Almost as legendary as the premiere itself of Walt Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, was the reception it received from the celebrity audience. Hardened movie-moguls and their wives, famous actors and specially invited guests, cried, laughed and cheered their way through the films 83 minutes running time.
“They even applauded backgrounds and layouts when no animation was on the screen”, recalled art director Ken O’Connor. “I was sitting near John Barrymore when the shot of the Queen’s castle above the mist came on, with the Queen poling across the marsh in a little boat. He was bouncing up and down in his seat, he was so excited. Barrymore was an artist as well as an actor, and he knew the kind of work that went into something like that.”
It’s actually unlikely that the famous star had any idea of what was really involved in bringing stunningly atmospheric sequences like the ones described to fruition. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was no mere animated film stretched out to feature length dimensions. It was a totally new approach to film-making, and the meticulous planning that went into its four year conception was a pioneering effort on behalf of a great number of talented individuals. The press campaign at the time which loved, as do all Hollywood publicists, expounding to the public the most trivial of statistics wrote “If one man were to undertake the job of completing Walt Disney’s first full-length production Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and had sufficient talent to do so, he would be able to complete the job in a little over 230 years by working eight hours a day minus a two week vacation each year.”
[…]
