The Making of Disney’s Lion King: How a Lion of a Movie Found It’s Center

"Late Night with Lion King," a CTNX roundtable discussion with several of the crew, revealed key insights to the films creation and success.

Late Night with “Lion King” – A Celebration of “The Talent”

Hindsight is 20/20 and it’s easy to overlook the gutsy moves in development and production of one of the greatest animated films in recent history.

The now legendary film, Lion King originally earned $79,300,000 (with a world wide gross of $928,475,367…and counting) and was a key film during Disney’s Renaissance.

Last November, several key players held a round table discussion at CTNX called “Late Night with Lion King” as they shared key insights to the films creation and success.

The panelists included:
Roger Allers, Director (IMDB)
Ruben Aquino, Supervising Animator (IMDB)
Brenda Chapman, Head of Story (IMDB)
Andreas Deja, Supervising Animator (IMDB)
Mark Henn, Supervising Animator (IMDB)
Andy Gaskill, Art Director (IMDB)
Irene Mecchi, Writer (IMDB)
Rob Minkoff, Director (IMDB)
Moderated by Charles Solomon

Several themes emerged during the casual conversation and I’ve categorized them and listed highlights below.

DEVELOPMENT PROCESS

• The films development took place thru writing and story boarding. The story department and writer worked simultaneously and gave each other notes to make adjustments.
• Each sequence was a little different. Some started with more writing, and other sequences started with more boards.
• One key balancing act was merging believability with fantasy. It had to be Africa. The key characters had to feel like real lions but the audience had to accept the fantasy of them talking.
• Visual elements from the trip to Africa including the red dirt, acacia trees, and thorns, were all captured well in visual development and carried thru the film as key shapes, colors, patterns and formed the visual language of the film.
• Both studios (Orlando and LA) had live animals in and looked at a ton of reference video.
• Both models taken from Disney’s early days during development on Bambi.
• House cats walking patterns use the same mechanics, you just have to add the weight.
• Deja designed scar to that his shoulders would still show because it’s so signature to cats, big and small.
• Carnivores are more flexible than herbivores and felines are the most flexible of all carnivores.

COLLABORATION
The film had co-directors, 2 lead animators on same character working on opposite coasts (ex: young Simba and old Simba). Coordinating fight scenes, the lead animators for different characters would switch back and forth based on which character was more dominant.

With co-direction, Allers and Minkoff collaborated on story then broke apart once into production. They each had musical and dramatic sequences to direct, and they had at least one chance to see each sequences together to give each other feedback.

In the early phases they worked together, then divided up sequences to follow them thru.

GUTSY MOVES
Well into production, Lion King went thru a complete reboot. Original development began in 1988. Production began in 1991, but Scribner left production and was replaced by Minkoff. Hahn joined the project the story was entirely rewritten.

In Lion King they intentionally had longer scenes hoping it would help the audience believe in the performance of the character. The characters needed screen time to think and feel. A 3 frame shot doesn’t let that happen.

TECHNOLOGY
The latest generation using iPads, iPhones, FaceBook, and the like would not be familiar with the amazing technology used during the production of Lion King. Things such as:

• the US postal service
• Audio tapes for rough cuts of songs
• VHS video tapes for reviews between Orlando and LA
• Fax machines and other equally antiquated technology.

Not to downplay the truly amazing technology used in the animation that has set the standard for modern hand drawn animation.

This is a reminder that the journey is as important as the destination. The large and small stories and the many talented people all contribute to a film artistic and commercial success.

Collaboration and risk are key components to making something great!

Next week we’ll share some little-known and interesting facts from Lion King!