In 1941, simmering tensions between Walt Disney Studios and its animators boiled over into one of the most notorious walkouts in American labor history, an incident that changed the face of the animation industry. Behind the surfact of the Disney Strike is a tangled story of clashing egos, rising labor power, Hollywood activism, and a looming European war.
Author Jake S. Friedman dug through troves of documents from the Disney archives and interviewed many of the surviving figures from the golden age of animation. Jake sits down with S.W. Conser for a two-part conversation about this largely overlooked episode in film and labor history.
Part Two of this two-part conversation can be found at this link.
- KBOO