The Best Vintage Disney Ads in Variety Magazine

As Variety celebrates its 115th anniversary, we peered back into the archives to honor some of Hollywood’s biggest movers and shakers that were chronicled in the pages of Variety Magazine. The Walt Disney Company that many know and love today was originally founded as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio back in 1923, and the company adopted its current name in 1986. The first Disney ad to run in Variety Magazine graced the pages in 1934, bringing Mickey Mouse to color for the very first time.

“Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” was the next Disney smash hit to land a Variety ad, which urged theatergoers and critics to sit tight and enjoy the full-length cartoon. “Dumbo,” “Peter Pan,” “Sleeping Beauty,” “Pinocchio” and “Pocahontas” were some of the other classic toons that got the ad treatment throughout the years.

Take a look at some of the best Disney ads featured in Variety.

1934
The idea of animation in color was a big deal. Disney’s first toon with sound was the Mickey Mouse short “Steamboat Willie” in 1928. Though Disney created toons in color starting with “Flowers and Trees” (1932), the combo of Mickey and color, with “The Band Concert” in 1935, was a huge selling point for the studio, when most live-action films were in black and white.
1937
In the 21st century, we know “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” was a mega-hit. But before it opened, it was called Disney’s Folly: Many were skeptical that the audience would sit still for a full-length cartoon. This ad was Disney’s way of telling theater owners that the film is good, and they should book it.
1938
Disney characters like Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck were audience favorites with name recognition, while the studio also created other shorts, some under the umbrella “Silly Symphony.” This was one of those, with Mother Goose characters portrayed by movie star spoofs like Katharine Hepburn, Greta Garbo and W.C. Fields. The short was Oscar-nominated but is rarely revived, partly because of the racist moments, such as Hepburn in blackface.
1941
Disney was hard-hit by an animators strike and other factors, including the cost of building a permanent studio in Burbank. “Pinocchio” and “Fantasia” found fans but were extremely expensive, so Disney relied on shorts to keep the income flowing. This ad was a reminder to theater owners to book the shorts. As the ad says “Play them, but play them up!”
1941
This ad was signed by “Your striking employees,” as animators battled the Disney studio. Willie Bioff was a labor leader who was the target of an investigation (by the media, including by Variety) into his underworld ties; he was convicted two years after this ad. As the letter indicates, the strikers didn’t want Bioff to handle their demands.
1941
Disney was banking on “Dumbo” to help the studio’s finances, and it paid off. The film was a fraction of the cost of the earlier films and, at 64 minutes, was one of the shortest. As a private joke, Disney depicted some of the strike leaders as clowns in the film. This was part of a four-page ad spread in Variety, and the color was unusual for the paper at that point.
1943
Animated shorts were the lifeblood of the studio in those days. “Bambi” (1942) was well-liked, but in WWII, it didn’t do great box-office, particularly overseas. So Disney touted its shorts, bragging that they were in Technicolor, even though the Variety ad was in glorious B&W.
1944
The U.S. and Canadian governments recruited Disney to produce training and propaganda films during WWII. By 1944, that work was easing up, so Disney wanted to reassure everyone in the industry that it was still contributing to the war effort. So the ad touted the studio’s participation in the Fourth War Loan Drive, which ran Jan. 18-Feb. 15, 1944. Its goals were to raise money for the war effort and to provide a safe savings plan for buyers; U.S. savings bonds began during the Great Depression, urging people to save money; war bonds became an extension of that program.
1952
In the days before homevideo, Disney re-released each animated feature film to theaters every seven-to-10 years. This ad reassured theater owners that the public would still care about an old film, and reminded them that there were a lot of youngsters who had never seen it. At the bottom, the promotion for “The Story of Robin Hood” refers to Disney’s 1952 live-action movie, not the animated version, which came out in 1973.
1953
Walt Disney held the rights to James M. Barrie’s play “Peter Pan” since 1939, but the war delayed production. It was the last film released by RKO, before Disney started its own distribution company. In the small print on the second page, the ad says the film will be accompanied by “the greatest advertising, publicity and exploitation campaign in the history of show business.” Yes, Disney always knew how to promote its films.
1953
Disney had pioneered sync sound and Technicolor early on, so the studio made its “Melody” the first U.S. animated short in 3-D. As TV was becoming a phenomenon, all the studios tried ways of luring audiences into the theater, including 3-D, Cinemascope and Cinerama. Disney didn’t stay with 3-D for long, and became the first major studio to embrace television production.
1955
With animation costly and slow, Disney increasingly expanded its work in live-action. Forty years before “The Lion King,” Disney offered “The African Lion,” one of its nature films that were released under the umbrella title “True-Live Adventures.”
1959
Disney was excited on “The Shaggy Dog,” and the enthusiasm turned out to be well-founded. It was the second-highest grossing films of the year, outdone only by “Ben-Hur.” But since “Shaggy Dog” was so low-budget, it was far more profitable than the Oscar-winning film. The comedy, about a teenager who turns into a dog thanks to a magic ring, also marked the start of a long partnership between Fred MacMurray (as the boy’s dad) and Disney, including “The Absent-Minded Professor,” “Son of Flubber” and “The Happiest Millionaire.”
1959
Disney continued to try tech innovations, filming “Sleeping Beauty” in Technirama 70 and featuring 6-channel stereophonic sound in its first-run engagements. The movie itself was fairly experimental for Disney, with stylized backgrounds and Tchaikovsky’s ballet score adapted for various sequences. It got mixed reactions in 1959, but appreciation has grown.
1962
“Pinocchio” was not a huge hit when it opened in 1940; it was expensive, plus European and Asian bookings were limited due to the war. This was its third re-release, after 1945 and 1954. Variety wrote in a 1940 review that it “is the finest piece of feature length animation yet created,” though there wasn’t much competition for that honor; but 80 years later, many would still agree with that assessment.
1963
Disney had purchased rights in 1939 to T.H. White’s book about King Arthur, but it took years for the film to happen. It was the last full-length animated movie to be released during the lifetime of Walt Disney, who died in 1966. It also marked Disney animation’s first collaboration with the songwriting Sherman brothers.
1964
This ad came out Aug. 4, 1964, before “Mary Poppins” opened and became a huge hit for the studio. Here, “Poppins” is the most prominent of Disney’s seven films, but just barely. The movie was a big box-office winner and earned 13 Oscar nominations, winning five.
1978
This ad, with a drawing of Mickey, gives thanks to everyone who participated in his 50th-birthday TV special. The drawing seems simple, but when you look closer, it becomes clear that the image is created by including all the names of the show’s participants, with everyone from Annette Funicello to Gerald Ford, and also including Bette Davis, the Carpenters, Peter Sellers and Raquel Welch, among many others.
1983
Disney didn’t usually get too gung-ho about Oscar campaigning. Though other studios often take out ads in Variety to salute their film workers and to remind voters of good work, Disney generally abstained, even with biggies like “Mary Poppins.” But the studio was particularly proud of “Tron,” and the film earned Oscar nominations for costumes and sound, with the latter team recognized here.
1996
The love affair between awards and Disney’s toon songs goes back to 1940, when “When You Wish Upon a Star” from “Pinocchio” won an Oscar. The affair got more heated starting with the Howard Ashman-Alan Menken tunes from such films as “The Little Mermaid” and “Beauty and the Beast.” After Ashman died in 1991, Menken teamed with various partners, including Stephen Schwartz (after “Pippin” but before “Wicked”) and their “Colors of the Wind” won a Golden Globe and eventually an Oscar.

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Update: 2024-08-16