Roy E. Disney

There was Peter Schneider, who was the president of Walt Disney Feature Animation.

There was Roy E. Disney, Walt's nephew, vice chairman of that part of Disney Studios, and then there was Jeffrey Katzenberg, who right up until Michael Eisner booted him out of the Mouse House, uh, that would've been September of '94, uh, he had the final say when it came to everything that Feature Animation did.

Anyway, as Chapek recounts in Behind the Castle Wall, and I'll qu- I'm quoting directly now from the books, Bob told these guys, "There's a lot of demand for Aladdin.

I think we should do a sequel." Now, as for the response that Chapek got when he offered up this suggestion, and again, I'm quoting directly from Behind the Castle Walls here, "Let's just say they didn't look like a genie had just come out of a lamp.

Now, to dispute what Bob Chapuk recently said in his memoir, these men didn't think that making a theatrical sequel to a Disney feature animation film was beneath them.

I mean, again, they just produced The Rescuers Down Under some three years earlier.

So if we're being completely honest here, what was likely more concerning to Peter Schneider and Roy E. Disney was, well, they didn't want to spend the next three and a half years producing a sequel to Aladdin only to have that film misfire at the box office the way The Rescuers Down Under just had.

I mean, I remember talking with friends at Walt Disney Feature Animation back in the early 90s and the subject of why exactly The Rescuers Down Under hadn't connect with audiences back then.

Well, that's another good question.

One of the things that we see happening, I mean, one of the things that happens 2004, 2005 is Michael Eisner gets forced out of top job at Disney and this is a guy that was hired 20 years earlier in the mid 80s when Roy Disney Walt's nephew executed a boardroom coup and was able to bring in Michael Eisner and his chief He liked to call him his golden retriever, but he was his second in command at Paramount, Jeffrey Kassenberg.

And Eisner is worth mentioning because, you know, his departure marks in many ways, he was the last of the of the studio heads back in the day who came up, who understood production and who was invested in filmmaking and who actually thought he could run the studio.

And once he forced Katzenberg out, he went off and started DreamWorks with Spielberg and the SKG Troika, David Geffen and Steven Spielberg and Katzenberg.

Well, that's another good question.

The, the [clears throat] one of the things that, that, uh, we see happening, I mean, one, one of the things that happens 2004, 2005 is Michael Eisner gets forced out of the top job at Disney, and th- this is a guy that was hired 20 years earlier in the mid-'80s when Roy Disney, Walt's nephew, uh, executed a boardroom coup and, and was able to bring in Michael Eisner and his chief, uh, he liked to call him his golden retriever, but he, he was, uh, his second in command at, at Paramount, uh, Jeffrey Katzenberg.

Uh, and, and, and, uh, Eisner is worth mentioning because, uh, you know, his departure marks in many ways, he was the last of the, of the studio heads back in the day who came up, who, who understood production and who was invested in filmmaking and who actually thought he could run the studio.

And once he forced Katzenberg out, who went off and started DreamWorks with Spielberg and, and, uh, as-- or, or the SKG troika, David Geffen and Steven Spielberg and Katzenberg.