Balancing a bustling career as a world-famous animation producer/director with the duties of a branch president, Don Bluth is a man who doesn't take organization lightly.
When asked how he balances his Church responsibilities with his demanding career, he replied with a smile, "Good counselors are the key. I also write down on paper everything I have to do for the next day, and list the items from 1 through 20." He then takes care of each item in order of priority.But the director and producer of such animated classics as "An American Tail," "The Land Before Time," and "All Dogs Go to Heaven" acknowledged there's an underlying foundation in his life that holds all his activities together.
"Everything I do is centered around the gospel," Bluth said in a recent interview. "Even our films are, although the secular world would never realize it. The gospel gives you a pivot point around which you can make a circle for your life. Because the gospel's permanent and doesn't shift or change, it provides a strong base in all you do."
Born 52 years ago in El Paso, Texas, Bluth moved with his parents and six brothers and sisters to a farm in Payson, Utah, when he was 6 years old. Later, the family moved to Salt Lake City, then south to Mapleton in Utah County, then to Santa Monica, Calif., for Bluth's senior year in high school. Heading back to Utah, he attended BYU, majoring in English.
"I felt a tremendous inadequacy as a reader," he explained, saying that he'd never read a book cover-to-cover before then. "I tried to fix that by becoming an English major and taking speed-reading."
After a year, though, he couldn't resist the lure of his first love - drawing. In 1955, Bluth took a portfolio to the Disney studio in Burbank, Calif., and was hired immediately as an assistant animator for "Sleeping Beauty," despite the fact that he'd never before taken art lessons.
After a couple of years of working under the direction of Walt Disney himself, Bluth left the studio to serve a mission in Argentina. Upon his return 2 1/2 years later, he dabbled in an assortment of endeavors: First, he opened the Bluth Brothers Theatre with his brother Fred in the Los Angeles area; then, after two years he returned to BYU to receive his English degree; after that he worked for Filmation Studios, drawing Archie, Sabrina and friends; and in 1971 he went back to work for Disney.
"I just did my own thing," Bluth acknowledged, referring to his independence and variety of interests. "I still don't conform to any mold."
It was precisely this creative unorthodoxy and restlessness that led him, once again, to embark upon yet another venture. Finding himself dissatisfied with the decline of animation quality since Walt Disney's death, Bluth left in 1979 to form his own company, Don Bluth Studios, with some Disney colleagues.
"We were asking ourselves, `Couldn't we make something that has more dignity?' " recalled Bluth. "We wanted to go back to the animation of the early Disney films, and got tired of the resistance, so we went out to make our own."
Working in Bluth's garage, the animators produced a cartoon movie, "Banjo, the Woodpile Cat," which aired on TV. Then they became more ambitious with the full-length production "The Secret of NIMH," a story based on the award-winning children's book, "Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH." For that work, Bluth received the Golden Saturn Award from the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror films.
Although the film did very well critically, it was not a box office success, and the company began to flounder. It was at this time that Bluth, who hadn't been very active in the Church since his mission, began to reevaluate his life, and determined to get priorities back in order.
"I went to my partners," he recalled, "and told them I was the reason the business was going down. `I'm the Jonah in this boat,' I told them. They weren't too familiar with that, so when I explained it, they said, `Boy, are you conceited!' But I said no, it's just that I know better, and more is expected of me."
Bluth remembered the promise to full tithe-payers, that the windows of heaven would be opened to pour out blessings, (see Mal. 3:8-11) and thought, "If anyone needs blessings, it's me." He determined how much tithing he owed for the last two years, and it added up to be the amount he had in the bank. Writing out a check for the full sum, he put it in an envelope and took it to the bishop.
"Soon after that," Bluth said, "[movie producerT Steven Spielberg came to us and said, `I'd like to make a picture with you guys.' " The picture was "American Tail," which grossed some $150 million in total revenues. Bluth's company became solvent, and in 1983, he received the coveted Inkpot Award for excellence in animation.
Don Bluth Studios has since become Sullivan Bluth Studios, with headquarters in Dublin, Ireland. It is there that Bluth was called as president of the Finglas Branch, with responsibility for some 200 members. He finds opportunities to share the gospel with friends and co-workers by simply "warming their hearts, not preaching," and by being an example.
"When they find out I'm LDS," he said, "hopefully they'll have a good impression and let the missionaries in their homes."
His movies as well, he explained, are centered around "straight-ahead gospel principles."
"In `The Land Before Time,' for example, the dinosaurs start off life heading for the promised valley, and they have to overcome obstacles to get there. They have to get along to survive, and work with each others' peculiarities. `American Tail' is about being separated from your family, but never giving up, and accomplishing what you set out to do.
"And in `The Secret of NIMH' [a story of some laboratory rats who escape from the National Institute of Mental Health], the characters solve their own problems through faith," Bluth continued.
The appeal of animation, he said, is universal, because "it's like looking into a mirror.
"People identify with and see themselves as the characters. It makes a person feel like, `I live in a world where it's all going to work out, where there's hope,' and lets him rest his hat on fantasy for a while.
"Fairy tales explain infant reality until children mature sufficiently to handle abstract reality," he continued. "Animation is a teaching tool to help you open your heart and let the sun in."
Bluth's current production is a full-length feature entitled "All Dogs Go to Heaven," which he described as a "2-Kleenex movie" about a German shepherd who gets a second chance at life.