 tractor-trailer trucks to haul the props, costumes and sets. Mike Grilikhes was brought in primarily to cut the show down to two hours and reduce the amount of props and sets without losing any of the quality. He did a magnificent job doing that.

     And I got to be his assistant. Cool, yes?

     One of the more entertaining tasks for which I was responsible was supervising the recording of the sound tracks of the show into the 8 languages for the countries in which it would eventually travel: South American Spanish, Spain Spanish (Castilian), Portuguese, Japanese, German, French, Italian and Dutch. Try to imagine me sitting in a recording studio, hour after hour, first with a German Donald Duck, then a French Donald Duck, then an Italian Donald Duck and on and on and on…absolutely hilarious!

     After the show opened and it was successfully running out on the road, my production assistant job was over and I was headed back to Disneyland. 

     My goodness, what a whirlwind I was headed into...1973.