When you think of Pixar, you can’t help but also think of Disney. The two companies have been intertwined as deeply as a pair of locked-in LEGO bricks or the actor/director combo ofToshiro MifuneandAkira Kurosawa. Even with endless hurdles that have plagued the relationship between the two entities, particularly whenMichael Eisnerwas riding as CEO of Disney, Disney and Pixar have turned into an inseparable corporate entity. Their bond has only strengthened thanks to theenormous presence of Pixar charactersat Disney theme parks and on Disney’s streaming service, Disney+.
Given these deep bonds, it’s weird to remember that Pixar wasn’t always a company that was owned outright by Disney. In fact, Pixar has only been officially a Disney entity since January 2006. While this animation studio scored a distribution company with the much larger movie studio in the early 1990s, for many years, Pixar was an independent entity controlled bySteve Jobs. Evenbeforethat, though,Pixar began its existence as just a divisionof Lucasfilm. Decades before a costly Disney acquisition was on anyone’s mind, Pixar was simply part of the company spearheaded by Star Wars mastermindGeorge Lucas.
A Division of George Lucas' Lucasfilms Eventually Turned Into Pixar
Per Pixar’s own website, George Lucas hiredEd Catmullto serve as the leader of Lucasfilm’s Computer Division all the way back in 1979. This outfit would eventually transform into Pixar and Catmull and would remain an important part of the Pixar family for decades to come. Fascinatingly, this very first member of the Pixar team may have never even been recruited if Lucas hadn’t been in dire need of special effects wizards. Per the bookEasy Riders, Raging BullsbyPeter Biskind,George Lucas had a contentious relationshipwith various visual effects artists responsible for many of the most groundbreaking elements of the originalStar Wars.
After the release of that 1977 blockbuster, Lucas abandoned folks likeJohn Dykstraand hired a bevy of new visual effects artists to work at Industrial Light & Magic (his visual effects shop) and on the various Star Wars sequels. If Lucas had maintained good relationships with artists like Dykstra, it’s hard to imagine he would have needed to reach out to folks like Ed Catmull to work on his newest visual effects division. Alienating those folks, though, offered up a big opportunity for Catmull and a handful of other artists who were now tasked with navigating the possibilities of groundbreaking digital effects technology. The world of computers and digital effects work was so new that the possibilities seemed excitingly limitless but also frighteningly uncertain.
This division of Lucasfilm and Industrial Lights & Magic initially concerned itself with just trying to make digital images that looked believable to audiences. The outfit also managed to incorporate CG effects into a handful of live-action films, namely the blockbuster tentpoleStar Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.In the 2009 textThe Art of Pixar Short Films, it’s noted that, around 1938, Catmull and other animators at Lucasfilm’s CG division finally put their hearts andsouls into realizing computer-animated characters. Previously deemed an impossibility due to the restrictions of digital effects work in its nascent stages, Catmull and his team were eager to prove the naysayers wrong. They were going to make CG characters that would be as astonishing as the great visual effects feats in the works of George Lucas.
Steve Jobs Bought What Would Become Pixar From George Lucas
The results of these efforts, not to mention expanding the group’s roster of employeesto include folks like futureToy StorydirectorJohn Lasseter, ended up being the 1984 short filmThe Adventures of Andre and Wally B.An incredibly simplistic piece of animation, it was still a groundbreaking work in 1984 that redefined the norms for what CG storytelling could look like. A new horizon opened up, and it looked like the CG division of Lucasfilm was about to take off as something pivotal in the history of animation. This was true in a sense, though the company that would become Pixar would develop that reputation far from its original home of Lucasfilm.
Per a 2006Varietyarticle, George Lucas put Lucasfilm’s computer graphics division up on the market for $30 million in the wake of his costly divorce settlement. To keep the production company of Lucasfilm going, he was selling off parts he deemed extraneous, including the division responsible forAndre and Wally B.Steve Jobs would eventually pick up the company for an incredibly low price of just $5 million while also investing $5 million into the company itself to help it stay above water. After this, the company would christen itself Pixar and release short films likeLuxo Jr.that solidified its place as a new titan of the animation industry.
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In hindsight,the company that would become Pixarjumping ship from Lucasfilm in the mid-1980s was a blessing in disguise. This was not a productive era for the company and it’s doubtful Lucas, with his financial woes, would’ve exhibited the patience Jobs had during Pixar’s lean years. Without that patience, Pixar never could’ve gotten to the point where it could produce something likeToy Story, which would inevitably lead to later projects ranging fromThe Incredibles,Soul,Turning Red, and a number of other classics. Lucas’s love for new technology was essential in birthing Pixar in the first place, but the company needed new ownership to meet its fullest potential.
Ironically, Lucasfilm and Pixar would collide again years later under drastically different circumstances. In 2012,Disney purchased Lucasfilm for a massive sum, a maneuver that mirrored the company’s purchase of Pixar just six years earlier. For the first time in decades, the two companies were once again under the same roof. Each outfit had come a long way from their respective humble origins and, in many ways, had managed to live up to their promise of merging groundbreaking technology with nifty storytelling possibilities. Granted, this purchase also paved the way for the existence ofCars 2andThe Rise of Skywalker, but as George Lucas himself knows after letting go of Pixar, you can’t win ‘em all.
