John Lasseter Accused of Sexual Assault

[Sotiris]

Lee needs to stop praising Lasseter in interviews. She may feel grateful to him for giving her a chance as a director but considering everything he did to her fellow female colleagues over the decades, it comes off as not only tasteless and out of touch but an implicit attempt to rehabilitate his image.

Lee has had a lot "to process" these past few years. She watched someone she respected, John Lasseter, get forced out of Disney over allegations of sexual misconduct. Lee says Lasseter was instrumental in putting her on Frozen after he saw how well she connected to the team developing the movie. "As a woman, the kind of princess I always felt we needed, in terms of the strength and the messiness and the quirkiness, the lack of grace some of us have...that resonated," Lee says. "And [Lasseter] saw that and brought me into that team."

Source: https://www.kuow.org/stories/disney-ani ... a-and-anna

[JeanGreyForever]

This is not a good look for her. I can understand her not wanting to badmouth him, but in that case, she should simply not bring him up at all rather than constantly reiterate all he's done for her.

[Disney Duster]

He did bad things. She's pointing out the good things. Should you only bring up the bad someone did all the time?

I'm not a supporter of him or defending him I just think you don't always have to say "he's bad, he's bad" and that's all you get to say about him. I'm defending Lee, not him.

[rodis]

^absolutely agreed. He did good things too.

[JeanGreyForever]

I'm sure Hitler did some good things too but that doesn't mean normal people feel the need to go around and remind others of that. And I'm not trying to equate Lasseter with Hitler here, but Lasseter's legacy has been tarnished and if Disney isn't willing to speak out about that then it's better for them to not speak about him at all rather than continuing to laud his accomplishments and all he did, particularly in this case all he did for a woman, when we know how he really was with women. Lee seems to be trying to suggest that since he treated her correctly, he shouldn't be held accountable for his dealings with other women as if those accusations are unfounded.

Anyway, it's not like you hear people go around in the media and try and praise Weinstein or any of the other sexual offenders exposed by #MeToo. Lasseter shouldn't be held to a different standard.

[Disney Duster]

I think if someone has done good things for you, and then you learn they did horrible things, you want to point out the good in addition to the bad. I'm sure Lasseter's family and loved ones would say good things about him, too. I don't hold him to a different standard, I think you can say good things about any one who is still what we would call an awful person.

[JeanGreyForever]

Except Jennifer Lee isn't pointing out the bad at all or acknowledging the people he victimized. And in fact, Disney has had a pretty bad track record of owning up to what Lasseter did in general so this isn't an issue exclusive to Lee.

[Disney Duster]

Well, she's torn about her feelings and wants to say what she knows happened to her, and what happened to her was good things related to him. She isn't saying he should be absolved or allowed to have a position like he once had again. They just asked about her feelings about him and she talked about what he did for her. You are right she should say something about the bad, like, "I'm sad to hear what he's done, and it's awful" at the very least.

It's weird we are talking about this, and in Frozen II she has Elsa say Hans was an iredeemable monster.

[JeanGreyForever]

Well, she's torn about her feelings and wants to say what she knows happened to her, and what happened to her was good things related to him. She isn't saying he should be absolved or allowed to have a position like he once had again. They just asked about her feelings about him and she talked about what he did for her. You are right she should say something about the bad, like, "I'm sad to hear what he's done, and it's awful" at the very least.

It's weird we are talking about this, and in Frozen II she has Elsa say Hans was an iredeemable monster.

The bolded text is what I think a lot of us wanted or expected to hear especially since Jennifer Lee is responsible for creating such a feminist film yet she doesn't apply those principles to real life. It would be like if Elsa and Anna try to brand Hans a villain but some lady claims that he has always been good to her and constantly defends him from all criticism regardless of the fact that how he treated her doesn't mean he didn't try and kill Elsa and Anna.

And yes, a lot of fans here have posted on the blatant hypocrisy of Jennifer Lee claiming Hans is an irredeemable monster, yet the real-life one gets no such flack whatsoever from her. A part of me almost wonders if the reason Hans was cut from the film (since apparently he was a major character at some point in production) is because they feared that a redemption storyline for him wouldn't gel after what Lasseter was exposed as.

[Disney Duster]

Oh, I understand. Yeah, I agree.

[Semaj]

It's a complicated subject.

Only a fair number of diligent cartoon fans had heard about misogyny behind the scenes before Lasseter got outed, and many more Disney fans knew nothing at all. The mass majority beyond those on the inside never knew about Lasseter's dark side; the lot of us only ever knew him as a modern-day Walt Disney. This, along with Chris Savino and John Kricfalusi, has me second-guessing celebrities in general.

Although Jennifer Lee is downplaying the situation, it's not as if Disney or Pixar are ignoring the problem completely. The fact that Jennifer Lee took Lasseter's place indicates that they're making a move to tear down the "glass wall" within the studio. Pixar's own moves, with positioning Pete Docter as the top man, reinvigorating their shorts program with new artists, AND putting a stop to their sequels all indicate that there was a bit of malaise going on at Pixar over the past decade. All of which can be surmised to the studio resting on its laurels under Lasseter's rule. (Who REALLY asked for a Cars 2 or 3? Why did we REALLY need a Toy Story 4?)

Toy Story 4 became more symbolic than what was intended. Not only is it the end of the Toy Story saga, dating back to the beginning of Pixar's features, it also marks the very last Pixar film that will bear Lasseter's name, and HOPEFULLY, the last of their sequelitis, which is unfortunately what the 2010's at Pixar will be remembered for.

[Farerb]

Well, good for Jennifer Lee. I wonder if Brenda Chapman shares her views on Lasseter.

[Hardbackyoyo]

Why did we REALLY need a Toy Story 4?

Simple. Because Toy Story 3 marked the ending of Woody's time with Andy, but it was not necessarily the ending of Woody's OWN story.

[thedisneyspirit]

^Stop white-knighting Disney's cash grabs.

[Disney's Divinity]

We didn't need oodles and oodles of off-shoots of Winnie the Pooh either, but I'm still glad they exist. Toy Story is one of the few properties with a world that can go on forever really.

[Sotiris]

John Lasseter has hired Peggy Holmes who directed Secret of the Wings and The Pirate Fairy for him at DisneyToon Studios to direct an animated feature titled "Luck" at Skydance Animation.

Skydance Animation's First Film 'Luck' Lands New Director
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat- ... or-1269771

[D82]

I was a bit surprised that John Musker and Ron Clements thanked John Lasseter in their speech when they received the Winsor McCay Award at the Annies. This is what they said:

Ron Clements: ... and (thanks to) John Lasseter who brought us back to Disney after Treasure Planet, after our exile.

John Musker: We have been exiled, yes. Thank you, John.

You can watch their speech here (they mention Lasseter at the 2:13:18 mark).

Well, I understand they are grateful to him, what surprised me is that they dared to say it publicly. Their speech was quite humorous, by the way. I knew John likes to tell jokes, but I didn't know Ron could also be funny. I'm glad they were given this award. They really deserve it.

[JeanGreyForever]

TBH, that's a bit upsetting. I understand Lasseter did something for them but they really should have left his name out completely. And is it even true that after the failure of Treasure Planet, he was the one who brought them back from their "exile?" I was under the impression they were asked back for Fraidy Cat, before Lasseter was put in charge, and that the entire reason the film got canned was after the regime change when Lasseter came aboard and felt the film had no commercial value.

[Sotiris]

And is it even true that after the failure of Treasure Planet, he was the one who brought them back from their "exile?" I was under the impression they were asked back for Fraidy Cat, before Lasseter was put in charge, and that the entire reason the film got canned was after the regime change when Lasseter came aboard and felt the film had no commercial value.

Fraidy Cat was canceled during the David Stainton era, about a year before Lasseter took over. I don't think their heart was ever in that project. It was a radical departure from their story interests and they hadn't even come up with the idea themselves like they had with their previous films. They were replacement directors. This was the pet project of Piet Kroon who had been working on it since 2002. In 2004, he was replaced by Musker and Clements (with the story pretty much remaining intact) and in 2005 it was canceled. So, they spent less than a year in development working on it. I doubt they were emotionally invested in the project. I speculate it was assigned to them by management as busy work until their contracts expired.

When Lasseter took over, he called Musker & Clements who were about to sign a contract with DreamWorks Animation and offered them their jobs back. But of course, that's not a valid reason to publicly thank someone who sexually assaulted their female colleagues. I don't understand why they feel so grateful to him in the first place. Yes, he took them back at Disney but at the cost of their artistic integrity. With The Princess and the Frog, he forced them to set the film in New Orleans, imposed Randy Newman as the songwriter and corrupted their storytelling style with the road trip formula and dumb hillbilly jokes. And he did the same thing to them with Moana. They wanted to make the film about Maui (like their other male-led films) but he forced them to make it about an Ariel knock-off. Not to mention, he didn't even let them make their last film there in 2D animation, stringing them along with promises of revolutionary hybrid techniques that never came to be.

[Disney's Divinity]

I didn't know they were going to sign on to Dreamworks. I wonder if we would've got M&C with Menken if they'd actually went over there. Maybe we still could if Musker decided to work over there, since Menken doesn't seem really tied down to WDAS. Of course, he does do TV, Broadway, and the re-makes with/for Disney, so maybe he does have a contract that restricts him?

Also, how do you know Lasseter was responsible for the hillbillies? I'm not doubting you, that's just something I didn't know. I know the roadtrip thing and Randy Newman had to be down to John Lasseter at least. The thing was, I have a hard time believing TP&TF wasn't forced on them as well... Not that I don't love what they did with it, but I thought Disney decided they wanted to create a black princess and that's where TP&TF began. Do we know that M&C initiated or pitched the film themselves? I mean, even Moana feels like they were told to re-create The Little Mermaid, there are so many similarities...

I don't think they really enjoyed their last years at Disney, but given the choice between going to a new studio and staying at Disney, I imagine they wanted to stay at the studio where they have so much history, that's the most renowned animation studio in the world. Perhaps he is simply acknowledging that they were allowed to continue working there by Lasseter, when they could've been forced out with so many other employees (including Menken) as well as the hand-drawn medium itself.