A Minute with Eric Goldberg

A brief interview by Jake Friedman. Originally published in the October, 2005 issue of aNYmator Magazine

You might recognize his animation when you watch Aladdin's Genie, or Phil from Hercules, or "Rhapsody in Blue" from Fantasia 2000. But Eric Goldberg got his humble start on 1977's Raggedy Ann and Andy when he was barely out of high school. Since then he's animated and directed for Disney features, directed the Warner characters in their own feature, and bounced around in independent animation. For a guy who started out making cartoons with a super-8 he got for his bar mitzvah, this self-proclaimed "frustrated ham" has secured a place for himself on the animation map.

As far as inspirations, Goldberg says that "the list is endless," but he starts off with Chuck Jones and the other Warner directors like Freling, Tashlin and Avery. "Their work had to be very economical," notes Goldberg, "but they were able to bring a vitality to animation on a shoestring budget."

Goldberg also notes the influence of Disney animators Freddy Moore and Ward Kimball. "Freddy Moore's work had such a degree of confidence and subtleness; he could try anything and almost always make it work. Just looking at the variations on Mickey's legs while he's walking in ‘Nifty Nineties' [you'll see] things that nobody else would attempt, because nobody else had the confidence to be that audacious with leg movement, among other things. And his work always looked like it had fun." Kimball, similarly, injected an element of fun in his animation, but Goldberg calls him the "studio Maverick. The guy would try anything ... I admire him for that. He always wanted to go in a different artistic direction from everyone else at the studio, very stylized." Goldberg also tips his hat to illustrator Al Hirschfeld, art director Mary Blair, layout artist Ken O'Conner and background artist Maurice Noble.

The work of artists like these has an appeal that has lived on for decades, and isn't it every creator's dream to come up with something that popular? I had to inquire about the appeal in Goldberg's big blue Genie. Goldberg coughs it up to the public's appetite for something "completely bombastic and off the wall," not to mention the fact that the character utilizes the animation medium as well as any character can, morphing into anything at the drop of a hat. Goldberg also credits Robin Williams as the inspiration for the character. "Being able to visualize Robin's delivery was something that was a huge delight," he notes.