Disney's Animated Classics

Alice Comedies

The Alice Comedies: In late 1922, Walt was hired by a dentist to produce a live-action dental health film called "Tommy Tucker's Tooth." The payment received from this effort allowed Walt to rehire some of his animators and begin work on a new series of animated shorts. He came up with the idea of having a real girl appear in a series of adventures in an animated cartoon land. The first of these animated shorts was released in 1923. Shortly thereafter, Walt moved to Hollywood, where he recruited many of his former animators and continued to produce films in the Alice Comedies series for distributor Margaret Winkler and her husband Charles Mintz. A total of 57 Alice Comedies films were produced between 1923 and 1927. Three different girls -- Virginia Davis, Dawn O'Day, and Margie Gray -- played Alice. Two recurring animated characters were Julius the Cat and Peg Leg Pete, who would later be developed into a regular adversary of Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and others.

1927: Scene from an "Alice Comedy"