‘Genuinely Humbled’: Legendary Disney Animator Shares His Testimony
By Movieguide® Contributor
Glen Keane might be a Disney legend, but did you know he almost quit animating to join a seminary?
“I was accepted into the School of Film Graphics,” Keane said during an interview with The Gideons International. “It wasn’t long until I discovered that was what I was born to do.”
After two years of study, Keane joined a training program at Walt Disney Animation Studios “where I learned everything I know about drawing, design, and storytelling.” He would go on to work on beloved Disney classics like THE LITTLE MERMAID, BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, ALADDIN, TARZAN and TANGLED.
READ MORE: REEL LEGENDS OF REDEEMING HOLLYWOOD
While he was enjoying this success in his personal life, Keane was also rediscovering her faith. He was raised Catholic but strayed from his faith. Eventually, Keane began to feel “a weight of sin on [his] shoulders.”
“I became really concerned about where I stood with God,” he explained. This led to his friendship with Ron Husband, a fellow Disney animator who read the Bible each day during their lunch hour. Husband gave Keane his Bible and urged him to read it.
“As I was reading the Bible, I was finding how — it was dealing with the deepest parts of my soul, and life after death, and it had such incredible weight to it,” Keane explained during an episode of “The Bancroft Brothers Animation Podcast.” “It was just pure and wonderful truth.”
Keane continued, “[It] is actually humbling to draw a living being in front of you. You feel genuinely humbled by the beauty of that figure. It was the same kind of thing when I was reading the Bible — humbling, like, this is truth — except in a bigger, grander way.”
He also integrated his faith into his work for Disney. In an interview about his work on BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, Keane shared, “When I was creating the transformation scene at the end of Beauty and the Beast, I had 2 Corinthians 5:17 written on my sketches. I really wanted to capture on paper the emotion of a new creation — of having this prince inside wanting to break free and bring redemption to the old creature.”
Keane’s newly-discovered faith led to some serious soul-searching about his career.
“I started thinking, ‘I made the wrong choice. I shouldn’t be in animation. I really want to go to seminary…what I’d like to do is be a pastor,’” Keane recalled, adding that he began thinking about studying at a seminary.
While he considered leaving the world of animation, Keane continued to share his faith with others.
“I’ve always been somebody that can’t not share the truth that I’ve discovered,” he said. “I started a little Bible study with some of the animators and we would walk to the back lot and, you know, just read the Bible and go through a study book.”
Keane shared his struggles with his church pastor, who gave him some guidance about what he should do next.
“You had an opportunity,” he told Keane. “You’re an animator. I think God has you there for a reason. I think you should really stay.”
Keane stayed at Disney but kept looking for ways to share his faith and teach others. He began teaching a “junior church” service for young children and even reached out to author and Christian psychologist Henry Brandt to see if he could illustrate one of his books.
After their meeting was over, Brandt’s wife prayed over the pair, “asking God to open a door for me to use my talents in a way that I was desiring for Him [to do],” Keane remembered.
While he was driving home, he thought about his upcoming vacation Bible school sermon, which was about John 3:16. When he got home, Keane started working on a storyboard, with cartoon animals telling the story of the verse.
“And that’s where all the first books [came from],” Keane said, referring to “The Adventures of Adam Raccoon,” an eight-book series that follows Adam Raccoon as he goes on adventures and learns Biblical truths.
READ MORE: CHRISTIAN ANIMATOR LEAVES DISNEY TO FOCUS ON THE GOOD, TRUE, BEAUTIFUL
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