The Stage

Roy E Disney

Published Monday 25 January 2010 at 16:15 by Michael Quinn

Roy E Disney was the last Disney to run the eponymous entertainment empire created by his uncle Walt and father Roy.

Briefly a film editor on the television crime series Dragnet, he joined the family firm in the early fifties as a writer on the TV series Zorro and scored two early Oscar successes as producer of the True Life Adventure series. In 1961, he helped to create and was a director of the California Institute of the Arts.

Elevated to the board in 1967, following Walt’s death, he twice left the company due to creative differences and disagreements about strategy, initially moving into real estate before heading a takeover bid with Michael Eisner and Frank Wells in 1984. Under his direction, Disney regained its animation crown with hits like The Lion King and The Little Mermaid, although Fantasia 2000 was a notable flop.

Following his second resignation in 2003, he launched the Save Disney campaign, leading to messy and prolonged boardroom wrangles that culminated in Eisner’s ousting in 2005 and the on-off, on again collaboration with 3D animation specialists Pixar.

He divorced his wife of 52 years, with whom he had four children, in 2007 to marry Leslie DeMeuse, with whom he produced a documentary on the Transpacific yacht race.

Born on January 30, 1930, Disney died from cancer on December 16, aged 79.