John Musker | |
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![]() Musker at the 2016 Annecy International Animated Film Festival | |
Born | John Edward Musker November 8, 1953 |
Alma mater | Northwestern University (BA) California Institute of the Arts (MFA) |
Occupations |
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Years active | 1977–present |
Spouse | Gale Musker |
Children | 3 |
Signature | |
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John Edward Musker (born November 8, 1953) is an American animator, film director, screenwriter, and film producer. He often collaborates with fellow director Ron Clements and is best known for writing and directing the Disney animated films The Great Mouse Detective (1986), The Little Mermaid (1989), Aladdin (1992), Hercules (1997), Treasure Planet (2002), The Princess and the Frog (2009), and Moana (2016).
Musker was born in Chicago, Illinois, the second [1] [2] oldest of eight children in an Irish Catholic family. His father, Robert J. Musker, who worked for over 40 years at Illinois Bell Telephone, died in 2008 at the age of 84, [2] and his mother, Joan T. Musker (née Lally), died in 2011 at the age of 81. [1]
He attended Loyola Academy in Illinois and then graduated from the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern University, [3] where he majored in English and drew cartoons for the Daily Northwestern. [4] After that, he obtained his Master of Fine Arts at CALARTS, California Institute of the Arts in Santa Clarita. There he served a two-year apprenticeship with famed animator Frank Thomas, a supervising animator of Disney films such as Peter Pan (1953), Lady and the Tramp (1955), and The Aristocats (1970).
Musker met Ron Clements during the production of The Fox and the Hound in 1981, where he worked as a character animator under Clements and Cliff Nordberg. Musker teamed up with Clements as story artists on The Black Cauldron before they were removed from the project. [5]
Following the green-lighting of Clements's pitch for an adaptation of the children's book series Basil of Baker Street by Eve Titus into an animated feature, Musker and fellow story artist Burny Mattinson were assigned as the original directors while Dave Michener was brought in as an additional director. Due to a shortened production schedule and multiple story rewrites, Roy E. Disney assigned Mattinson to serve as director/producer while Ron Clements was brought in as another director. [6]
While working on The Great Mouse Detective , newly appointed Disney CEO and chairman Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg issued invitations to the animation staff for their first held "gong show" session. Demanding only five new ideas, Clements pitched an adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid and a high-concept idea of Treasure Island in Space , which were both rejected by Katzenberg and Eisner. The next morning, Katzenberg approached Clements and asked him to expand his initial treatment. [7]
With The Little Mermaid in production in 1986, Musker joined Clements in expanding the original treatment into a twenty-page rough script, eliminating the role of the mermaid's grandmother and expanding the roles of the Merman King and the sea witch, [8] and were later joined by Off-Broadway musical composers Howard Ashman and Alan Menken who collaborated on the song and musical score. [9] Released in November 1989, The Little Mermaid was praised as a milestone in rebirth of Disney animation by film critics and collected a domestic gross of $84 million, [10] cumulatively receiving $184.2 million worldwide. [11]
When work on The Little Mermaid was wrapped, Clements and Musker re-developed their idea for Treasure Planet, [12] but the studio still expressed disinterest. Instead, the two directors were offered three projects in development: Swan Lake , King of the Jungle , and Aladdin . [13] The directors eventually chose the latter, desiring a wacky, faster-paced, and more contemporary mood separate from the previous Disney animated films. [14]
Working from Ashman and Menken's treatment and musical score, the two delivered a story reel to Katzenberg in April 1991, which was strongly disapproved. [14] Jettisoning multiple characters and story ideas and adding Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio as co-screenwriters, the production team restructured the entire story in eight days. [15] Released in November 1992, Aladdin received positive reviews from critics, and became the first animated film to gross over $200 million domestically. [16]
Following work on Aladdin, Clements, along with Musker, resumed their work on Treasure Planet, which was again turned down by Katzenberg in 1993, who disapproved of setting the adaptation of a classic adventure tale in outer space. [12] A deal was struck with the two directors to create another commercial film before he would approve Treasure Planet. Rejecting projects in development such as Don Quixote , The Odyssey , and Around the World in Eighty Days , they were later informed of animator Joe Haidar's pitch for a Hercules feature, and signed onto the project. [17]
During production on Hercules , in 1995, Clements and Musker signed a seven-year contract deal with the studio which stipulated following Hercules, the studio would produce Treasure Planet or another project of their choosing. [12]
With Treasure Planet completed in 2002, Clements and Musker later inherited Fraidy Cat, which was originally a project developed by Dutch animation director Piet Kroon. [18] Fraidy Cat, however, never saw its light of day, as David Stainton, then-president of Walt Disney Feature Animation, refused to green-light the project. [19] It was soon followed with Clements and Musker's resignation from Walt Disney Feature Animation in September 2005. [20]
When John Lasseter was appointed chief creative officer over Walt Disney Feature Animation in February 2006, he invited Clements and Musker back to Disney to oversee production on The Frog Princess, [21] and were officially confirmed as directors in the following July. [22] Later re-titled The Princess and the Frog , the film received positive reviews and grossed $267 million worldwide. [23]
After directing The Princess and the Frog, Clements and Musker started working on an adaptation of Terry Pratchett's Mort , [24] but obtaining the film rights prevented them from continuing with the project. [25] To avoid similar problems, they pitched three new ideas, where by 2011, the two directors started developing the film based on an original idea. [25] In late 2012, the duo announced that they will be directing a new film in the future, but they have their lips sealed for the title, the plot, and the animation style.
In July 2013, it was revealed that the film, titled Moana , would be "a Polynesian tale involving the island folk and the idols made famous the world over". [26] On November 10, 2014, Disney confirmed Moana would be released on November 23, 2016. [27]
In March 2018, having worked at Disney for 40 years, Musker announced his retirement from Walt Disney Animation Studios. He is currently animating his own original short film by hand. [28]
Musker is married to Gale. [29] They have twin sons, Jackson and Patrick, and a daughter, Julia. [29] He also has sisters by the names of Patricia, Colleen, Kathleen, Maureen, and Terri, and two younger brothers, Robert and Martin.
Year | Film | Credited as | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Director | Writer | Producer | Animator | Other | Notes | ||
1981 | The Fox and the Hound | No | No | No | Character | No | |
1985 | The Black Cauldron | No | No | No | No | Yes | Additional Story Contributor |
1986 | The Great Mouse Detective | Yes | Story | No | No | No | Developer - Uncredited |
1989 | The Little Mermaid | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Various Voices - uncredited |
1992 | Aladdin | Yes | Screenplay | Yes | No | Yes | Additional Voices - uncredited |
1997 | Hercules | Yes | Screenplay | Yes | No | No | |
2002 | Treasure Planet | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Developer - uncredited |
2008 | Bolt | No | No | No | No | Yes | Special Thanks |
2009 | The Princess and the Frog | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes | Additional Voices |
2012 | Wreck-It Ralph | No | No | No | No | Yes | Additional Visual Development Artist |
2014 | Big Hero 6 | No | No | No | No | Yes | Creative Leadership |
2016 | Zootopia | No | No | No | No | Yes | |
Moana | Yes | Story | No | No | Yes | ||
2018 | Ralph Breaks the Internet | No | No | No | No | Yes | |
2019 | Aladdin | No | No | No | No | Yes | "Based on" credit |
2023 | The Little Mermaid | No | No | No | No | Yes | |
Year | Film | Credited as | ||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Director | Other | Notes | ||||||||
1982 | Luau | No | Yes | Role: Businessman | ||||||
2008 | Jack's Gift | No | Yes | Role: Doctor 1 | ||||||
2017 | Gone Fishing [30] | Yes | No | |||||||
2019 | Mel | No | Yes | Special Thanks | ||||||
2023 | I'm Hip | Yes | No | |||||||
Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
2007 | The Pixar Story | Himself | |
2009 | Waking Sleeping Beauty | caricaturist | |
2018 | Howard | ||
Ceremony | Category | Recipient | Result |
---|---|---|---|
Edgar Allan Poe Award | Best Motion Picture | Nominated | |
Best Animated Film | Won | ||
Won | |||
Annie Awards | Best Individual Achievement: Directing in a Feature Production | Won | |
Best Individual Achievement: Producing in a Feature Production | Won | ||
Best Animated Feature | Nominated | ||
Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award | Best Animated Film | Won | |
Academy Awards | Best Animated Feature | Nominated | |
The Princess and the Frog | Nominated | ||
African-American Film Critics Association Award | Best Screenplay | Won | |
Academy Awards | Best Animated Feature | Nominated | |
Alliance of Women Film Journalists | Best Animated Feature | Nominated | |
Seattle Film Critics Awards | Best Animated Feature | Nominated |
John Musker and Ron Clements have cast certain actors in more than one of their films.
Aladdin is a 1992 American animated musical fantasy comedy film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Buena Vista Pictures Distribution under Walt Disney Pictures. It is based on the Arabic folktale "Aladdin" from One Thousand and One Nights. The film was produced and directed by John Musker and Ron Clements from a screenplay they co-wrote with the writing team of Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio. Featuring the voices of Scott Weinger, Robin Williams, Linda Larkin, Jonathan Freeman, Frank Welker, Gilbert Gottfried and Douglas Seale, the film follows the titular Aladdin, an Arabian street urchin who finds a magic lamp containing a genie. With the genie's help, Aladdin disguises as a wealthy prince and tries to impress the Sultan of Agrabah to win the heart of his free-spirited daughter, Princess Jasmine, as the Sultan's evil vizier, Jafar, plots to steal the magic lamp.
Hercules is a 1997 American animated musical fantasy comedy film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation for Walt Disney Pictures. It is loosely based on the legendary hero Heracles, a son of Zeus in Greek mythology. The film was directed by John Musker and Ron Clements, both of whom also produced the film with Alice Dewey Goldstone. The screenplay was written by Clements, Musker, Donald McEnery, Bob Shaw, and Irene Mecchi. Featuring the voices of Tate Donovan, Danny DeVito, James Woods, and Susan Egan, the film follows the titular Hercules, a demigod with super-strength raised among mortals, who must learn to become a true hero in order to earn back his godhood and place in Mount Olympus, while his evil uncle Hades plots his downfall.
The Little Mermaid is a 1989 American animated musical fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation in association with Silver Screen Partners IV and released by Walt Disney Pictures. It is loosely based on the 1837 Danish fairy tale "The Little Mermaid" by Hans Christian Andersen. The film was written and directed by John Musker and Ron Clements and produced by Musker and Howard Ashman, who also wrote the film's songs with Alan Menken, who also composed the film's score. Featuring the voices of René Auberjonois, Christopher Daniel Barnes, Jodi Benson, Pat Carroll, Paddi Edwards, Buddy Hackett, Jason Marin, Kenneth Mars, Ben Wright and Samuel E. Wright, The Little Mermaid tells the story of a teenage mermaid princess named Ariel, who dreams of becoming human and falls in love with a human prince named Eric, which leads her to make a magic deal with the sea witch, Ursula, to become human and be with him.
Treasure Planet is a 2002 American animated science fiction action-adventure film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures. It is a science fiction adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's adventure novel Treasure Island (1883), and it is the third retelling of the story in an outer space setting, following the Bulgarian film Treasure Planet (1982) and the Italian miniseries Treasure Island in Outer Space (1987). It is the third Disney adaptation of the novel, following Treasure Island (1950) and Muppet Treasure Island (1996). In the film's setting, spaceships are powered by solar sails and resemble the 18th-century sailing vessels of the original Treasure Island.
Walt Disney Animation Studios (WDAS), sometimes shortened to Disney Animation, is an American animation studio that creates animated features and short films for The Walt Disney Company. The studio's current production logo features a scene from its first synchronized sound cartoon, Steamboat Willie (1928). Founded on October 16, 1923, by brothers Walt Disney and Roy O. Disney after the closure of Laugh-O-Gram Studio, it is the oldest-running animation studio in the world. It is currently organized as a division of Walt Disney Studios and is headquartered at the Roy E. Disney Animation Building at the Walt Disney Studios lot in Burbank, California. Since its foundation, the studio has produced 62 feature films, from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) to Wish (2023), and hundreds of short films.
The Computer Animation Production System (CAPS) was a proprietary collection of software, scanning camera systems, servers, networked computer workstations, and custom desks developed by The Walt Disney Company and Pixar in the late 1980s. Although outmoded by the mid-2000s, it succeeded in reducing labor costs for ink and paint and post-production processes of traditionally animated feature films produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios (WDAS). It also provided an entirely new palette of digital tools to the animation filmmakers.
Ronald Francis Clements is an American animator, film director, screenwriter, and film producer. He often collaborates with fellow director John Musker and is best known for writing and directing the Disney animated films The Great Mouse Detective (1986), The Little Mermaid (1989), Aladdin (1992), Hercules (1997), Treasure Planet (2002), The Princess and the Frog (2009), and Moana (2016).
The Princess and the Frog is a 2009 American animated musical romantic fantasy comedy film produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and released by Walt Disney Pictures. It is inspired in part by the 2002 novel The Frog Princess by E. D. Baker, which in turn is based on the German folk tale "The Frog Prince" as collected by the Brothers Grimm. The film was directed by John Musker and Ron Clements and produced by Peter Del Vecho, from a screenplay that Clements and Musker co-wrote with Rob Edwards. The directors also co-wrote the story with the writing team of Greg Erb and Jason Oremland. The film stars the voices of Anika Noni Rose, Bruno Campos, Michael-Leon Wooley, Jim Cummings, Jennifer Cody, John Goodman, Keith David, Peter Bartlett, Jenifer Lewis, Oprah Winfrey, and Terrence Howard. Set in New Orleans during the 1920s, the film tells the story of a hardworking waitress named Tiana who dreams of opening her own restaurant. After kissing prince Naveen, who has been turned into a frog by the evil voodoo witch doctor Facilier, Tiana becomes a frog as well and the two must find a way to turn human again before it is too late.
Randy Cartwright is an American animator.
Tiana is a fictional character in Walt Disney Pictures' animated film The Princess and the Frog (2009). Created by writers and directors Ron Clements and John Musker and animated by Mark Henn, Tiana, as an adult, is voiced by Anika Noni Rose, while Elizabeth M. Dampier voices the character as a child. She will appear in the Disney+ series Tiana.
The Disney Renaissance was a period from 1989 to 1999 during which Walt Disney Feature Animation returned to producing critically and commercially successful animated films. The ten feature films associated with this period are The Little Mermaid (1989), The Rescuers Down Under (1990), Beauty and the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), The Lion King (1994), Pocahontas (1995), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), Hercules (1997), Mulan (1998), and Tarzan (1999).
Mark Alan Henn is an American animator and film director. His work includes animated characters for Walt Disney Animation Studios films, most notably leading or titular characters and heroines. He served as the lead animator for Ariel in The Little Mermaid (1989), Belle in Beauty and the Beast (1991), Jasmine in Aladdin (1992), Young Simba in The Lion King (1994), the title character in Mulan (1998), and Tiana in The Princess and the Frog (2009). He directed the short films John Henry (2000) and D.I.Y. Duck (2024). Henn spent a total of 43 years at Walt Disney Animation Studios, from 1980 until his retirement in 2023.
Waking Sleeping Beauty is a 2009 American documentary film directed by Disney film producer Don Hahn and produced by Hahn and former Disney executive Peter Schneider. The film documents the history of Walt Disney Feature Animation from 1984 to 1994, covering the rise of a period referred to as the Disney Renaissance.
Rob Edwards is an American television and feature film screenwriter and producer. His writing includes the Disney animated feature films Treasure Planet and The Princess and the Frog, both of which were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. In 2009, along with Ron Clements and John Musker, Edwards was awarded the Best Screenplay award from the African-American Film Critics Association for The Princess and the Frog.
Aladdin is a Disney media franchise comprising a film series and additional media. It began with the 1992 American animated feature of the same name, which was based on the tale of the same name, and was directed by Ron Clements and John Musker. The success of the film led to two direct-to-video sequels, a television series, a Broadway musical, a live-action remake, various rides and themed areas in Disney's theme parks, several video games, and merchandise, among other related works.
Moana, is a 2016 American animated musical fantasy adventure film produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and released by Walt Disney Pictures. The film was directed by John Musker and Ron Clements, co-directed by Chris Williams and Don Hall, and produced by Osnat Shurer, from a screenplay written by Jared Bush, and based on a story conceived by Clements, Musker, Williams, Hall, Pamela Ribon, and the writing team of Aaron Kandell and Jordan Kandell.
Moana of Motunui is the title character of the 2016 Walt Disney Animation Studios film Moana. Created by directors Ron Clements and John Musker, Moana is voiced by Hawaiian actress and singer Auliʻi Cravalho. As a toddler, she is voiced by Louise Bush. Moana is set to return in the sequel film Moana 2, which will premiere in 2024, again voiced by Cravalho, as well as a live-action remake film, in 2026, in which she will be portrayed by Catherine Laga'aia.
Wonderful World of Animation is a nighttime show at Disney's Hollywood Studios. The show is a celebration of all Disney animation, beginning with Mickey Mouse. It premiered on May 1, 2019, as part of the park's 30th anniversary celebration, replacing Disney Movie Magic.
Wondrous Journeys was a projection mapping and fireworks show at Disneyland that debuted on January 27, 2023. It premiered alongside World of Color: One as part of the Disney 100 Years of Wonder celebration to commemorate the centennial of The Walt Disney Company. The show contains a large assortment of songs and characters from the entirety of the Walt Disney Animation Studios feature film canon.
Moana is a Disney media franchise that originally started in 2016 with the release of the American animated feature film Moana, produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios, and released by Walt Disney Pictures.