Quick Chats with Cam: Leslie Iwerks
Conversations with Cam
Cameron Oaks Rogers
4.7 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 13 February 2026
⏱️ 9 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this episode, I sit down with filmmaker, Leslie Iwerks, to dive into the making of her documentary, Disneyland Handcrafted. Leslie reveals how Disneyland was built in just one year and the film’s fascinating archival process of never-before-seen footage from the 1950s. We chat about Leslie’s Disney family legacy, her favorite behind-the-scenes childhood memories, and how growing up surrounded by Disney magic has shaped her life. We also get into rapid-fire Disney favorites!
Key Takeaway / Points:
The behind-the-scenes of making the film, Disneyland Handcrafted
What it was like digging through the Disney archives, uncovering the stress of building Disneyland in one year, and the process of matching audio to the silent footage
Leslie’s childhood memories of growing up on Disney film sets and parks
The magic of her grandfather co-creating Mickey Mouse with Walt Disney
Disney rapid-fire favorites: Disneyland vs. Disney World, favorite Disney films and rides, and best food at Epcot
Watch Disneyland Handcrafted HERE
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Leslie, thank you so much for joining us on Quick Chats with Cam. |
| 0:03.0 | Thank you. |
| 0:03.8 | I just had the honor of watching Disneyland Handcrafted, and my mind is utterly blown. |
| 0:09.2 | Like, I really have so many questions. |
| 0:11.5 | I wish I could speak with the people who are actually building it in the 50s. |
| 0:15.0 | But I'm curious, if you can share for people who are listening who didn't obviously get a chance to maybe see the movie yet. |
| 0:22.5 | What does Disneyland handcrafted show? It shows the extraordinary journey of hundreds of |
| 0:28.1 | craftspeople who built Disneyland in the year, the frantic year leading up to opening day in great detail, |
| 0:34.0 | all pristine footage shot by the cameramen who were tasked to document all of it. |
| 0:39.1 | And it's really wild because, A, I don't feel, I mean, I don't know, maybe people are watching |
| 0:43.8 | footage from the 1950s. I'm not, so I feel like I haven't seen real footage from the 50s |
| 0:48.5 | and forever. But also how you guys paired the audio. Can you talk about that? Because I know |
| 0:52.8 | the footage didn't actually have audio. |
| 0:54.7 | And so you went and found audio that either matched the era or, you know, walk us through how that worked. |
| 1:00.6 | So what we did was we found all this footage. Well, we sifted through all the 65 reels, 65 hours of footage to cut a 70-minute film. |
| 1:09.9 | And then as we forensically kind of organized all this material, |
| 1:15.4 | we started separately looking for a narrative structure, |
| 1:18.3 | which is a lot of sound bites from the people that were there on the ground, |
| 1:21.7 | that were living, breathing it, building it. |
| 1:24.0 | So we scoured the archives at the Walt Disney Family Museum, |
| 1:26.8 | and the Disney Archives, the Disney archives, |
| 1:28.9 | the TV Academy, you know, everywhere. And Mark Catalina, my co-producer and Gigi O'More, who is our |
... |
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