They were completely surreal characters, more `graphic' than `character' animation," notes Beiman on animating The Fates for Hercules. © Disney

"You've got to realize, when you're brought up doing what you call the traditional Disney style, Scarfe's designs can look a little intimidating at first, but Gerald had worked in animation before, so he would meet us halfway. If I said, `Gerald, she won't turn. I need a back view,' he did it for me. And, I would combine the two designs, I would interpolate the two, making a happy medium. I did every scene on The Fates. They were completely surreal characters, more `graphic' than `character' animation. I figured that they were spirits, so they didn't need bodies. They were just heads and hands (and one portable eyeball) and the drapery suggested `bodies' underneath. I designed The Fates, and The Old Theban, the Fat and Thin Women, and many other characters based on drawings by Gerald Scarfe.

"[Scarfe] is a gentleman and a professional. For example, as he was going to go back to England, [at the last minute] I said, `Hey, Gerald, I forgot something! I need a bug!' I was doing this scene with these Thebans standing around the well, and a cricket has to hop in, and I didn't have a model for the cricket. He said, `Big eyes or small eyes?' I said, `I think big eyes.' He did this funny little jelly bean of a cricket, with giant eyes, that goes, `Cheep!' and frightens all the Thebans. I also did the Painter in Herc's villa, who is, by the way, a caricature of Gerald Scarfe! Gerald had sent his drawing for the character and [Ron and John] said, `You know, this looks a lot like him.' I said, `Do you think he'll get mad at me?' And, I don't know if he knows it now, that he's in there."

Nancy Beiman continues today at Walt Disney Feature Animation in Burbank, but she wanted you all to know she's not the only girl anymore. "There were many women animating on Hercules. Ellen Woodbury was the other Lead Animator. She did Pegasus. Caroline Cruikshank, Teresa Wiseman, and Terri Martin were all in the Phil[octetes] Unit. Catherine `Catpou' Poulain worked on Meg[ara] in Paris. Gilda Kouros in the Hercules unit was our only Greek animator [as well]. [There were three] female animators in the Effects Department, and a number of Department Heads and Key assistants were also women."

So different from the time nearly twenty years ago when Beiman stood alone as the first woman to graduate from the CalArts Character Animation Program. Luck (or The Fates) had an influence, but raw talent and hard work, combined with a deep appreciation of a great tradition, tenacity and courage in the face of adversity were there and needed as well.


Janet Benn was Scene Planner, Layout Checker and Retake Supervisor on MTV Animation's Beavis and Butt-head Do America at MTV Animation in New York. She has worked in animation production for 20 years, and was an inker and final checker at Zander's Animation Parlour when Nancy Beiman was animating there. She was also the first vice-president of Women in Animation/New York, and has also officiated at ASIFA-East and Women Make Movies, Inc.