Marc Davis

Born: Marc Fraser Davis
Birthday: March 30, 1907
Location: Bakersfield, CA, U.S.
Alma mater: Kansas City Art Institute, California School of Fine Arts, Otis Art Institute
Occupation: Animator, Director
Years active: 1937–1978
Died: January 12, 2000

Although Marc Davis was born in Bakersfield, California, his family moved frequently, He was often the new kid in school, and thus a target for bullies. When he took up drawing, he discovered that the other kids wanted his art, and bullies wouldn’t harass him. By the time he was in high school, Davis had attended 26 schools. Davis studied at the Kansas City Art Institute, the California School of Fine Arts in San Francisco, and the Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles. He spent his days sketching animals at the zoo, and studying animal anatomy at the public library in the evening.

Marc was inspired to apply to work at The Walt Disney Studios After seeing the Silly Symphony, Who Killed Cock Robin? He was hired as an apprentice animator for lead animator Grim Natwick working on Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Davis often had to find a balance for the young princess’ design between the contradictory ideas of Grim and Ham Luske.

For the production of Bambi, Marc was a member of the story team for three years before Walt assigned him to be trained by Milt Kahl and Frank Thomas to become an animator. Davis’s efforts were applied to Bambi, Thumper, and Flower. This was followed by animating Br’er Rabbit, Br’er Fox, and Br’er Bear in Song of the South, Bongo and yawning trees for Fun and Fancy Free, and Mr. Toad, Cyril Proudbottom, Rat, Mole, Angus MacBadger, Mr. Winkie and the weasels on The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad.

Davis’s skill, his in-depth work with reference images, voice actors, and live action actors gave him a level of expertise resulting in assignments to animate female characters almost exclusively for the rest of his animating career. His animation of these characters’ acting, posing, and movement was so masterful, he became known as Disney’s “ladies’ man.”

In Cinderella, besides working on the Stepsisters tearing Cinderella’s dress apart, Marc animated Cinderella herself. His scene where Cinderella is transformation into her ballroom gown was regarded as Walt’s personal favorite of all the Disney films.

Marc animated Alice for Alice in Wonderland, Mrs. Darling and Tinker Bell’s personality using only Tink’s pantomime and facial expressions in Peter Pan, and Briar Rose/Aurora, Maleficent, and Queen Leah from Sleeping Beauty.

He animated both Anita and Cruella de Vil for 101 Dalmatians in 1961. Once that feature’s production ended, Marc transferred to Walt Disney Imagineering to create and develop rides for Disneyland and Walt Disney World before retiring in 1978.

In 1982, Marc was the recipient of the Winsor McCay Award. He received the Golden Award for 50 years of service from the Motion Picture Screen Cartoonists 1985, and in 1989, he was inducted as a Disney Legend.

The Author

Lavalle Lee

Lavalle Lee has been creating animated cartoons online since 1999/2000 for his website flashcartoons.org. Many cartoons on the site have gained viral video status reaching millions of viewers online. In 2009, Lavalle started learning hand drawn animation from Don Bluth in his animation classes, as well as attending his Masterclasses in Arizona. He has also personally studied animation and visual effects from Veteran Disney animators in Orlando, FL.

Lavalle is widely known in the animation industry as the creator of the TraditionalAnimation.com website. After seeing that most animation sites were about all types of animation, not any specific to classical hand drawn animation, Lavalle knew Traditional Animation needed to be represented online. TraditionalAnimation.com has become the leading website and social media account for all things 2D. The website served as inspiration for “The Traditional Animation Show” in which Lavalle was both producer and host.

His partnership with Don Bluth began when he championed the Dragon's Lair Indiegogo campaign as lead project manager, editor, voice actor and in-betweener. The campaign reached $730,000 dollars to produce a 7-minute pitch video. In 2017, Lavalle brought the idea of creating a school to Don Bluth, and Don Bluth University was born. After a decade of learning from Don Bluth and working together on multiple pitches and business ventures, Lavalle accepted the position as Vice President of Don Bluth's new company Don Bluth Studios.