Even in the midst of the Great Depression, movie premieres were still glamorous, star-studded affairs. The premiere of “Snow White” was no different, with more than a dozen big-name celebrities turning out for the historic Disney film.
Some of the “Hollywood royalty,” according J.B. Kaufman’s book, “The Fairest One of All,” (via the Walt Disney Family Museum), who attended the Hollywood premiere included Shirley Temple, Charlie Chaplin, Marlene Dietrich, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Helen Vinson, Claudette Colbert, Gail Patrick, Hedy Lamarr, Preston Foster, and more. Kaufman also wrote that Temple and her friends posed with some of the actors hired to appear as the dwarfs, while other celebrities walked the red carpet and spoke to radio broadcasters.
Walt and Lillian Disney were also there, of course, and wire news services reported that Disney “bit his fingernails, waiting for the verdict of the tail-coated and satin-gowned audience.” That same report said the celebrity-filled audience loved the movie.
In the biography “Disney’s World,” author Leonard Mosley wrote that Disney said to the celebrity-filled he had “always dreamed that one day I would attend a gala premiere in Hollywood of one of my cartoons” and that their enthusiasm for “Snow White” made him feel like he had truly become a legitimate filmmaker.
