Klay Hall, Sean Lurie on Animation - Interview
Disney Brings Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure to DVD
Oct 20, 2009
With Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure, the Mouse House hopes to not only sell truckloads of Disney Fairies merchandise but also give their direct-to-DVD animation division some much-needed respect. That's why director Klay Hall and producer Sean Lurie not only decided to give this film a more quest-based, action-packed orientation than in previous Tinker Bell movies, but also tell a great story.
In Part #1 of this exclusive interview, Hall and Lurie talked about how their vision for the film, and their vision for Tinker Bell. In this installment, they reveal more of the process of making Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure.
S101: When I saw the troll sequence, I thought: who’s the Monty Python fan? “None shall pass!” That’s straight out of Holy Grail!
(everybody laughs)
Hall and Lurie together: “The writers!”
Klay Hall: “It could have been anybody. We had several writers weigh in on the process. Working so closely with John Lasseter: he’s restructured how you tell stories. We have a whole Story Trust now–“
S101: Who’s on that?
Hall: "All the directors, producers and writers. Pixar guys will weigh in as well as people from the other divisions.”
Sean Lurie: “The groups change depending on the project and who the director really wants to bring in. But we tap into some of the development people at Pixar, we tap into the directors, writers and story people at Disney Toon Studios. That’s why naming names doesn’t really help us any.”
S101: When I chatted with Doug Sweetland about 'Presto,' he said (Up writer/director) Bob Peterson helped him understand the story he was trying to tell. And I was wondering if there was anyone in your Story Trust who provided that–
Hall: “Big spark.”
S101: Exactly.
Hall: “I can’t think of anybody really, other than John–“
Lurie: “Definitely John Lasseter.”
Hall: “–But it was definitely awesome to have so many different people – boys and girls – who helped us with ideas, and helped keep us on-track.”
S101: What were some of the points where you felt yourself going off-track, and how did you get back on?
Hall: “Here’s a funny inside bit. I don’t know how funny it was – at the time, it was pretty painful. (everybody laughs). We were already in our 3rd pass on the film, basically we get five–“
Lurie: “This is where you put the storyboards up, dialogue, temp music and sound, you get a feel for where the movie is going–“
Hall: “You do this every 8 or 10 weeks in front of John and all the other Brain Trust people. So, by our 3rd pass, we had Tink building a crown for the queen and someone said, 'The crown seems selfish. Why would the queen have to have a crown?'
"And then someone said, 'What if it was a scepter? Then it’s for the whole kingdom, it’s for everybody.' And we all agreed: yeah, that’s a great idea. But I had lost 20 weeks of work (Lurie laughs). So that was a big one. But when you look at how the story has turned out, it totally makes sense.”
Lurie: “It actually increased the stakes and drives the movie better.”
Hall: “There was another when (former Disney Studios Chairman) Dick Cook came in and said, ‘Guys, let’s raise the stakes a little bit here.’ And that’s what prompted that previous note.”
Lurie: “You make these movies and you’re able to show them to fresh eyes, and one of the great things about John and the team is identifying the things that don’t feel believable or natural or don’t work story-wise.”
Hall: “John is the Logic Police. And even though it’s a mythology and a made-up world, you got to have rules and has to be grounded and make sense.”
Lurie: “There are two scenes in particular that we spent a lot of time grappling with, because they didn’t seem quite right. In the opening scene, Tinker Bell is building this boat and there’s this comedic mishap. When Klay first directed that, with the frog race, there was something about the tone of the characters that didn’t quite work in establishing the characters–“
Hall: “The frog race came off as more competitive and not as fun or friendly. The friendship wasn’t coming through.”
Lurie: “The characters weren’t as likable immediately. These are the things the group looks at and says, ‘How can we strengthen the story and strengthen the characters.’ The way the sequence was originally conceived, Tinker Bell was coming off as mean. She’s our heroine and you don’t want her not to be likable.”
Hall: “Which was tough, because you also want to see that feistiness and independence in her, and it was a hard line to walk.”
(In Part #3 of this exclusive interview, Hall and Lurie discuss the importance of mistakes and the connotations of colour.)
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