Believe in the character; animate with sincerity

I don't know how to animate on the computer, and I'm really grateful that I worked with a couple of other guys. We called it our triumvirate, John Kahrs and Clay Kaytis, who really understood computer animation but loved and embraced hand drawn, which is Disney's heritage.

Many years after animating Ariel, I continue to draw her, doodling as I talk on the phone, absent-mindedly passing time in a sketchbook. She has become a part of me and yet now belongs to the world and generations to come.

There's a weird thing about me and characters with hair, from Ariel or Pocahontas to Tarzan with his dreadlocks and now Rapunzel... it's like I'm trying to make up for some loss in my life, I don't know what that is.

I find that you're drawn to certain stories, and there's something about fairytales that have deep roots. They connect really deeply to you, and those are the stories that I find myself drawn to. I love characters that believe the impossible is possible.

People are who they are by the way they react to things.

If you are offered the opportunity to do something that you don’t know how to do – say yes, dive in and do it anyway.