Fred Moore

Freddie and the Seven Dwarfs

Although he worked on none others than the dwarfs, Fred Moore is responsible for their final look. He almost single-handedly animated them in sequence 5A, which was the pilot scene for the film. Surprinsgly, his efforts on other scenes like Dopey’s fight with the soap in sequence 6A were reanimated by Fred Spencer. He did do a good deal of Dopey when he’s dancing on the shoulders of Sneezy in sequence 8A. Some of his animation was reused in the short Seven Wise Dwarfs.

On the film his assistant was originally Frank Thomas until he became an animator himself. Ollie Johnston filled in as an assistant for the rest of the production.

Fred Moore had started in the studio as Les Clark’s assistant. Walt Disney trusted him him enough to make him supervising animator on several of his early features and to be a Mickey Mouse specialist, a character which he redesigned with white pupils. He also drew a very recognizable type of sexy girls which his colleagues were fond of, like the ones in the segment All the Cat’s Join In from the film Make Mine Music.

In spite of his amazing talent, Fred Moore happened to be an alcoholic, which eventually took its toll on his work and his health. Ward Kimball remembers he would be called-in to take over Fred’s drawings because he was enable to finish them. He was fired from the studio around 1947 and worked for Walter Lantz on Woody Woodpecker. A year later, he came back to Disney where he remained until he died in a car accident in Big Tujunga Canyon.