Glen Keane gave me his pencil.

When I was 19 years old, I decided to quit my job as an apprentice joiner and go all in on my dream. I sold all my worldly possessions, my car and two surfboards, and headed up to an animation school in Auckland New Zealand. It was a horrible time, but I sucked it up and focused on my goal. I worked two side jobs, punched holes in paper for 20cents a sheet, had death threats and hustled seven days a week. It was during this time that I sent a letter to Glen Keane, who at the time was a feature animator at the Walt Disney animation studio.
Why did I send a letter to this particular feature animator? What did I want from him? Well, I guess I was looking for a glimpse of hope. I discovered animation late and Walt Disney animation even later. When I finally did it was a behind-the-senses clip of Glen Keane’s animation of the ‘Beast’ in Beauty and the Beast that struck me. That wild and energetic animation is the reason I got into animation in the first place. Glen was an inspiration to me, and I wanted to reach out to what I imagined to be that wonderful world of feature animation.
I continued to struggle past my limits in draughtsmanship and get to a place where I could start to think about things like timing, spacing and even acting. Then one day when I had almost forgotten about the whole thing I received a letter from the Walt Disney company. I was nearly too scared to open it. When I finally got the courage to opened and read the note inside my heart sank. It was a letter from Glen Keane’s assistant telling me to keep up my training and to read the following list of books. As I was about to throw it away, I noticed something on the back of the letter. It was a handwritten note in thick black charcoal pencil. Glen had taken the time to write a personalised letter to some nobody on the other side of the world.
I spent years trying to follow his advice and struggling to get work where I could. All the while improving my draftsmanship so that one day I would be worthy to be a member of the animation elite in Burbank. I animated on television series and direct to video films in New Zealand and then moved to London where I was lucky enough to join the ranks of some fantastic animators like Gary Dunn, Steve Small, Gabriele Zucchelli, Pete Candeland and many more. I worked on a ton of breakfast cereal commercials and learnt so much just through the sheer volume of work we produced and the creative problems we were solving. Then I worked on an independent feature film where I saw the discipline of Gabriele Zucchelli a wonderfully skilled animator. All this finally leads to a shot at a Dreamworks Film called Sinbad.
Myself and a few other animators were asked to stay on after finishing the production of a pilot and try out for the crew on the coming Film — As we had never done a feature before we were considered juniors. We sat in the studio working blind on shots from previous feature films which were then judged by the head of the animation studio. I couldn’t help but feel this was a pointless ego trip that made no sense to me and frankly cured me of all desire to enable these delusional bullies. I mean we did so many versions of these scenes and had no direction. We were a remote studio in the UK that would get the overflow from Burbank, and as junior animators, we would end up doing crowd shots or background characters if we were lucky. This type of management breeds stupidity, and I had already seen this when I was an apprentice cabinet maker. The funny thing was a few months into production they were hiring pretty much anyone that could hold a pencil. There were some fantastic animators on the film of course like Gary Dunn, Tim Watts and Gabriele Pennacchioli.
The closer I got to feature animation, the less I wanted it. I realised my romantic image of what it would be like was not at all in line with my new reality. I had moved so far away from it that it never really seemed to have a point anymore. The freedom I had on commercials and flat management structure that came with small crews was terrific. Also, with the introduction of digital tools drawing was no longer your ticket to an exclusive club.
Anyone that could understand spacing and timing could be an animator. Technology had democratised the whole thing and allowed new types of films and styles to emerge. We were no longer trying to replicate real movements, but we’re learning more about storytelling and expressing emotions through new stylistic possibilities.
Years went by, and I had become a Director, Creative Director, Development Executive and finally a Producer. After 12yrs in the same company, I left to start a new adventure. It was at this time, after yet another ANNECY festival, when I saw a familiar figure board the train just ahead of me. I waited for the train to depart for Paris, and then I summoned my courage to go and see if it was indeed Glen Keane who had just boarded. Sure enough there he was with his wife. I interrupted them, as politely as possible, to say thank you.
Many things have happened over the years some things worked out how I expected, and some turned out completely different, but this whole adventure would never have started if this man had not sent me that letter at a moment when things were very difficult.
We had a chat, and after a moment I got up to leave. As casually as you like, Glen said: “hey you should try this pencil, it’s not as good as the old ones I had but tell me what you think?” This man has accomplished everything there is to accomplish in the world of animation and his child like enthusiasum for what we do is nothing short of magical.

I don’t know what any of this means but for some reason 23yrs after I got that letter and right when I was stepping into a new phase of my life, Glen Keane gave me his pencil. Which in hindsight was exactly what I needed because it gave me hope for the future.
