+Postage Due+Disney-comics digest #192.

[Don Rosa]

MATTIAS:

	I'm not sure if you were "lecturing"... and I can't disagree
with anything you say about how the important thing is how an actor like
Michael Caine portrays Ebenezer $crooge; but to compare that to $crooge
McDuck playing Ebenezer $crooge is where you lose me. This implies that
you feel the same way that James Williams correctly states that Disney
views $crooge in their helpless manner -- that he is NOT $crooge McDuck,
but a character PLAYING that part, as he "played" the part of Ebenezer
Scrooge. This is what strikes me as a serious, basic misconception of
who $crooge McDuck (or Donald Duck or Sherlock Holmes or Nero Wolf or
Indiana Jones) is/are; would you like to see Indiana Jones playing
Ebenezer Scrooge? Sherlock Holmes playing $crooge McDuck? $crooge
McDuck's similarity to Ebenezer Scrooge may be closer than Indiana Jones
is to Ebenezer, but the basic idea, to me, is equally silly and an equal
misuse and misunderstanding of who a "character" is. A "character" can't
portray another "character" -- that sounds like something out of a Monty
Python sketch.
	But as silly an idea as it is, Disney's intellectual hands are
tied through their lack of actual use of these characters for 50 years
as well as their total inexperience in using a character ($crooge) whom
they never had an iota of participation in creating or shaping. It also
indicates their being lost in the morass of modern Hollywood thinking of
always making movies or shows which "are like" this or that, rather than
creating something totally new. From $crooge McDuck "playing" Ebenezer
Scrooge they went to Baloo the Bear "playing" the TALESPIN Baloo.
Projecting this silliness another batch of years, and considering the
popularity of their recent cute properties, someday they'll do a remake
of THE LITTLE MERMAID with Belle "playing" Ariel and the Beast "playing"
Sebastian. If a Disney exec were reading this right now, I'll bet he's
filing that idea away for future use.