The Chelsea Standard
A Heritage Newspaper
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Chelsea native draws quite a career
'Black Cauldron' movie cel donated to Chelsea museum
By Kathy Clark, Guest Writer
PUBLISHED: November 1, 2007
A layered, painted celluloid with hand-colored background from the 1985 full-length feature film "The Black Cauldron" was donated to the Chelsea Historical Museum by Marjorie Hepburn of Chelsea.
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Tom Diab, Chelsea Area Historical Society president, was on hand to receive the donation this month.
The celluloid film frame, or "cel," was given to Hepburn by her friend Joe Hale in 1985.
Twenty-four cels are photographed every second to create an animated movie, and there are 115,200 frames of film in "The Black Cauldron."
Hepburn is one of Hale's friends from Chelsea High School's Class of 1944. Toward the end of an illustrious career with Walt Disney Productions, Hale wrote and produced "The Black Cauldron" which was Disney's 25th animated film in 1985, costing $25 million. He retired the following year.
Since 1951 Hale worked on more than 100 Disney projects in character animation and cartoon layout.
He drew backgrounds and special effects such as explosion and laser beam enhancements, and his artwork contributed to such classics as "Sleeping Beauty."
Live-action and cartoon combination films like "Mary Poppins" and "101 Dalmatians" came next.
Hale did the technical planning and animated sequences of 1979's "The Black Hole," for which he received an Academy Award nomination for best animated visual effects.
Hale was raised in Chelsea with seven sisters and one brother in a small house in the 100 block of Madison Street with no indoor bathroom plumbing. His parents were Vincent and Chloe Hale.
The family outgrew this home and moved three doors south on Madison. He attended Chelsea schools from 1929 to 1942. Hale would have graduated with the Class of 1944 had he not entered the U.S. Marines in 1942.
"Several of our classmates enlisted early to choose a branch of service, rather than be drafted into the U.S. Army," Hepburn recalled.
While in the service he illustrated other servicemen's letters and created his own greeting cards. After leaving the Marines, Hale attended the Michigan Academy of Arts in Saginaw and later the Likits Academy of Fine Arts in Los Angeles.
Chelsea is home
Over the years Hale has stayed in touch with his friends Phil Vogel, Dan Ewald, Margie Hepburn and others. He often attends Class of '44 reunions. At age 82, he has not lost his artistic ability and this month sent a few more autographed "off the tip of his pencil" drawings to the museum and friends, along with movie cels, storyboards, photocopies and original pencil drawings from "The Black Cauldron."
It is his intent that the museum, library or schools will use these tools to teach how an animated film is produced.
Hale has kept his friends updated as his career in motion pictures developed.
Inclinations to draw began in school when he would sketch characters or scenes on every blank page of any book.
"On my first military leave I saw 'Bambi' in the Chelsea Sylvan Theater and I sat through it seven times during three days." Hale recalled in a 1985 conversation.
"During 'Bambi' I decided all I wanted to be was a Disney artist. It was a time when all available jobs in Chelsea were at the Federal Screw Plant or other factories. I never dreamed I would succeed beyond that."
During one class reunion visit to Chelsea, Hale drove down Madison Street and stopped at his first home.
"I was walking around the house when the lady living there invited me inside for a tour. It was when tattoos had entered the mainstream of society," Hale said.
He noticed the woman had a tattoo of Mickey and Minnie Mouse on her left shoulder.
"I drew that!" he told her, and that same version of Mickey and Minnie had been used for the "Wonderful World of Disney" TV series in the 1960s.
At home in California
He was hired by Disney in 1951, and was present during some historical moments with the company.
"In the late 1950s, I sat in on the first meetings with Walt Disney when a simple 'kiddieland' was envisioned at the end of the California Disney lot," Hale recalled.
"The project was put in the hands of Disney cartoonists and they created drawings of 'Main Street U.S.A.' Their ideas were expanded to become the first Disneyland park."
The cartoonists did not profit from the drawings used to construct the first Disneyland, and at one point unsuccessfully negotiated for a small percentage of Disneyland's profits.
"Disney pulled everyone off 'Sleeping Beauty' to work on the theme park. A top animator earned $500 a week in those days," Hale added.
This month Hale is sculpting his third three-foot-high gargoyle out of sandstone.
"I have always been interested in drawing gargoyles," Hale said. "This one has a place on my roof with the other two."
He and his wife Beverly live in Vista, Calif., which is 40 miles north of San Diego. Their Spanish-style home is built on a cliff 2,000 feet above the coast with a view of the Pacific in the front and mountains in the back.
Living close to the California film industry, Hale has been able to salvage and incorporate various pieces of old movie sets into his home.
He used wrought iron work from the movie "Zorro," and the gates from Cherry Tree Lane off the "Mary Poppins" set.
"The three Indian maiden statues from 'Something Wicked This Way Comes' looked great with a flat coat of white paint," Hale said.
Along with collections of small movie character statues, he brought home his Disney Studios drawing desk.
Hale has remained active with the Marines at Camp Pendleton for the past 20 years.
"I instruct Marines in skeet and trap shooting at the Skeet & Trap Range at Vado Del Rio," he said.
Another Marines-related project Hale has started is a cactus and succulent memorial garden at the range.
"The garden is a tribute to the 340 Marines from Camp Pendleton already killed in Iraq," he noted
Hale is on the board of directors for the Moonlight Jewel live theater of San Diego County.
Finally, Hale has sat on the board of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences for 20 years. He will soon receive 60 to 80 films to review from all the movie studios for the 2008 Oscars ceremony.
"Everyone in the Academy nominates choices for Best Picture, then we receive one big ballot where everyone votes on their choices in all other categories," Hale said. "My neighbors love this time of year because they get to borrow all the movies."
In the back of his mind, Hale thought of moving back to Chelsea for many years. Now it appears he is comfortable and very active in his California retirement.
"Chelsea has always been my hometown," he said recently. "When I come back to talk with everyone, I envy the people who have stayed here."
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