Following is a personal report by Animated News’ Christian Ziebarth on the funeral services held yesterday in memory of Joe Grant:
Early this morning I went to the Forest Lawn Mortuary in Glendale to attend the funeral of Joe Grant. This wasn’t exactly how I imagined my first encounter with Joe would be. You see, for the past couple of months I had been thinking that I should try to arrange an interview with him but I always put it off. I figured he’d made it to 96 so why wouldn’t he just keep on living forever?
The occasion was solemn, but not somber, reverent, but not dismal. As the crowd walked in and took their seats a classical guitarist played classical versions of classic Disney songs. Some of them that I remember were, “Baby Mine,” “Whistle While You Work,” “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah,” and “Give a Little Whistle.”
The speakers included Joe’s granddaughter, Diane, who was choked up but managed to keep it together and gave a well-worded, well-crafted eulogy. She got a laugh when she told how her grandfather would write out all his checks in calligraphy so that it would take longer for the bank to cash them.
Next up was Roy E. Disney who talked about his remembrances of Joe and Joe’s remarkable capability for recall. He mentioned that the recent short Lorenzo actually began with an idea Joe had approximately 60 years ago. Roy didn’t give a “Save Disney”-style speech but did obliquely mention a project that he promises to complete that I can only assume has to be a “Disney project” . . . and from what I could gather it is to be short feature centered around penguins.
Don Hahn spoke next and also gave a wonderful speech. He mentioned many of the ideas Joe had contributed to Disney films over the last fifteen years. If what Don was saying was correct then Joe was responsible for creating Rafiki and Zazu in The Lion King. Don got a big laugh when he said, “I just know Joe is going to appear to me tonight and give me story notes on how the ceremony went today.”
The final speaker was Leonard Maltin. I don’t remember much about it except that he was funny and talked about Joe’s strong work ethic. I believe he was the one who said Joe’s daily routine was to wake up, have some Irish oatmeal, do the exercises he learned in the Air Force, then go to his drawing desk.
I think I may have been the least qualified person to attend this funeral because it seemed like everyone else there had met Joe in person at least once before, if not many times. The person I sat next to, Bert Klein, said that he and his wife had had lunch with Joe every Wednesday for the past three years. But after I completely dropped the ball and never scheduled an interview with Joe Grant before it got to the point that it was just too late, I felt like I should go and do something to connect with his memory and I am glad that I did.
