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Tuesday, March 03, 2009

Happy Birthday Ronald Searle

Today is Mr Searle's 89th birthday! Before I left France I was over-joyed to receive a package from Mr Searle himself. When I met him last year he told me about the animated spots he made with Ivor Wood & would try to dig out the tape for me. As good as his word the tape arrived along with some photos from his archive. The photos relate to his time in New York & Hollywood in the 50s making Energetically Yours.

Above is a shot from his tour of the Disney studio that is previously un-published as far as I know. Walt must have been in a particularly jovial mood that day.

It's an honour to have Mr Searle effectively contributing to this blog! I told him about this site but I don't think he's online, although he did tell me to look for pen nibs on Ebay!

7 comments:

samacleod said...

What the??? That's incredible! What an awesome guy.

That's an amazing photo.

docnad said...

I believe that's an animatronic hippo destined for Disneyland's Jungle Cruise ride.

Uli Meyer said...

89 years and still working. Happy Birthday Mr. Searle.

Joe Corrao 4 Eyed Animation said...

Still the man...I was just thru the Davies Bio of RS on his BDay...awe inspiring.

warren said...

Happy Belated Birthday, Mr. Searle! May you have more fruitful years to come.

Unknown said...

working at 89 ! its great ! happy birthday Mr.Searle
and its a great work of you to create and contineu this blog.
good luck

Brian Sibley said...

A year late on commenting here, Matt, but on the subject of Searle's influence on 101 Dalmatians, I pointed out on the extras to the most recent DVD (and I'm sure you already KNOW this) that, amongst the clutter in Roger's bachelor apartment, we see lying on the window-seat, a copy of Lilliput...