Micky Mouse

Mickey Mouse
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|Mickey Mouse |
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|First appearance |Steamboat Willie (1928)[1][2] |
|Created by |Walt Disney |
||Ub Iwerks |
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Mickey Mouse is a cartoon character who has become an icon for the Walt Disney Company. Mickey Mouse was created in 1928 by Walt Disneyand Ub Iwerks.[4] He was voiced by Walt Disney from 1928–1946 theatrically, and again from 1955–1959 for the original ABC TV The Mickey Mouse Clubtelevision series. The Walt Disney Company celebrateshis birth as November 18, 1928, upon the release of Steamboat Willie,[5] although Mickey had already appeared six months earlier in an unfinished test screening of Plane Crazy[6] (Steamboat Williebeing the first Mickey Mouse Cartoon to be released). The anthropomorphic mouse has evolved from being simply a character in animated cartoons and comic strips to become one of the most recognizablesymbols in the world. Mickey is currently the main character in the Disney Channel's Disney Juniorseries "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse". Mickey is the leader of The Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, with help from Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, and other friendly friends of his.

In late 2009, The Walt Disney Company announced that they will begin to re-brand the Mickey Mouse character by putting a little less emphasison his pleasant, cheerful side and reintroducing the more mischievous and adventurous sides of his personality,[7] starting with the newly released Epic Mickey.

Creation and debut

Mickey Mouse was created as a replacement for Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, an earlier cartoon character created by the Disney studio for Charles Mintz of Universal Studios.[8]

When Disney asked for a larger amountfor his budget for the popular Oswald series, Mintz announced that Disney could keep doing the Oswald series, as long as he agreed to a budget cut and went on the payroll. Mintz owned Oswald and thought he had Disney over a barrel. Angrily, Disney refused the deal and returned to produce the final Oswald cartoons he contractually owed Mintz. Disney was dismayed at the betrayal by his staff, butdetermined to restart from scratch. The new Disney Studio initially consisted of animator Ub Iwerks and a loyal apprentice artist, Les Clark. One lesson Disney learned from the experience was to thereafter always make sure that he owned all rights to the characters produced by his company.

In the spring of 1928, Disney asked Ub Iwerks to start drawing up new character ideas. Iwerks tried sketchesof various animals, such as dogs and cats, but none of these appealed to Disney. A female cow and male horse were also rejected. They would later turn up as Clarabelle Cow and Horace Horsecollar. (A male frog, also rejected, would later show up in Iwerks' own Flip the Frog series.)[4]Walt Disney got the inspiration for Mickey Mouse from his old pet mouse he used to have on his farm. In 1925, HughHarman drew some sketches of mice around a photograph of Walt Disney. These inspired Ub Iwerks to create a new mouse character for Disney.[4] "Mortimer Mouse" had been Disney's original name for the character before his wife, Lillian, convinced him to change it, and ultimately Mickey Mouse came to be.[9][10] Actor Mickey Rooney has claimed that, during his Mickey McGuire days, he met cartoonist...