Aladdin & Hercules Animator Eric Goldberg On What It Takes To Create A Highly Successful Career As An Animator

… You know, it starts in my fever brain, and really, it’s hard to make a stroke without knowing what it is you’re trying to draw. I think that’s something that a lot of artists and animators don’t think about first, they’ll just start doodling and there’s nothing wrong with that. But for characters, you’ve gotta think about who the character is, what the situation the character is in and how that character would react in particular to that situation.

You can’t just draw a character as much as drawing a character doing something, or being involved in a particular train of thought or an idea, you know? So for the drawing that I made on Sketchbook, obviously the genie is a ham. So he’s got his top hat in his cane <laugh>. If I wanted to make the genie feeling sad, I would’ve given him downcast eyebrows and kind of an arched back. So you’re always thinking about what the character is thinking and trying to express to the audience.

Asa part of our series about pop culture’s stars, I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Eric Goldberg. Eric is renowned for his role in creating and supervising the animation of the Genie character for “Aladdin,” for directing “Pocahontas” and the “Rhapsody in Blue” and “Carnival of the Animals” sequences for “Fantasia/2000,” along with numerous other achievements. He is the recipient of the 2011 Winsor McCay award from ASIFA-Hollywood for lifetime achievement in animation. Among his recent work, he created new animation for the Cirque du Soleil show, “Drawn to Life,” at Disney Springs in Orlando, Fla. He has also contributed animation to a variety of projection shows and special projects for Disney Parks and Experiences around the world.

Goldberg’s animation knowledge started early, creating flip books at age six and moving on to making prize-winning Super 8 films from the age of 13. After attending Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY, majoring in illustration, Goldberg became a full-time assistant animator to legendary director Richard Williams on “Raggedy Ann and Andy.” He went on to direct countless TV spots for Williams in London before coming to Los Angeles to serve as director of animation on the Emmy®-winning “Ziggy’s Gift.” Returning to London, he co-founded Pizazz Pictures, a commercial studio with a world-wide clientele.

Goldberg joined Walt Disney Animation Studios in 1990 to supervise the animation of the wise-cracking Genie in “Aladdin.” He then co-directed “Pocahontas” (1995), and animated the feisty satyr Phil in “Hercules” (1997). His directing stints on “Fantasia/2000” were a labor of love and were inspired by both George Gershwin and the legendary theatrical caricaturist Al Hirschfeld, who served as artistic consultant.

Other Disney credits include “The Princess and the Frog” (for which he supervised Louis, the trumpet-playing alligator, earning him his third Annie Award for best character animation), “Winnie the Pooh” (supervising Rabbit and the “Backson Song” sequence), and “Wreck-It Ralph” (helping to flesh out the character of King Candy). He also served as head of animation for 2013’s Oscar®-nominated short, “Get a Horse!” and recently was the director, writer, and a supervising animator for the animated shorts “Disney Presents Goofy in How to Stay at Home.”

Goldberg and wife, Susan, a talented artist and art director in her own right, have two daughters, Rachel and Jenny, who both work as artists in the entertainment industry.

Eric Goldberg joined Disney Animation as the supervising animator of Genie for 1992’s Aladdin. He is considered one of the greatest animators in history. In this episode of Sketchbook, he revisits the character Genie. (Disney/Richard Harbaugh)

I’m so excited to talk to you today. I checked out the new docu series. and it looks like a lot of fun. What was your favorite part about working on Sketchbook?

Ohboy, I think my favorite part about working on it was knowing what it was going to mean for people who were, you know, kids. I remember what it meant when I was a kid, to see this kind of stuff and understand that everybody could do it, that it’s not a million miles removed to actually pick up a pencil and start drawing. It’s actually very natural for the human animal. I mean, animals are the only animals on the planet who want to make a mark on something.

Right. I know my kids like to make marks on everything..! and they love to draw.

Yeah, but it’s a natural thing and drawing is just a part of that. You know, one of the nice things when you’re a kid is that you don’t think you know you can do it, but you try! <laughs>.

Yeah. They just wanna try whatever, right.

Absolutely, dive right in and you can do it and I think shows. Sketchbook really helps enforce that idea because it basically says, look, we’re all humans. We all started a certain way, and here, this is our career. I hope it’s inspiring for young and old because I know a lot of people who got into animation after a left turn on their previous career paths. I know people who were engineers and decided I wanna be an animator. You know, people who, who were lawyers who wanted to…

Really, I love that. Really more fun than being a lawyer too. Right. <laughs>.

So I would love to hear about your process of drawing from scratch and witnessing a character come to life. What’s the process like for you? Where do you start?

You know, it starts in my fever brain, and really, it’s hard to make a stroke without knowing what it is you’re trying to draw. I think that’s something that a lot of artists and animators don’t think about first, they’ll just start doodling and there’s nothing wrong with that. But for characters, you’ve gotta think about who the character is, what the situation the character is in and how that character would react in particular to that situation.

You can’t just draw a character as much as drawing a character doing something, or being involved in a particular train of thought or an idea, you know? So for the drawing that I made on Sketchbook, obviously the genie is a ham. So he’s got his top hat in his cane <laugh>. If I wanted to make the genie feeling sad, I would’ve given him downcast eyebrows and kind of an arched back. So you’re always thinking about what the character is thinking and trying to express to the audience.

Do you start with the eyes? I’ve heard a lot of animators do that.

Most of the time I start with the eyes and nose. For the genie, I actually started with a nose <laugh>

Really? So that’s important.

Do you know what the character’s voice is like before you create them? Do you have a meeting, and say okay, this is what we’re going for, or are you the first person to get going on it?

It’s actually very, very important. You know, in the case of the genie in Aladdin, John Musker and Ron Clements, the directors knew they wanted Robin Williams to be the voice of the genie, even before they had him signed on. So in my earlier concept drawings, I’m still doing this kind of bit here, the eyes, nose, mouth, that felt like a Robin Williams caricature, you know, in order to make it more “Robin Williams like”. Now John and Ron had certain things that they wanted the genie to have. They wanted him to have a big barrel chest. They wanted him to have a bald head with a top knot. You know, they wanted him to look like a genie. And so even though I would play with facial caricatures, he still had to present himself as a viable, powerful genie.

Yes. Yeah. That makes sense. I also heard that you made flipbooks as a kid, pretty young, right. You’ve been doing this a long time.

Yes, I started when I was six.

So what makes a Great flip book? Compared to say, just an okay one.

You know, it’s how I taught myself to animate. I learned much, much more as I went along and took art classes and film classes and things like that. I learned a huge amount when I started working with Richard Williams and he was really my mentor. More than anything.

Oh, so that was my next question. <Laugh>

Okay. If, you know, Richard Williams, you know he directed the animation on Roger, but, prior to that, he had his own studio in London and also concurrent with that, he was directing a feature film called Raggedy Ann and Andy and I was an assistant animator on it. So I had been associated with Dick Williams for quite a few years and, you know, and he and I just geeked out about things..

<Laugh> Yeah. So you just geeked out together.

Absolutely. <laugh> and, I learned so much from him. I was assistant animator to Tissa David on Raggedy Ann and Andy, one of the pioneer women animators and she taught me so much. I learned so much working on her work, that it was, it was really an eye-opener for me and that was really my first big professional job.. was working on that film. Yeah.

Exciting times… Now, if you hadn’t taken this path, and I really can’t imagine you now doing anything else. But, if you hadn’t been an animator, what would you be doing, do you think?

Well, when I was in college, you know, I thought I could do a whole bunch of stuff. I thought, well, I wanna be an illustrator. I wanna be a political cartoonist. I wanna be all these things…

Ah, okay.

And I figured, okay, New York was a good place to, to kind of aim for all of those things but when I got into animation professionally, I realized, first of all, how hard it was.

And second of all, that, if I was gonna be in good at it, I had to devote 24–7 to it. You know, so I put the other stuff aside in order to grow as an artist, and funny enough, some of the other things kind of came back as my career took off. I did book illustrations with my wife, Susan. We did various things that I wanted to do prior to getting into the business professionally but really, I just had to concentrate so much on learning about animation if I was gonna be any good at it.

Yeah. Almost obsessing over it. I hear that a lot. People just kind of really have to hone in on that one thing. I guess it can get kind of scattered if not.

Well, thank you so much. I think I speak for everyone when I say I’m so glad that you took this path, because it’s pretty cool. This whole story. I know kids and adults alike will enjoy learning how to draw these characters and hear the stories behind them. I wish you all the best with the show.

Thank you so much.