D23 has opened some crates that have been sealed for over 10 years at the Walt Disney Archive to show us some of the amazing miniatures behind Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland.
What’s Happening:
- As part of a series exploring some lost treasures in the Walt Disney Archives, the D23 YouTube series “Unseen Artifacts” explores some lost miniatures, models from Tim Burton’s Alice In Wonderland.
- Released in 2010, Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland stars Johnny Depp, Anne Hathaway, Helena Bonham Carter, Crispin Glover, Matt Lucas, and Mia Wasikowska, featuring the voices of Alan Rickman, Stephen Fry, Michael Sheen, and Timothy Spall. The film was loosely inspired by Lewis Carroll's fantasy novels, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass (later interpreted as a sequel from Burton) and was influenced by Walt Disney's 1951 animated film of the same name.
- The models featured are models used in pre-production of the film, as reference for what the sets will look like when actually filming.
- The models shown in the collection, one of the largest collection of set models in the archives, include:
- Red Queen’s Bedroom Chamber
- March Hare’s House
- The Red Queen’s Dungeon (complete with removable pieces)
- Melissa Pankuch, a registrar at the archive, is also featured in the video and explains what she does to “condition report” the models, examining them and monitoring their condition before they get sealed in crates again and tour for an exhibition.