Tim Burton suspects his Disney days are behind him: ‘I needed to escape’
To his horror, his latest Disney film, “The Jungle Book,” which was expected to be his comeback project, came out and he was out.
‘I loved working with him for so many years and really wanted to work with him again,’ says Burton. But he was working, and Disney was not going to renew his contract.
The Disney legend and founder of Marvel was asked about his decision to leave the studio. He spoke with CNN’s Piers Morgan.
Piers Morgan: How do you feel about your Disney days coming to an end?
Pixar co-founder Michael Eisner: I left Disney, which was very shocking. I never said goodbye to any of the people. I didn’t leave. It happened and I didn’t leave. I was there for 24 years running the company. Michael [Disney] and I had an extraordinary relationship for the last 20. He’s not a small man. He’s a big man but he’s fun. Piers Morgan: What was the turning point you reached the end of it? Why did it end? Michael Eisner: It was when I had to make a choice. I had to make a choice to step back from the day-to-day operations of the company to spend more time on the projects I’ve spent so much time on, the projects that really define the company, the projects that I’ve worked with for 22 years. It just got to be — with the way the studio was, and the way it’s being run today — it just got to be unsustainable, financially, creatively. So I had to make a choice. And it was not to work with them at all. It was to leave. Because I loved working with the company and working with people, from the executives all the way down to the people working on the shop floor all the way up through the executives, I worked with all of them for so many years. And it just wasn’t there for me, and I had to leave. And it hurt — deeply — I’m really sad about it. And I feel terrible that I had to leave. Piers Morgan: [Laughing] How do you feel about your Disney days coming to an end, Michael?