There was going to be a CG
Dumbo spin-off, starring Casey Junior, the train. Thankfully, it was shelved. I hope it stays that way.
So how did Klay Hall wind up as director of Disney's Planes? First there was this train derailment or should I say: First an earlier project that Hall was going to helm -- one built around a talking steam train -- got derailed. "This must have been June or July of 2009. I was just finishing up directing Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure. And John Lasseter asked me what I wanted to do next," Klay remembered. "As it turns out, John and I are both big train buffs. So for a while there, we knocked around an idea for a movie that would kind of built off of the steam train from Dumbo. 'Where this train would transport animals that could talk, and you'd only see the people who ran this steam train in shadow. It was a fun sounding concept, but the overall story never really jelled. So our steam train movie idea eventually wound up getting shelved."
Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jim-hill/ ... 63895.html
When asked about the origins of the project Hall told us that he and John Lasseter had a great working relationship and they began to talk about a new project. “I had an idea about working on a train movie, I love locomotives and I wanted to do a historical piece on the railroad but then set it the present with flashbacks,” Hall said. ” And he liked that idea, he’s a railroad guy too, we talked back and forth. And then he called out of the blue one day and said, “what do you think about planes? I know we have the train thing going, but how about you set that aside and we do something with planes?” Hall was enthusiastic, “He knew I had a passion for aviation, if there is one thing I love more than trains, it’s planes.”
Source: http://www.babble.com/disney/disneys-pl ... -producer/
It all began almost 4 1/2 years ago when Disney “Planes” director Klay Hall was finishing up his last film, and had become friends with John Lasseter. “It just happened that I am a geek and nuts about planes, trains, and cars, and so is he,” said Hall. John Lasseter and Klay Hall would talk about it all the time, and when Hall was finishing up his current movie, John Lasseter asked him what he wanted to work on next? Klay Hall knew that Thomas the Tank Engine was currently out on the market, but he wanted to elevate the idea.
Then 4-6 months into working on the film, Hall got a call from John Lasseter who said, “I know that you are working on the trains thing, and everything is coming along, and it’s looking really cool…but what do you think about making it an airplanes movie?” He remembered exactly how it happened. He was sitting in the coffee shop over at the other animation studio when Hall said to John Lasseter over the phone, “If there is one thing I love more than trains it’s planes.” Then Hall described how they both started laughing.
Source: http://ocmomblog.com/how-disney-planes- ... klay-hall/
When ideas for a new movie were being tossed around between John Lasseter and Klay, one idea they talked about, and even started on, was a movie about trains. Klay and John wanted to pay homage to the transcontinental railroad, but in a Disney classic kind of way. But after a few months, John called Klay and asked him what he thought about sidelining the trains project and concentrating on planes. Klay was instantly on board and that’s how PLANES was born.
Source: http://www.fabulousmomblog.com/2013/07/ ... ys-planes/
And then, as time went on and I finished my previous film, I was working on this idea about the Transcontinental Railroad with steam trains. It had animals and people in it. It had nothing to do with the Cars world. One day he had the epiphany. He called me up, and he was like, “Hey, what do you think? I know you're working on the train thing, but what do you think about maybe shifting from the train and maybe working on Planes?” And like John, if there’s one thing I like more than trains, it’s planes.
Source: http://collider.com/klay-hall-traci-bal ... interview/
I was working on a train idea that dealt with the Transcontinental Railroad. It had steam trains, it had humans and it had animals. He really liked it a lot and was helping me flush it out. Then one day he was flying in from Pixar and I got a call. He said, “Hey Klay, I have this idea. What do you think about planes instead of trains?” I was like, “John, if there is one thing I like more than trains, it’s definitely planes.” [...] He said, “Look, I’m thinking about this idea. What do you think about let’s drop the trains thing for now and let’s do planes. Let’s make a whole new world above the world of Cars, drafting off the cars world that has already been established. Let’s leave it there and go for something brand new.” And that’s kind of how it all came about.
Source:
http://www.awn.com/articles/films/direc ... ure-planes
