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The Brave Little Toaster

• The film was produced by Hyperion Pictures along with The Kushner-Locke Company.
• Many of the original members of Pixar Animation Studios were involved with this film, including John Lasseter and Joe Ranft.

Made by former Disney animators/executives, and CalArts graduates.

• While the film received a limited theatrical release, The Brave Little Toaster was popular on home video.

Production

Conception and financing

The film rights to The Brave Little Toaster, the original novel by Thomas M. Disch, were bought by the Walt Disney Studios in 1982, two years after its appearance in the publication Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine". After animators John Lasseter and Glen Keane had finished a short 2D/3D test film based on the book Where the Wild Things Are, Lasseter and producer Thomas L. Wilhite decided they wanted to make a whole feature this way. The story they chose was The Brave Little Toaster, and this became the first CGI film Lasseter ever pitched. But in their enthusiasm, they ran into issues pitching the idea to two high level Disney executives, animation administrator Ed Hansen, and Disney president Ron W. Miller. During Lasseter and Wilhite's pitch, the film was rejected due to the costs of having traditionally animated characters inside then expensive computer-generated backgrounds. A few minutes after the meeting, Lasseter received a phone call from Hansen and was asked to come down to his office, where Lasseter was told that he was dismissed. Originally set to commence at the Disney studios with a budget of $18 million, development was then transferred to the new Hyperion Pictures, which had been created by former Disney employees Tom Wilhite and Willard Carroll, who took the production along with them after Wilhite successfully requested access to it from then-president Ron Miller. As a result, the film was financed as an independent production by Disney, with the aid of electronics company TDK Corporation and video distributor CBS-Fox Home Video. The cost was reduced to $2.3 million as production began, approximately a third of the budget offered when in-house. Despite providing funds to get it off the ground, Disney was not actually involved in the making of the film. Rees later commented that there were external forces at work that had the right to say this was a cheap film that could be shipped overseas, which the staff objected to and therefore were willing to make sacrifices to improve the quality of the film despite its limited budget. They were dedicated of making something they were proud of rather than simply making a kid's film, and to following the Disney's Nine Old Men influenced storytelling. They also aimed to "not belittle it because it happens to be drawn". Tom Wilhite helped to maintain the creative integrity of the project.

Writing

In 1986, Hyperion began to work on the story and character development. Jerry Rees, a crew member on two previous Disney films, The Fox and the Hound and Tron, and co-writer of the screenplay along with Joe Ranft, was chosen to lead the project. He had been working on an animated adaption of Will Eisner's The Spirit with Brad Bird, and received a call from Wilhite asking him to develop, write, and direct, explaining that The Brave Little Toaster was being adapted into a short, but that a feature film was possible if handled correctly. Joe Ranft and Rees worked on developing the story and designing the storyboards. When animators ran out of pages to storyboard, Rees sat down and wrote more of the script. Much work had to be done to adapt the book, for example there are only around four lines of dialogue that ended up in the movie. There was a junkyard sequence in the original text, but it took place in the middle of the film. However, Rees decided that it should instead serve as the film's finale because the setting is the graveyard for appliances. He also wanted a definitive moment that earn the Toaster the title of "brave", so had him jump into the gears to save his Master, a plot point that wasn't in the book. Having the character's voices in his head when writing the script helped to personalise the dialogue. Rees even reworked some of the already-completed script in order to customise sections based on the actors' personalities. After cutting together the storyboards and scene-planning in Taipai, production manager Chuck Richardson explained the logistics issues - the film would be 1:50 minutes long. As a result, Rees cut around 20 minutes worth of the story - these deleted scenes that have not been released to the public.

Casting

Rees was still in the process of writing when he decided to find actors. Many auditioneers presented cartoony, exaggerated voices, which displeased him, because they didn't believe their characters or bring a reality to the role. As a result, he sought out voice talent from the Groundlings improvisational group, after being recommended by Ranft who took classes there, and appreciated the honesty and naturalism they gave to their performances. Many of their members, including Jon Lovitz (Radio), Phil Hartman (Air Conditioner), Timothy Stack (Lampy), Judy Toll (Mish-Mash), and Mindy Sterling (Rob's mother) voiced characters in the film. Already established as an actor through Tony the Tiger and The Grinch, Thurl Ravenscroft was cast as Kirby the vacuum cleaner. Heading the ensemble cast were Groundlings performer Deanna Oliver as Toaster, and newcomer Timothy E. Day as Blanky. Oliver originally auditioned for Air Conditioner using a Bette Davis accent, but accepted the lead when offered. Rees, who had conceived Toaster as a female character, later recalled an anecdote where a crew member "slammed the door and walked out" because he had hired a woman to play the lead role. Day had never done acting work before, and had asked his mother to take him to auditions after becoming fascinated with a child actor voice over. The actors brought a lot of comedy and funny moments to the dark themes that shrouded the film.

Recording

Recording sessions did not take place at Disney; the crew found and renovated a small derelict property in Hollywood. When recording, Rees first had each scene delivered as written, and then allowed the voice actors to play around with the dialogue, and ended up using many of the improvised lines in the final film. His direction primarily consisted of ensuring the performances were as natural and realistic as possible. Some of the recordings were done in group sessions. For example most of Oliver's recording sessions were with Stack and Rees. After being cast, John Lovitz got an opportunity to appear on Saturday Night Live. Because Rees had written the part for Lovitz, he tried to find a way to keep him in the film, and ended up doing a marathon recording session, recording all his lines of dialogue on one night. Rees then performed as the stand-in for Lovitz when the others were recording. Rees described Day as an "amazing performer", who would ask about his character's motivation and the context of each scenario before recording his lines. He was nicknamed "one-take Timmy" due to nailing the emotional truth of the text so quickly, such as crying loudly or delivering a line with a quiver in his voice. Comparing this film to the sequels, where a high note was dubbed by another singer due to being off-key, Olivier noted that in this film it would have been kept in due to being part of the character.

Animation

The crew initially worked on the film for six months in Los Angeles, and then a staff of ten people moved to Taiwan with Rees for another six months to work with with Taiwan's Wang Film Productions for the overseas unit (headed by James Wang), then returned for a third six-month work period in the U.S. Rees' wife Rebecca was the film's directing animator, and she taught classes to the Taiwanese animators in order to improve the quality of their output. The animators also had a mixture of ex-Disney employees and college graduates from CalArts. Every day, they had to do what would normally be done across a two week period at Disney. The colour stylist was veteran Disney animator Ken O'Connor, a member of Disney's feature animation department from its first feature Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and Oliver likened the light-hearted frog sequence to Merry Melodies. A massive TDK sign was included by Rees as the company was a big sponsor. The animators used many visual cues to help inform the audience about plot and character. For example during Toaster's nightmare at the beginning of the film, he burns toast and emits smoke, which symbolises his guilt and fear of being responsible. They deduced Toasters would be afraid of things like forks and falling into the bathtub while plugged in, so included them in this sequence. Oliver described the transition from bathtub sparks to lighting outside the house as proper filmaking. Similarly, Blanky being a certain shade of yellow bares significance to the plot. In the beginning of their journey, the other characters dismiss him, even Toaster when he tries to snuggle her. Then Toaster encounters a flower that is the same colour, who also wants to snuggle. After explaining it is just a reflection, he walks away, thereby making the flower wilt. The next moment shows Toaster proactively rescuing Blanket. The idea is that the flower informs Toaster that his actions will make Blanky wilt too

Music and sound

The Brave Little Toaster: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
Soundtrack album by David Newman and Van Dyke Parks
Released	2004
Genre	Soundtrack
Label	Percepto

The film score of The Brave Little Toaster was composed and conducted by David Newman and performed by the New Japan Philharmonic. The film contains five original songs ("City of Light", "It's a B-Movie", "Cutting Edge", "Worthless" and "Hidden Meadow") that were written by Van Dyke Parks. Newman's score for this movie was one of his earlier works and apparently one that he felt very close to. He did not view it as a cheerful one, and decided to give the film a dramatic score to reinforce the serious nature of many of the film's themes. In writing the score, Newman, "tapped into an inherent sadness in being abandoned and seeking reunion." Rees said that Newman got into the headspace of the characters, and thought in terms of these inanimate objects as being real characters. He said Newman's score was as "grand as anything he would ever do", rather than writing differently due to the medium being animation. He wove death, joy, love, loss, and struggle into the work. Newman's composing style was influenced by his philosophy that behind every "chord of joy" lies an element of sadness, whether it being the knowledge it won't last forever, that it is a facade for a deeper emotion, or that joy comes from sadness. The score was finally given a limited release in 2004. Another important notion was that of "valuing things from the past and taking them...into the future", both in terms of objects and relationships. All of the main characters have personalities that are unique twists on the appliance functionality. Blanky is a security blanket but is insecure without its owner, the bright Lampy is mentally dim, Vacuum is supposed to hold everything inside but has a nervous breakdown, Toaster is warm and reflective so can easily empathise, and Radio is constantly switched on and entertaining. He has the philosophy that despite being inanimate, they each symbolised things we actually feel. As the foundation for writing the story, Rees reasoned that the characters would only be happy if they were being used by the Master. As a result of this, a major aspect of the film is about inanimate objects becoming alive when you are not observing them. As opposed to other films of the time, The Brave Little Toaster was able to include dark, scary, edgy, or risque content due to being an independent fringe feature and therefore not being castrated by a studio. For example there are some sexual innuendos scattered throughout (for example the boob-tassles on the tape recorder), and included an interracial couple through Rob and Chris. They were able to explore the "wouldn't it be fun if" places that Disney wouldn't allow. They rejected the false dichotomy of being joke-driven or overly-sincere, and instead incorporated both elements as that is how real conversations work.

Release and home media

With the producer help, the film premiered in various festivals, including the Los Angeles International Animation Celebration in 1987, and the Sundance Film Festival in 1988. Though the prize went to Rob Nilsson's Heat and Sunlight, before the awards ceremony, Rees claims he was told by some of the judges that they considered Toaster the best film but they could not give the award to a cartoon as they considered people would not take the festival seriously afterwards. Though it is sometimes thought that the film was not released in cinemas because it failed to find a distributor, in reality arthouse film distributor Scoures took on the distributing rights for the theatrical release, and was going to do evening screenings, noting it was more for college and young adult than kids. Disney, who had invested in the video and television rights, according to Rees did not want competition so moved their release date up and prevented it from being financially successful in theatres. The film premiered on The Disney Channel on February 27, 1988. To compensate, Hyperion continued its plan to enter the film into various festivals, and managed to secure limited theatrical airings at arthouse facilities across the United States, such as New York City's Film Forum in May 1989. This helped to give the film a cult following.

Rees thinks most people discovered the film thorough syndication on The Disney Channel, or through home video releases. In July 1991, Disney released the film to home video format and LaserDisc. In the UK the VHSs were released under Video Collection International (1990's) and Carlton Video (2000's), while in the USA and Australia, Walt Disney Home Video and Roadshow Home Video has the rights respectively. In Spain, Divisa Home Video and Aurum Produccines were in charge of distribution, the former during the 2000's. Throughout the '90s onward, it enjoyed popularity as a rental amongst children. The VHS was re-issued in March 1994 and in May 1998. The DVD was released in September 2003, to tie in with the film's 15th anniversary. In the UK, Prism Leisure Corporation was in charge of distribution. This has since expired, but the disc can still be found on UK-shopping sites. Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment was in charge of USA distribution. As of 2014, no Blu-ray version has been released. The only copies that exist are "scratchy" and have a "wobble", as the VHS and DVD tranfers were based on a worn print taht had done the festival rounds.

Legacy

This film is unique in that it attracted a substantial amount of talent from both old and new sources. Many of the cast and crew members went onto have successful careers in the animation industry. Co-writer Joe Ranft became a script supervisor at Pixar, while animators Kirk Wise and Kevin Lima when on to co-direct films of the Disney Renaissance, Beauty & the Beast and Tarzan respectively. Effects animator Mark Dindal directed Disney's The Emperor's New Groove and Chicken Little, as well as Warner Bros.' Cats Don't Dance. Character designer Rob Minkoff directed the Stuart Little films. After directing a financially unsuccessful film The Marrying Man in 1991, Jerry Rees now directs Disney theme park films. Voice actors Jon Lovitz and Phil Hartman wound their way onto animated shows such as The Simpsons. Many have noted that this film shares similarities to the Toy Story franchise, also worked on by John Lasseter. Rees saw it as "the next inanimate object feature".

The Brave Little Toaster was followed by two sequels a decade later: The Brave Little Toaster to the Rescue (1999) and The Brave Little Toaster Goes to Mars (1998). The former is based on the sequel to Disch' novella while the latter is a brand new story. While reuniting most of the cast, they had a new director and crew, and were released out of chronological order. Rees noted that the original film was make out of pure love and not thought of as a kid's film or a product, and that he had heard the new approach was a more commercial venture. Olivier felt that despite Ramirez being a talented director who handled the franchise with care, instead of "film" and "character driven", the project seemed more about getting it done because it could be made. Neither Rees nor Olivier have watched the finished sequels. Waterman Entertainment is currently in the process of developing a remake.

Despite its limited release, the cult following of the film has seen the cast and crew get substantial recognition throughout the world. Rees recalled a situation where a person he was doing an online project with imdb'd him, discovering his work on TBLT, and explained how deeply the film affected him due to teaching life lessons. He appreciated this genuine reaction from a real person. Oliver went to the Afghanistan deployment ceremony for her son in June 2010, and he had told Brave Company his mum played Toaster, so they brought toasters with them for her to sign, which the soldiers took to the country with them. She also received fan art from one of the soldiers. The consensus among people who worked on the film such as Tom Wilhite and Donald Kushner is that the original is the one that has the cult following as opposed to the sequels. Rees said that when his future-Pixar friends saw the movie, they appreciated it despite the animation due to the heavy financial and time constraints.

Awards

Year	Nominee / work	Award	Result
1988	The Brave Little Toaster	Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program	Nominated
1988	Jerry Rees	Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury Prize, Dramatic	Nominated
1988	The Brave Little Toaster	Parent's Choice Award.	1988 style="background: #9EFF9E; color: #000; vertical-align: middle; text-align: center; " class="yes table-yes2 notheme"|Won

References

• Datlow, Ellen and Windling, Terri (2001). The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror. ISBN 0-312-04450-X. St. Martin's Press. Retrieved March 29, 2007.
• Beck, Jerry (2005). The Animated Movie Guide. ISBN 1-55652-591-5. Chicago Reader Press. Retrieved March 29, 2007.