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Episode 57: Dan Wolf - PART 2
73 Plays1 year ago
Join us for part 2 of our conversation with former VP of Communications of the Walt Disney Company, Dan Wolf!
For more on Dan visit his website HERE
DISCLAIMER: We are not an affiliate of the Walt Disney Company nor do we speak for the brand or the company. Any and all Disney-owned audio, characters, and likenesses are their property and theirs alone.
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Sharing the Magic'
00:00:01
Speaker
Welcome to Sharing the Magic, the podcast that takes you on a journey through the enchanting worlds of Disney. Each week, we're joined by a special guest, whether they're a magician creating moments of astonishment or a Disney expert sharing the secrets behind the magic of the happiest place on Earth. Together we'll uncover the stories, inspirations, and behind the scenes tales that bring these worlds to life. So, get ready to be spellbound and transported to a place where dreams come true.
Recap and Katzenberg Memo Impact
00:00:49
Speaker
yeah
00:00:53
Speaker
Hi everyone, welcome to this week's episode of the Sharing the Magic podcast. Last week we shared part one of our conversation with Dan Wolf. This week we invite you to sit back and enjoy part two as we jump back into our conversation. So you you had written the Katzenberg memo and that resulted in what what did you say, a 9% bump? No, no, no, no, no, the the but the the cast no now the cast i theisner shareholder letter ah went up five dollars, which was which was six or seven percent.
00:01:30
Speaker
OK, so six or seven percent. So I want you to go straight tonight when we're done here. Send one over to Disney that they can present to. lock We've been having a rough year. And if we can get the stock up there a little higher, that would be fantastic. Yeah. Yeah, no. great That was a one time. But I will say the cats are now also the stock went up on that because it was, you know, leaked out and people said, oh, they've got a strategy for the student to improve its performance. And I'm joking with you a little bit on that, Dan. but did not I did not have a contractual deal where I got a percentage of those bumps. Well, but that's that's too bad.
Disney's Evolution and Brand Strategy
00:02:15
Speaker
yeah but But on a serious note, when you look at having worked for the Disney company and seeing the evolution over the last few years,
00:02:24
Speaker
You know, what would your personal viewpoint or strategy be on things that you would change now? Do you have anything that you feel, you know, ah or is that something you don't want to touch on? That's absolutely fine. You know, I know I'm happy to talk about just about anything you guys want to. And I I have thought I certainly have thoughts on Or let me, go I'll give you a quick global view, if you will, which is until Touchstone Pictures was started, which was, you know, under, ah you know, Walt's nephew. His name's escaping me right now.
00:03:04
Speaker
may or may not come. Anyway, it it was before Michael Eisner. A lot of people think that all that started under Eisner, but it actually didn't. In Tell Touchdown Pictures, the Disney company and the Disney brand, although Roy Disney would shoot me for saying the brand because he hated calling it a brand, but that's another story I'm happy to discuss. But did the Disney company, the Disney brand were the same thing, okay? Everything the company did was Disney. Then they did in, I guess it was 1983, I think, when Splash came out, Don't Hold Me to the Ear, Touchstone Pictures was started. And even though Splash ironically could be a Disney film today, back then it was it was breaking from the pure family G-rated thing and they called it a Touchstone. Anyway,
00:03:49
Speaker
So once Touchstone Pictures, Touchstone Television, Hollywood Pictures, ah there were these other non-Disney brands that came into the company. And so disney and disney the Disney company now was a bigger tent, did but it was still mostly Disney. Then they bought Cap City's ABC. And then suddenly Disney had ABC and ESPN and they started having shows like who like ah The Bachelor, pretty young Disney, if you will. so for And I was there during that era, that was while I'm there. And then it became just from a communication standpoint, it became harder because you have a company called Disney and you have a brand that is Disney, which is this incredible family brand, but the company called Disney includes all this other stuff.
00:04:40
Speaker
And so it became more confusing, if you will, as to, and when we, you know, when we, because it in before I touched on pictures, you know, if you talked about, him immediately because one thing I did, I was called upon to do several times in my career was to come up with a mission statement for the company. And I came up with some great ideas. None of them were were adopted because it was very hard to say, you know, we could talk about entertainment. We couldn't say we're about family entertainment anymore as a company. ah So, till then we have the phase with Cap Cities and then they buy Marvel and Lucas, which are, you know, which certainly still, which are, you know, gets bigger and bigger as to what's not Disney. And then they buy Fox, which is a whole other studio, which is a whole other company, which most people, I think, now think was not a wise acquisition.
00:05:33
Speaker
ah And so it's all became become, the company's become bigger and a juggernaut, but it's become more confusing as to what it is. and so i So as a VP of communications, if you were in that position now, do you know obviously it becomes slightly more convoluted in the direction of where you're targeting because it's going to be multi-markets or multi-platforms, so to speak, that you have to kind of gear that speaking to. Do you feel that makes you know the CEO's job
00:06:10
Speaker
even more complex and difficult than when you were dealing with Eisner in your time there? You know, does that make Bob Iger's position much more difficult than it's ever been for the Disney company? And is some of that criticism he receives maybe unjustified for the sheer growth of the company as a whole?
Acquisitions and Corporate Identity
00:06:34
Speaker
Well, I mean, those all those acquisitions were his under his watch. So, you know, it was his strategy to make the company what it is today. ah yeah and And certainly one can make a case, certainly Pixar, which I was there for, for the Pixar acquisition. And Pixar fits easily within the Disney scope.
00:06:59
Speaker
Marvel, you can make case that that's still, you know, those films are for kids too and stuff. And and Lucas, you know, and the same thing with Star Wars stuff. When it gets to the Fox acquisition, you know it's just making the company bigger and it has nothing to do with Disney and it's and it's unclear that and and they paid a lot of money for it and I think on Wall Street they pretty much think they overpaid and the company would probably be better off without it. Anyway, and and certainly Eisner said at the time and and I think he was right,
00:07:38
Speaker
that if they didn't buy if they didn't buy cap cities abc it would have been easier to you know disney would still been primarily disney but it might have been acquired in other words in in in this world where of mega mergers and stuff uh if you don't get bigger you tend to get swallowed and if they hadn't bought cap cities abc which for link to a side story there, when after they bought they bought it for, I think, $19 billion, dollars which at the time was one of the biggest acquisitions ever. And somebody I knew who was like number two at Imagineering, I had lunch with, and he said, you know, if Disney was smart, they would sell ABC, the ABC network, because the networks are just going to go downhill. yeah ESPN is very valuable. If Michael had only done that,
00:08:33
Speaker
And he said, you probably get like $10 billion dollars for ABC network at the time, which would be more than half of the acquisition. If Michael had just done that, um he probably would have because they would have offloaded when it was still valuable. and something that has become over the years a bigger and bigger drag uh you know because those three networks that were once so dominant in the country are now you know struggling terribly uh so anyway that was somebody in real time saw that that was would have been a smart thing to do and keep a ESPN and now the problem is now ESPN is struggling
00:09:10
Speaker
Uh, cause that was, that was sort of the dirty little secret of Disney profitability for years, which is they just, you know, people, everybody had basic cable and basic cable. They just kept raising the rate to have ESPN. Cause all basic cable had to include ESPN, but that whole world is changing with streaming. So. You know, Disney now has, you know, it has a lot of challenges because yeah ESPN is isn't what it used to be. ABC
Challenges with ABC, ESPN, and Parks
00:09:38
Speaker
continues to be a problem. The Fox acquisition probably can't be justified financially. ah You know, they talk about selling ABC now, but now who wants to buy ABC? Back in 1995, 96, people would have jumped at it.
00:09:54
Speaker
so yeah you know it's just it's And you have the challenge of you know and they how much more can they raise prices at the parks. you know It's staggering to me how expensive it is. ah and And so, you know, how do you, where do you get the growth? Even in, you know, obviously the Disney sparks are uniquely valuable. ah There's a lot of theme parks out there, but that Disney is still it's its own category. But how do you grow it? How do you get more people? ah Now, Tony Baxter, who probably a lot of you have heard of, you know, who's a great imagineers and I know him and he thinks the wall had the right idea. The ticket books,
00:10:36
Speaker
They should go back to but an electronic form or whatever, wherere where people, i because then if you put if you make a new attraction, and it's the equivalent of any ticket and people buy tickets, then the actually, ah you know, it it actually generates income. Uh, directly, but anyway, all those kinds of issues are debated and it's hard because when you're big, it's hard to get bigger. And it, at the end of the day, we're talking about it a big American corporation, which people have a lot of. Emotional attachment to, but they, you know, as you say, the stock price has to go up and all that. And so there's, there are all these challenges, which I'm happy to not be CEO to have to deal with, but Bob Liger wanted, wanted the job back. yeah So he'd better figure out the solutions.
00:11:24
Speaker
Speaking of Bob Iger, so um when he convinced Steve Jobs in 2006 to accept the Pixar merger, a couple of questions. Interesting story. Go ahead. I was going to answer your question, but i sure I have two questions. Two part questions that you can probably just segue into both of them on the same topic. ah So did you have anything to do with communications on that merger, both with Bob Iger speaking to him or a speech that was given after the so set the successful
Dan's Encounter with Steve Jobs and Pixar
00:11:56
Speaker
merger? And did you meet Steve Jobs? I met job Steve Jobs once in 1994.
00:12:06
Speaker
Jeffrey Katzenberg had left the company and put together a retreat. That was another aspect of my job for a while ah for Rich Frank. who was then they had theyd created a unit of the studio where they broke up the studio and it was called Television and Telecommunications and Rich was the chairman of Television and Telecommunications and we had a retreat in Santa Barbara for the executives of that which I put together and we got Steve Jobs to come speak at it. Now Steve Jobs was not Steve Jobs then. I mean, it was what we think of Steve Jobs. he had he had He had left Apple and we had him come to talk about Pixar, which was this exciting new thing. Toy Story had not come out yet. And so he was there as the guy behind Pixar. And I shook his hand and said, hi. And that was my one interaction with Steve Jobs. Again, sort of before he was Steve Jobs.
00:13:05
Speaker
But then I was there for the Pixar acquisition. I wrote some press release-y type stuff. I didn't write a speech for Bob, per se, as I recall, or anything like that. But here's what I can tell you, which is not what's generally reported. You were saying how how he convinced Steve Jobs to to sell Pixar. That's actually untrue. The tail wagged the dog on that. and Here's the deal. Disney did not want to buy Pixar. Disney wanted to do another distribution deal with Pixar. And Disney held just about all the cards because Disney in the original deal with Pixar, or the deal was in effect at that time, Disney owned 50% of every Pixar film through cards.
00:13:57
Speaker
and And Disney had the right to do a sequel, and Disney was under Michael. Disney had started working on a sequel to Toy Story on their own, because Disney had the right to do that, which John Laster was not happy about, and Steve Jobs wasn't happy about. that So Disney wanted to do another distribution deal with Pixar. Steve Jobs. He told Bob Iger that either you buy Pixar or we will do a deal with another studio.
00:14:30
Speaker
And he forced the issue. And so then Disney didn't want to lose Pixar. And so they ah ended up obviously buying Pixar. But it's amazing that to me that Steve Jobs said that because, again, Disney had the rights to do sequels to everything through cars. So they held most of the chips. But Steve Jobs, because he Steve Jobs was still able to drive that deal, he wanted to sell it. And Steve Jobs, I think it was in his interest to promote the mythology that Bob was behind it. He wanted to build up Bob. And so that's how it is known. But I was there. and And I know that Disney didn't want to buy it. And it all worked out for everybody. And everybody's happy. But that was that was driven by Steve Jobs, that whole deal. And as a result, the Jobs family, Steve Jobs became a major shareholder of Disney and and yeah the board of Disney.
00:15:23
Speaker
You know, and then tragically job site. But anyway, so that is that's my insight insight into that deal. It's just not quite how the story is generally told. It's interesting, because if you look at the history, that's the only perspective that they give that. Yeah, seven it was all somehow but it was really moved by Bob Iger and Bob Iger. It was at least his first round. It was a successful CEO at Disney, but that, and when I worked with him, he was very, he was, it made a lot of sense to me that somebody as strong as Steve Jobs would be, would lead.
00:16:00
Speaker
Steve Jobs and Michael Eisner are very different people. Michael Eisner was very much the guy. And and Michael Eisner was, for the 10 years from 84 to 94, if you will, Michael Eisner was Steve Jobs. In other words, he was celebrated, he was on the cover of everything. who you know Disney had was just zooming up and Michael was celebrated as a business genius. And and he's the kind of guy, when he was in the room, he you know he set the course. And Bob is much more a kind of guy who wants, who gets input, you know, and here's what everybody has to say. And it sort of, uh, goes with the, the sentiment in the room. And it made a lot of sense that that that's how it worked with jobs. And I can see how I wasn't there for that, but with Marvel, a similar thing. We're very strong business leader with Marvel came and said, we want you to buy us. And they did. And the same thing with, uh, with Lucas.
00:17:00
Speaker
All of which, those were good moves, at least for a time, now now they're they are challenged as businesses because the whole business the whole movie business you know is in flux. But anyway, so it's ah so that's my insight on that. ah So Dan, my, ah you know, every time somebody talks about Michael Eisner, my my mind goes back to Wizard of Oz, like he's a wizard, like behind a big curtain and everything. Everything works so well with him. And, you know, every time I see Agar, I just wish, you know, someday they're they're going to bring card against sweater specs for everybody to wear. And you're going to have to wear them at Disney. But moving on from Disney,
00:17:46
Speaker
let's ah Let's jump ahead and talk about ah what you're currently doing.
Dan's Current Work and Writing Ventures
00:17:51
Speaker
and you know I mentioned at the beginning of the show that you are an author and why don't you tell us about what you've been up to now and how people can get involved in that. Well, not an author. none i've I've almost written several books or co-written, but Roy Disney wanted me to write his autobiography with him.
00:18:17
Speaker
and i And I said, I'd love to. I have a problem, though, because when he had his falling out with Michael and said, you know, I still have a relationship with Michael and I can't write that chapter, you know, I can't write your perspective on that. And, you know, that's where my life was sort of weird or not even sort of is ah is because I and talked about those glory days before Frank Wells died when everybody was on the same team and I was working with Michael Eisner and and Roy Disney and Jeffrey Katzenberg and we were all rowing together, right? And there was no conflict, but they all ended up falling apart.
00:19:01
Speaker
And I still, until Roy died, I had a relationship with him. i I was sort of Switzerland because I was able to maintain relationships with all of them. And it was sad because I liked all of them. And it was so wonderful when everybody got along. And it was really sad that that it all fell apart. And so anyway, so we never were able to resolve the problem that I can't write the part of the book about his falling out with Michael. and and the book never got written. um And then anyway, have I was a good guy. And so and here after I, well, after I left Disney, I started what's called Lone Wolf Writing Company, which as this name goes, it's it's me, it's Lone Wolf. And a lot of my early clients and still repeat others who had left Disney like Eisner and and Katzenberg and Roy Disney.
00:19:56
Speaker
And then it's branched out in a lot of ways. You can go to my website, lonewolfwriting.com and see the list of clients. And it's basically, I continued doing what I was doing at Disney, which is mostly writing speeches, but also writing other stuff. And I was mentioning one of my clients, and Eli Broad, who you may have heard of, who's a highly successful businessman who's passed away. and I started writing a book with him, then that didn't go so well of either. So I am not an author in terms of having published a book. I author things, but ah but again, I still am almost totally a ghostwriter and writing for others who hire me, mostly corporate type stuff, but a lot of different things. One of my clients ever since I left was Bran Farrin,
00:20:49
Speaker
who was the head of research and development at Imagineering until he left in around 2000. And he started his own company called Applied Minds and they do all kinds of interesting stuff. It's sort of like his own Imagineering company. And, uh, what's been fun, what, you know, Disney was always Disney working there, you know, even at its worst, it was still, you know, it's still really interesting place. Um, and buddy still, how many ways can you write about Mickey and, you know, in the Disney stuff? And then after I left Disney, it's allowed me to write about all kinds of other things, uh, which has been, you know, a nice evolution after 18 years with Disney.
00:21:35
Speaker
but But that's what I have been doing and I'm still doing ah since I departed the mouse. yeah Dan, you you reference a book you'll never write. Yes. And and what what would you refer to that book as? Because I think I think that's the book you should write. You're a very skilled writer and you've your client list on your website is mind blowing for those that have not had the opportunity to go look, it is definitely going
00:22:09
Speaker
worth going on to your website to seeing who you've worked with. I mean, you know, just in addition to Disney, Nancy Reagan sticks out, you know, that that's an amazing person to work for or work with. You know, you've got some amazing CEOs listed, people that are incredibly successful. You know, you've been the words of these people over the years, and I think the book you'll never write should should most certainly be written. Can you tell us a little bit about what you reference when you say that the book I'll never write? And I love your title for it, by the way. i love that The title is is my favorite part. ah Years ago, the title popped in my head, which is a fly on the wall of the house of the mouse, ah which sort of sums up what I was because I was never a decision maker. As I've said in some of my stories, I you know contributed to decisions and I you know had my my day in the sun, if you will.
00:23:15
Speaker
helping to or having an impact but i was never the guy who said we should build this we should make this movie we should build this attraction whatever anything like that nor did i want to be those are hard jobs But I was in the room. you know There's a song in Hamilton. In the room where it happens. In the room where it happened. Well, I was often in the room where it happened. and And that was one of the great, especially in the good years, it was one of the real privileges because I was given access. Eisner, people like Eisner and Katzburg understood that if I was going to write about it, I need to know what's going on. you know it's I shouldn't get everything secondhand. ah So I was you know often,
00:23:56
Speaker
there, I was, you know, I fly on the wall. And so, ah you know, and that's like, that's why I know that that Disney really want to do a distribution deal with Pixar because I was in the room when they were talking about it. And then, you know, when I said, oh, we can't do that, we're going to have to either buy it or walk away from it. And if I were to write the book, the the best book it could be, I would burn a lot of bridges. I would be saying things that people that I still work with probably wouldn't especially want to have in there. So it's it might be interesting to people like you, but it maybe wouldn't be well advised. Although the and other weird part is
00:24:42
Speaker
You know, there was a time when, like, like when there was a big falling out between, I tell one quick other anecdote of how my life was weird. ah In 2004, there was the shareholder revolt led by Roy Disney against Michael. And like I said, it was sad for me because I like both of them. And then, you know, Roy's on the outs now and he's leading this shareholder revolt, which got a lot of traction. So anyway, at the shareholder meeting in Philadelphia in 2004, Roy Disney and his partner, Stanley Gold, ah were able to get ah time on the program at shareholder meeting to give a speech themselves.
00:25:28
Speaker
And so I was sitting there and I had written Michael's speech at the thing and this was like, I cannot overstate. It was like, you know, Democratic Republican Convention, say whatever you think of as something where all the news media are there. That's what this was like in Philadelphia. It was a huge, huge, huge news item, not an entertainment news news item. People were fascinated by this battle going on over the Walt Disney Company. There were all these news cameras and everybody else there. So Michael gets up and gives his speech about why he thinks, you know, current management is doing a good job and should be retained.
00:26:11
Speaker
And then Roy and Stanley get up and give their speech. And Roy's going along giving his speech, which I had nothing to do with, of course, until he gets to a part that I wrote. Because when he was with the company, I had written a speech for him where he had talked about how he hates calling Disney a brand. Because he thinks a brand is like a Nike swoosh. A brand is like Coca-Cola versus Pepsi. In other words, it's it's not really, it doesn't really mean anything. It's more of a marketing thing because is is a Nike really better than Adidas? You know, no, but it's, but people associate with it. It's just famous. It's a thing that you identify with. And he said, Disney is not, is more than a brand.
00:26:53
Speaker
And the best you can say it's a name, it's something that people, because people, it means something to people, it's different. You know, like Warner Brothers is a brand and Fox is a brand and Paramount is a brand. Does anybody really think one is different from another? Do they have any attributes that are different? No, they're just big studios. Disney has, that's why you have this podcast, it means something, right? and And Roy was adamant about that. And I wrote a speech for him which talked about that. So when he's giving this speech during this big shareholder revolt and he starts talking about, complaining about how current management calls Disney a brand and it's more than brand. He does this, but it is word for word what I had written for him before. So I'm sitting there and going, oh no.
00:27:40
Speaker
but then I wrote what the opposition is to and I made the mistake of telling my my boss who was sitting next to me Zenyamuka whoa I wrote that and she wasn't thrilled with that but I thought it was a little bit funny but it wasn't a career it wasn't a big career asset to say that And I'll tell you, you made the statement that, you know, you never made the big decisions. But I would say just hearing some of the stories that you told tonight, you you actually influenced a lot of the decisions. And, you know, your words brought people to different places and and changed direct the trajectory of the of the company.
00:28:22
Speaker
And, you know, I think that's an ah amazing claim to fame. And I know for myself, hearing you tell stories tonight has been truly amazing. And I know, you know, I know Barry and Lisa and Dawn all share the same. So, you know, it's been an absolute joy. So. Well, yeah, I guess I just, you know. I'm looking at your client list, but I don't see my name on it, so you may not have it on there yet. So you know know I wrote wrote some in my weekly reader growing up, so and but I don't see anything listed on it.
00:28:58
Speaker
you know and um It's just seeing some of these names and things. so I'm like, I'm a struggling fiction author and I'm like, I don't have time to write anymore like I used to when I was younger and things like that. And people like you, I mean, God bless you because the time and effort and the strength and the the thought process that you have to do just to just to whittle down to the one little morsel of whatever the issue is, and then you have to expand it enough to make it make sense. You're amazing. I mean, I i hope people like Jeffrey Katzenberger and Michael Eisner, I mean, I hope each Christmas you get like a huge, you know, an edible arrangement that comes to your house every year with money attached to it. So you can
00:29:52
Speaker
yeah sorry anyway i think I mean, you know, that's really nice to hear. I certainly wouldn't overstate or understate. so You know, yeah, as as I said, I wasn't certainly just taking dictation and then rewriting it. You know, I was putting some of myself into the what I was writing and, you know, but I also These other people, were you know they they're they're the people who are stuck getting the credit of the blame for but these big decisions of this big company, but it's ah it was a hell of a ride, I will say that.
00:30:29
Speaker
Well, I know I know you can't write the book, but I would love to see the memoirs get left to someone who published it later. And maybe I'll be blessed enough to be able to read that because I'm sure it would be some fascinating reading with your ability to write and what you've done. and If you can ever find a way to publish a book, I know it would be some absolutely amazing reading. but that is a So if I if I published it, you'd have me back on the podcast. well have youanly i would let
00:31:01
Speaker
we you you're back regardless There's an incentive. There's an incentive anyone. I think and you when you but when you do your your picture, hold up a picture of ah Michael Eisner, then no one will know it was you. yes Do it that way. Right. I have a question about the Family Museum, the Walt Disney Family Museum. I've had a couple times just love it. um Did you ever get to meet Diane Disney Miller or do any um type of writing or anything for that company? No, I never met her.
00:31:33
Speaker
And as you may know, the wall side of the family and the Roy side of the family were not close. And I was with the Roy side and family and and the wall side of the family once after the, yeah you know, it was her husband who was pushed aside as CEO. ah And ah so, no, I never had any interaction with her or her husband. I was on the Royce's family. and But I've been to the museum, which is wonderful. In fact, the thing that stood out the most to me at the museum, because I am you know kind of a student of Walt Disney, and I marvel at, you know I mean, there are a few people, I think Steve Jobs was one of them,
00:32:16
Speaker
who just see around the corner. They and they see what nobody else sees. and And Walt was certainly one of them. But what really struck me at the museum, because I had read about his Laffagrams, right? When he was a teenager, however old, he was very young, and he did these animations ah in Kansas City called Laffagrams. And they played them on a loop at the museum. I had never seen them. And they're funny, they're great. yeah You know, they are as primitive as you can get.
00:32:50
Speaker
with his resources and this is in 1919 or something, you know, it's, and you can just see, yeah, that's Walt Disney. And then of course I had seen the Alice comedies, which are amazing. You know, I had seen those early Hollywood productions, but what he was doing on his own back then, you see this guy had a gift that just, you know, and then between his incredible talent and then the luck of fate and how he came along, it's the right time. it's an incredible story and that's why that name is as Roy was arguing you know the name Disney is
00:33:30
Speaker
It means something to this day. you know and and and his And Mickey Mouse you know was his alter ego. And Mickey Mouse has this life of his own, even though he's not really... I mean, now in streaming, he has little shows and he's in 3D and stuff. But for decades, you know his his biggest his biggest role was in Fantasia. Which, by the way, to get way off the speed and track, I have a three and a half year old granddaughter. And it started when she was two. We were watching The Sorcerer's Apprentice and watching Steamboat Willie. So you're telling that a kid who sees, you know, picks our animation, sees the best, and she loves Steamboat Willie.
00:34:14
Speaker
which you would think logically, well, she would have nothing to do with black and white, these stick figures and all that. But aye there's there's magic in all of it. That's a true Disney fan right there. If you can you start him young with the the basics, you know, like like my kids, they were like my son, he was big on cars and things like that. But if I if i go to show him anything that's like pre pre Little Mermaid, you know, Yeah, I you know, when you punish your kids, you make them sit and watch all the Disney movies from the 80s and then and then they never act up again. That's what I hear. So I'm not sure on that. But but we're going to go ahead and we're going to go ahead and wrap up this episode. And Dan, again I want to I want to want to thank you for for coming on. um But before we wrap it up, go ahead and give everyone where where they can find your social media and your website and things like that so they can get in touch with you.
00:35:11
Speaker
you Sure. i mean Yeah, my website is www.lonewolfwriting.com. That's L-O-N-E, not L l-O-A-N. I think there is a lone L-O-A-N wolf out there somewhere. aye Anyway, and you know, I'm on Facebook. i'm I'm not a big social media guy, so I don't do Instagram. So i that's how old I am. But anyway, that's that's me. and And you can, you know, on my website,
00:35:42
Speaker
There's a way to contact animals, too. So then family one yeah and when your granddaughter grows up, she is going to be so impressed with her grandfather. She's going to think he can walk on water. So she it is going to be absolutely amazing. So, you know, I really do. Thank you so much for that. I will at least make sure because, you know, there's a lot of people I think who don't know they know that there is a. a company called Disney, but they don't know there was a man called so a human being named Walt Disney. She will know that. That's that's amazing. Thank you so much for tonight. Yeah. And and and and and you're right, because, this you know, I think I think people think look at Walt Disney World and Disneyland and think, hey, those are those are some cool places. But, you know, if there's actually a man behind it, that's pretty much no there's there's a great story.
Roy Disney's Legacy and Podcast Inspiration
00:36:34
Speaker
There's a great story that you may already know, but, you know, it is named Walt Disney World. Roy Disney, his brother, ordained that, even though they had had a falling out and actually Roy Disney, my Roy Disney, his son, you know, they had a fall out where for several years they really weren't, they were running the company, but they weren't talking to each other. And then they made up and Walt had the props department make a peace pipe. that he gave to Roy, and my Roy had that peace pipe. ah But then Roy, Walt dies,
00:37:07
Speaker
And Roy does two things. He scraps Epcot, which Walt wanted to build Epcot and not the Magic Kingdom first, ah because Walt never like repeating himself. But but Roy, who was a business guy, said, no, let's make money. Let's first make money, and we can do that with building another Disneyland. But he said, we're going to call it Walt Disney World. It's not going to be Disney World, it's Walt Disney World. And that was Roy's decision that we were going to, my brother was the guy and we're going to name it after him, which I think says a lot. I love that.
00:37:46
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. So yeah, our our name sharing the magic comes from the statue that they have in front of Walt Disney World, where Rory is sitting with Minnie Mouse. so Right, because that statue is in at the Burbank headquarters. They also have that statue and the the Walt and Mickey statue. Yeah. So yes, we're going to go ahead and wrap up this episode. We want to thank our guests, Dan, for joining us tonight. And we want you all to follow us on social media. You can find us at Sharing the Magic. And you also can find us on all podcast areas. Just search for Sharing the Magic. And until next time, keep sharing the magic.
00:38:40
Speaker
yeah