Title: The Queens of Animation: The Untold Story of the Women who Transformed the World of Disney and Made Cinematic History
Author: Nathalia Holt
Genre: Non-Fic, History
About the Book...
In The Queens of Animation, Nathalia Holt tells the stories of the few women who worked in the story and animation departments at Disney studios during its golden years, their struggles working in a male dominated sphere, their involvement in the films, and the impact and influence they had on future generations.
What I Think...
This was a fantastic book! I really loved that this focused on the women outside of the Ink and Paint department and the role they played in the creation of the classic Disney films.
Those who worked in the story department such as Bianca Majolie, Grace Huntington, and Sylvia Holland were women I had never heard anything about and really enjoyed finding out the contributions they made to some of my favorite Disney classics both in terms of shorts and feature films. I loved learning that the Nutcracker scene in Fantasia was created by a team of women headed by Sylvia Holland, since the men in the department wouldn't draw the delicate fairies. Mary Blair, not
unexpectedly, is also given a considerable amount of attention and as always was fascinating to read about.
This book didn't come across at all as biased or following an agenda, even though it does focus on matters that would have made life more difficult for women. It has a good balance between what was going on internally with the studio and external world factors as well. I liked that the stories of the women were integrated with one another rather than giving each woman an individual chapter. I was far more interested in the earlier chapters, as that time frame interests me more, but the book really kept my attention from start to finish.
Also, as a fun note, the
book has delightfully movie related movie titles to correspond with the
subject of each chapter and works it's way up from Snow White all the
way to Frozen.
And because I can't resist, some of the fun facts I learned while reading this book:
-To get Tinker Bell's glow they used Asian ox bile.
-Sleeping Beauty was the first film to ever use CinemaScope.
-Art was an event in the Olympics until 1946.
- Dodie Smith wrote The Hundred and One Dalmatians with the idea that it could be made into an animated movie.
To Sum it All Up...
A great book for anyone interested in Disney animation history! ♥