
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, May 6, 1993                   TAG: 9305060308
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

WALT DISNEY AIDED FBI AS HOLLYWOOD TATTLER

From 1940 until his death in 1966, Walt Disney served as a secret informant for the Los Angeles office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, according to documents that have come to light under the Freedom of Information Act.

Details about the filmmaker's FBI connection emerge in "Walt Disney: Hollywood's Dark Prince," an unauthorized biography by Marc Eliot scheduled to be published in July by Birch Lane Press.

Eliot, who has written several books on popular culture, provided a copy of the Disney file to The New York Times so that information and direct quotations in the book could be verified against the government documents. Experience with similar FBI dossiers leaves no doubt that the material submitted by Eliot is authentic.

Because many of the 570 pages in the Disney file are blacked out or withheld for national security reasons, it cannot be determined what names Disney passed on as Communists or subversives.

In return for Disney's information, J. Edgar Hoover allowed Disney to film in FBI headquarters in Washington. Disney, for his part, made slight changes in a few lesser-known movies and an episode of "The Mickey Mouse Club" television show to mollify Hoover. There is no evidence that revisions were requested in any of Disney's classic animated features.

by CNB