Courtesy of Mark Kausler (by way of his brother, Kurt) comes this article about Sonia the Duck from Walt Disney’s Peter and the Wolf that I’d never seen before. It’s from Screen Guide (May 1946), and a very clever way to promote the compilation feature Make Mine Music.
Mark says it “smacks of Ward Kimball’s kind of humor. I never had considered that Sonia’s femininity made much of a difference!” It does indeed. Click the pages below to see enlarged versions.
Jerry Beck is a writer, animation producer, college professor and author of more than 15 books on animation history. He is a former studio exec with Nickelodeon Movies and Disney, and has written for The Hollywood Reporter and Variety. He has curated cartoons for DVD and Blu-ray compilations and has lent his expertise to dozens of bonus documentaries and audio commentaries on such. Beck is currently on the faculty of CalArts in Valencia, UCLA in Westwood and Woodbury University in Burbank – teaching animation history. More about Jerry Beck [Click Here]
It sure does sound like ol’ Ward had a hand in this! The topical references to certain films were rather clever! And Donald’s blunt comment was the topper!
I always wondered if Sonia was a female or male duck since the name sounds like a girl’s name, yet the duck doesn’t look that feminie in the film. Now I know.
Sonia is a unisexual name in Russia and several other surrounding countries.
I just think that don’t change anything, I mean we alredy had female verison of Donald that didn’t make much of a difference.
Can anyone ID the artist behind that gorgeous portrait?
My father had a copy of this pin-up of Sonia the Duck on his wall in the Army in 1946. He remembered it and described it and I’ve just found it for him here on this site. Thank you, Jerry, for posting this image.