A celebrity's money trouble can spill over to others that they work with. Judy Garland was a popular guest on television talk shows in 1960s. The problem with booking her was in cities where she appeared hotels were reluctant to put her up. She was famous for abusing help and skipping out on her bills. One time New York based Host Merv Griffin called up Waldorf to see if she could stay there. Absolutely not, he was told. She owes far too much money. What if Merv paid her outstanding bills? He was told he could pay double what she owed and she still wouldn't get a room there.

Comedian Stan Laurel found money so tight he ended up in a sixty dollar a month apartment in Santa Monica in early 1960s. He was listed in phone book and people would call him up. Are you Stan Laurel? Can we come over and meet you? Charlie Chaplin's former vaudeville understudy would warmly welcome fans who visited his residence. But what happened to all his money? Laurel would joke about his three wives getting it all, then explain that Producer Hal Roach owned all Laurel and Hardy films. He and Oliver Hardy, (or Babe, as his friends called him) had been scared to death when silent films had ended in 1928. When Director Leo McCarey came up with idea of teaming skinny English comic with rotund Georgia born actor, two were happy just to keep getting a weekly check. Who knew that two reelers that they were only paid once for would be shown to new generations on television? Stan often told story about how he and Babe had gone touring in Europe. While browsing in an airport gift shop in London they saw some miniature Laurel and Hardy figurines. To take them back as gifts they had been forced to pay full price.

Comebacks abound in movie business. Frank Sinatra, who had not served in World War II due to a punctured eardrum, was very unpopular with American fighting men who were jealous of him being back home crooning to their girlfriends. As our military forces began returning his popularity began to wane. By 1949 both his film and singing career had bottomed out to point he was telling his manager to pay people to attend his concerts. His voice was in bad shape, his marriage was ending, his weight had gone down to 118 pounds and there were reports of suicide attempts. Four years later he was back on top, winning an Academy Award for his performance in film From Here To Eternity (1953). He decided to enjoy his accomplishment by taking a solitary moonlight walk through quiet streets of Beverly Hills, just him and his Oscar. After ten minutes Chairman Of The Board was stopped by two police officers who rained on his parade by not recognizing him, and asking hard questions about where he had gotten that statue.

Being broke in Hollywood is often a matter of perspective. One time at a party Martin Scorsese was lamenting to his fellow director Frances Ford Coppola," Frances I'm broke. They've torn up my credit cards. I have nothing, do you understand me, nothing!" "Marty, will you shut up? I owe fifty million dollars."

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If Walt was ignorant about some classical music pieces, he made up for it by plunging into Fantasia with boyish enthusiasm. His imagination was translated into unique visions by Disney animators. A Bach passage reminded him of a bowl of spaghetti, he was later amused when critics saw something profound in simple drawings that appeared on screen. Stokowski suggested they use a piece called Sacre du Printemps or Rite Of Spring, by Igor Stravinsky. "Socker, what's that?" Walt asked. After he heard music he wired ten thousand dollars to Stravinsky for permission to use it. The desperate Russian composer needed cash to get safe passage out of occupied Paris. Sacre was transformed from ancient pagan rituals to accompany a powerful depiction of Earth's evolution. Beethoven's sixth symphony, The Pastoral, was changed from a peaceful countryside setting to a Mount Olympus spectacle where unicorns, centaurs and nymphs roamed freely. After seeing completed work for first time Walt said with wide-eyed innocence,"Wow! This will make Beethoven!" Like what George Lucas would later do with THX, Walt developed a new recording system called Fantasound, so that audiences would be able to enjoy rich quality of music. All of this spending was viewed with alarm by his tightfisted business partner and classical music hating brother Roy, who annoyed Walt by suggesting they use some Tommy Dorsey tunes instead.

With past films Disney had often bowed to pressure from his financial backers to finish them early while he was still tinkering, trying to make them perfect. Giving in to money men always gave him a sense of loss. He dreamed Fantasia would play forever in some theaters with new segments constantly being added, an endlessly ongoing project. But Fantasia was a crushing disappointment for Walt in 1940. Many movie theater owners refused to pay for installation of Fantasound, giving film very limited distribution. The exhibitors who did show it charged much higher admission prices than normal keeping audiences away. The people that did come were often put off by lack of a story or frightening devil in Night On Bald Mountain sequence, for whom Bela Lugosi was real life model. Roy, who had indulged his brother because he was certain they would break even overseas, saw World War II cut off much of foreign market. Classical music aficionados like ungrateful Stravinsky looked down their noses at Disney's masterpiece. Fantasia was cut in length and went into mass release as second half of a double feature. The Disney brothers took a financial bath they nearly never recovered from.

Fifteen years later Mickey Mouse was back on top with The Mickey Mouse Club television show and Walt finally got his ongoing dream project with Disneyland. But unlike other initial money losers he made, such as Bambi (1942) and Pinocchio (1940), he never lived to see Fantasia become profitable. Shortly before he died in 1966 he said,"Fantasia? Well I don't regret it but if I had to do it over again, I wouldn't."

In 1968 Beatle's cartoon Yellow Submarine did very well with psychedelic crowd. Sensing a new market for Fantasia, Disney studio re-released it and film was finally made profitable by drug tripping hippies who speculated that Walt must have been on something when he produced it.