A Clean and Separate Space: Walt Disney in Person and Production.

DISNEY, Walt, 1901-1966; VALUES (Ethics); PERSONALITY; CULTURAL industries; POPULAR culture

This article profiles Walter Elias Disney. A close examination of his biography and his relation to his work reveals that while his life and values did provide the raw material for his creations, a little known private side actually contradicted his cheerful public image. Disney used his enthusiastic personal style as a model, and he set up his own traditional values, nostalgia for the past, and hopes for the future as guides for the creation of popular images that are cheerfully separate from social realities. Yet ironically, he used a harsh management style to produce easy-going, fun-loving stories. Disney's productions, including his organizations, have become his personality writ large in both their clean and cheerful images and their less well known passion for order and control. Although he gained fame as a Hollywood mogul, Disney always remained a child of the midwest. When critics and intellectuals accused his work of being corny and unsophisticated, he had the last laugh, responding ryely in defense of his heartland populism. Millions and more have indeed eaten up his midwest-nurtured vision of life. Disney was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1901, and his family followed their restless father through a series of jobs and relocations.