MORRISON MONDAYS!
By BILL MORRISON
Ninety-two years ago this week (June 9), Disney’s animated short “The Wise Little Hen” unleashed the world’s most cantankerous cartoon waterfowl, Donald Duck, on an unsuspecting world.
To avoid getting comments that begin with “Actually,” and which I would read in Comic Book Guy’s voice, I’ll add that Disney’s then-distributor United Artists set June 9, 1934, as the release date of the short, though it was first shown on May 3, 1934, at the Carthay Circle Theatre in Los Angeles for a benefit program. It was later given its official debut June 7 at Radio City Music Hall in New York City. So, we could also say that Donald Fauntleroy Duck was born 92 years ago yesterday, or even last month on the 3rd.
Regardless of those conflicting dates, Tuesday is officially recognized as Donald Duck Day, and for that reason I’m celebrating my favorite Disney character by sharing a limited-edition print that I drew and painted for the Disney gallery art program in 2014.
The original, with 10 emotions
One of the reasons I’m so partial to Donald is the fact that, for an animated character, he has a very wide range of human emotions that make him seem more real than most of his cartoon counterparts. Though he’s mostly thought of as ornery, he can at times be happy, sad, mischievous, carefree, suspicious, shy… all the things we humans are at one time or another. I identify with him because he exhibits all the emotions that I do. For that reason, I decided to explore — and to name the print — “The Many Moods of Donald.”
My original piece featured ten moods, but it was edited down to only seven for reasons that I no longer recall:
The final
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MORE
— THE SIMPSONS’ YELLOW ALBUM: When I Ripped Off THE BEATLES — Then Got Ripped Off to the Tune of $14.8 MILLION. Click here.
— BART, I AM YOUR FATHER: A Simpsons STAR WARS Anniversary Salute. Click here.
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Eisner winner BILL MORRISON has been working in comics and publishing since 1993 when he co-founded Bongo Entertainment with Matt Groening, Cindy Vance and Steve Vance. At Bongo, and later as Executive Editor of Mad Magazine, he parodied the comics images he loved as a kid every chance he got. Not much has changed.
Bill is on Instagram (@atomicbattery) and Facebook (Bill Morrison/Atomic Battery Studios), and regularly takes commissions and sells published art through 4C Comics.
