What Brad Said

Quite a lot, actually. At Tribeca.

Brad Bird on Learning From 'The Simpsons' and What Inspired 'Tomorrowland'

... "I worked on eight seasons of 'The Simpsons' as a consultant, I was there probably two days out of every week, sometimes three. It's kind of like that thing of 'I Love Lucy' when she has the chocolates, and she keeps shoving more chocolates down because she can't keep up with them. If you slow down in television, you will get eaten alive. I learned a hell of a lot from being on 'The Simpsons' because I saw episodes that were deeply in trouble up to two weeks before they were going to air. ... They would be almost done and things wouldn't work, and somebody would make a genius move of reediting something or re-voicing one part, and suddenly it would work beautifully. ...

"Some people don't appreciate that [computer animation] is an art form. They think that there's a button that's like 'Make Movie' and that it just gets done. ...

[Re Walt Disney:] [T]hey had to reupholster the seats in a very large movie palace in New York because little kids were peeing on the seats when the witch came on in 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.' I think what I always admired that about the Walt-era Disney films is that they were not afraid to be really scary. ...

Mr. Bird brings a zest and enthusiasm to everything he does. And passion.

This is what got him in trouble at Walt Disney Productions. Management did not want passion. They wanted conformity, and every one saluting their idea of "the way Walt would have done it," except Walt had been dead for thirteen years at that point and nobody really had a clue regarding what Walt Disney would have done.

Brad refused to salute. So after awhile he was gone.