We return to that unappreciated medium: the animation short. Today we will be looking at Presto which can be found here.

Presto explores the relationship between performer and audience through the lens of the relationship between performer and performer; albeit performers of differing ‘classes’.

We could, if we were the kind of people in the habit of doing such things, divide all performers into two classes; a higher class and a lower class. The Higher class are what we might call speaking roles, non-extra’s, main characters, magicians; these people are the primary focus for the audience, they are what the every-man is supposed to see as the heart and soul of the production. The Lower class we can see as non-speaking roles, extra’s, rabbits; these are no less vital to the production however they are of a more replaceable kind; the audiences attention is rarely on them, or rarely for any length of time. Thus we have our Dichotomy. Note also that this dichotomy is not earned, we don’t see the Magician practicing his stage craft for years to hone his technique; rather we see that he has been granted a pair of magical objects around which his entire act revolves.

Now if you think this distinction is savage, brutal, non-factual and arbitrary: Congratulations on not being an arse. Also Pixar agrees with you.

We quickly see the dichotomy established in ‘Presto’ the Magician and his rabbit are clearly on different levels, the Magician is the master the rabbit the servant. This is established not merely through traditional status but also in terms of goals. The Magician’s goal throughout is to attain the pleasure of the audience by performing Magic tricks; the rabbit is simply after a carrot. These goals are clearly of different kinds but note that they are not entirely unrelated, if the audience goes without entertainment the rabbit will go hungry, if the rabbit starves to death the audience will go unentertained; these two characters therefore exist in a symbiotic relationship; and it is our tragic hero the Magician’s failure to realize this that leads to the central plot of his downfall.

So while the Magician suffers greatly he does in the end succeed and the circle of life goes on. He realizes the rabbit is necessary to his continuation and is able to complete his act to rapturous applause.

It is at this stage that we must consider another interpretation: what if this was the Magician’s and rabbit’s plan from the start? What if their show was always intended as a show gone wrong? What if this ending while looking haphazard was in fact staged down to the last detail? This would explain why though everything appears extremely dangerous the Magician remains relatively unharmed throughout; it would explain why a piano is rigged and attached to a rope to take part in the finale, despite their being no realistic reason for the instrument to be tethered like this.

While this explanation is neat to get into why it’s wrong we have to consider this show from the point of view of the audience. And what we get is a far more exciting and interesting Magic show than what the Magician initially had in mind.

He performs a series of slight of hand tricks that build and build centering around the seemingly ‘magical’ hat; finally in a crescendo the curtains are thrown back the magician thrown high into the air only to teleport away fron the deadly landing and land in the final pose of the piece: he and the rabbit bow.

Once we take into account that the audience as characters see almost none of the story as presented to us by Pixar we now know this can’t be a deliberate act.

Now the question becomes what next? Can this duo recreate their most successful act in history, the tension between these two characters between these two classes of performers has created this incredible show, but the result of creating such a show has brought the two closer together and thus crippled their ability to create such a show. So is Pixar saying that good art necessitates the destruction of what made that art possible.

As we stare into the barrel of Finding Dory, Cars 3 and Toy Story 4: I think it’s worth taking a moment to consider the nature of creativity; how the people we create with shape our creations and how our creations shape ourselves and the creators we’re compatible with.

Also always feed your pets.