The Evil Queen


 * For information on the character's transformation, see Witch (Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs character).

The Queen is the main antagonist of Disney's 1937 hit film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and the first Disney animated features canon villain. Determined to remain the fairest of all, the Queen becomes insanely jealous of Snow White, the only one whose beauty surpasses her own. She eventually uses dark magic to transform herself into the Witch, in a final attempt to do away with her only, unknowing rival. Depicted in early designs as a fat, comical character, her appearance eventually evolved into a much more sinister, stately beauty. She is generally one of Disney's most iconic and menacing first villains, once being voted the 10th greatest movie villain of all time. The Queen was animated by Art Babbitt and the Witch by Norman Ferguson. Both were voiced by veteran actress Lucille La Verne.

The character's full name was given as Queen Grimhilde in old publicity material and comics, but the Disney company does not seem to acknowledge it as canon anymore. She is sometimes referred to as the Evil Queen or the Wicked Queen, while theme parks sometimes refer to her as the Snow Queen. The Witch is sometimes referred to as the Old Hag, the Old Crone or the Peddler.

Personality
The Queen's sole aim is to remain the fairest in the land, and she will stop at nothing to achieve this. She shows compassion towards none but herself; however, her jealousy of Snow White is emphasised by her stepdaughter's romance with The Prince. The Queen's vanity and jealousy of Snow White's beauty eventually drive her to insanity as she wishes for no other goal than to be the fairest in the land. That she transforms herself into a hideous hag to achieve this end is a sign of her determination and desperation.

As the Witch, her goal is the same, but she is far more excited as she comes closer to achieving her goal. However, in this new state she is slightly uncertain. She is no longer protected by her regal status and castle, she no longer has any minions, servants or magic to defend her, and she is older and frailer than before. However, this uncertainty is outweighed by her resolve to kill Snow White. However, the book My Side of the Story: Snow White/The Queen reveals that the Queen actually was very kind to Snow White at first (she even has a portrait of her stepdaughter on one of the walls of the castle), but she gets too wound up in her jealousy which ultimately results in her untimely end.. The book also reveals her, when not in her castle, owning a grocery store and that Humbert was a very good friend of hers. She also, according to her explanation, made Snow White a servant in her castle to ensure that her stepdaughter is not lazy.

Appearance
The Queen is an icily beautiful woman with a serene, unfeeling face, and a slender yet voluptuous figure. She is pale-skinned with green eyes, red lipstick, and seemingly penciled-on eyebrows. Her beautiful features and her royal attire create a very stunning and beautiful Queenly image. The Queen is seen wearing a purple gown with long sleeves and a rope belt tied around her waist. She wears a black balaclava that covers her ears, neck, and raven hair, leaving her face exposed. The Queen wears a long black cloak that appears to be part of the cowl. The cloak is lined with red inside and the bottom of the cloak is lined with white fur. She has a high white collar attached to her cloak. She also wears a golden pendant that seems to connect with the collar. To top off her royal appearance, the Evil Queen wears a golden crown atop her head with 5 spikes on the front and a jewel on the tip of the middle and tallest spike. The color scheme of her attire represents her pride and vanity.

In her witch disguise, the Queen's physical appearance changes from that of a youthfully beautiful queen with an unfeeling look on her face to that of an ugly, old peddler with face of displaying emotions. She has long, tangled white hair, thick eyebrows, gold eyes, and dark rings around her eyes. Her nose becomes long and crooked with a large wart, and she only has one visible tooth on her bottom jaw. Her hands are gnarled and have pointed, dirty fingernails. She dons a black, cowled robe that retains the hanging sleeves of her dress. She also seems to wear grey slippers.

Walt Disney described the Evil Queen, "a mixture of Lady Macbeth and the Big Bad Wolf... her beauty is sinister, mature, plenty of curves... she becomes ugly and menacing when scheming and mixing her poisons; magic fluids trasnsform her into an old. witch-like hag."

Discovering Snow White's Beauty
The Queen, jealous of her stepdaughter Snow White's beauty, forces her to work as a servant in her castle; even in rags and wooden shoes, however, Snow White's beauty shines through, causing the Queen to worry that Snow White's beauty may one day surpass her own. She has such vanity that she consults her Magic Mirror every day, ordering the slave within to reveal the name of the fairest in the land. Every day the spirit says that the Queen is the fairest, and she is content, until the mirror informs her that Snow White has finally become the fairest in the land. Outside, as Snow White works, she sings to herself, attracting the attention of the Prince, who is passing by, and they are instantly infatuated with each other. The Queen watches from her window, unseen by the two lovers, and, jealous both of Snow White's beauty and the Prince's affections, closes the curtains furiously.

The Huntsman's Orders
Summoning her faithful Huntsman to her, the Queen orders him to take Snow White far into a secluded area of the forest, where she can pick wild flowers, and kill her. She presents him with a box, in which Snow White's heart must be brought as proof. The Huntsman is reluctant to carry out such a deed, but, knowing the penalty for failure, takes Snow White deep into the forest. Just as he is about to stab the princess, he finds that he cannot bring himself to destroy such innocent beauty and, frantically warning Snow White of the Queen's vanity and jealousy, tells her to flee into the forest. He returns to the Queen, bringing in the box the heart of a pig. Meanwhile, Snow White finds the Cottage of the Seven Dwarfs, and is found by the dwarfs, whom she tells of the Queen's attempts to kill her. They are fearful of the dark magic of the Queen, not least because, Grumpy, not keen on having a woman around the house, refers to her as an "ol' witch" and suggests that she may have discovered them already, have made herself invisible, and be watching them right now. They nevertheless take pity and agree to take her in (though Grumpy is reluctant to do so, fearing the Queen's power, as well as being a self-proclaimed misogynist).

Transformation into the Witch
That night the Queen once again consults the slave in the Magic Mirror, who tells her that Snow White is living in the cottage of the Seven Dwarfs and that the Huntsman has brought her a pig's heart. Furious, the Queen descends a spiral staircase, entering a dark chamber filled with arcane and magical artifacts, as well as a raven perched on a skull. The Queen decides to go to the cottage herself, disguised as a peddler. Consulting a book on disguises, she mixes the required potion ingredients, such as Mummy dust to make her old, the black of night to shrove her clothes, an old hah's cackle to age her voice, a scream of fright to waten her hair, a blast of wind to fane her hate, and finally a thunderbolt to mix it well. After putting all the ingredients together she dranks the potition dies, and turns herself into the Witch. She then decides to dispose of Snow White with a poisoned apple, which will send its victim into the Sleeping Death.    

The Sleeping Death
The Witch brews the poison and dips an apple into the brew, turning the fruit a tempting red. (During this scene, she is speaking directly to the audience.) She reads that the victim of the poison can be revived by 'Love's First Kiss', but convinces herself that the Dwarfs will bury the poisoned Snow White. Cackling to herself, she puts the apple in a basket, and walks down through the dungeon below, emerging from the castle's catacombs in a raft. As she makes her way to the dwarfs' cottage, two sinister vultures see her and, sensing that death is imminent, quietly pursue her.

Defeat
She reaches the cottage and, according to plan, finds that the Dwarfs have left and Snow White is alone. Catching the girl by surprise as she is preparing food for the Dwarfs when they return home from their work in the Diamond Mines, the Witch offers her the apple, but is attacked by the animals of the forest (who sense danger when they notice the two wicked vultures). Snow White does not recognize any danger in the old woman and lets her into the house to offer her a drink of water, while the animals rush to find the Dwarfs. The Witch tells Snow White that the apple will grant wishes, and, knowing of Snow White's romance with the Prince, persuades her to wish for a happy reunion before taking a bite. Snow White falls to the floor, taken by the Sleeping Death, and the Witch cackles with glee as a storm starts outside. The dwarfs arrive in time to see her leave and, led by Grumpy, chase her up a mountain and corner her on a cliff. She attempts to crush them with a huge rock, but lightning strikes the cliff, causing her to fall to her doom to be crushed by the rock herself. The dwarfs watch as the two wicked vultures fly down to her body at the bottom of the cliff.

Comics
After the comic adaptation of Snow White, the Queen, in her hag form, returned as a recurring antagonist to the Seven Dwarfs, and later many other Disney protagonists, occasionally teaming up with fellow Disney villains like Pete and Captain Hook. One story in the 1980s provided an explanation for her return, and why she couldn't change back to her normal form. In two 1940s stories, it was also revealed that she had a deceitful twin brother.

TV specials
Disney's Haunted Halloween segments The Legend of Sleepy Hollow: The Wicked Queen becomes a evil witch spells Magic Potion sees The Poisoned Apple.

Who Framed Roger Rabbit
The Queen makes a cameo in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. She is seen in her Witch Disguise crossing the streets in Toontown to get to the Apple Store with help from Snow White.

House of Mouse
The Queen made frequent cameos in crowd shots on House of Mouse. One episode, "Pluto Saves the Day", had her selling her poisoned apples to Pete, which he used to put the House crew to sleep.

Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep
The Queen appears as an antagonist in Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, in her homeworld of Dwarf Woodlands, taking on both her Queen and hag forms. The Queen's first appearance in the Kingdom Hearts series was actually in Kingdom Hearts, a picture of her hag form appearing on Snow White's stain-glass podium in the Dive to the Heart.

In Terra's scenario, the Queen asks him to bring her Snow White's heart, and would allow Terra to ask her Magic Mirror about Master Xehanort's whereabouts in return. Terra fails in this endeavor, causing her darkness to grow in her anger. She takes control of her mirror to fight Terra, who wins the battle. The Queen reluctantly allows Terra to use her mirror and begins plotting how to kill Snow White once Terra leaves.

In Ventus's scenario, she appears under the disguise of an old hag and prepares to carry the poisoned apple to Snow White, but drops it on her way. Ventus, unaware of her motives, politely gives the apple back. She also tells Ventus how deep Terra is dabbling into darkness.

Some time between Ventus and Aqua's scenarios, the Queen succeeds in having Snow White eat the poisoned apple. She is then only briefly mentioned in Aqua's storyline by the Seven Dwarfs, who tell Aqua they chased away the Queen following her foul deeds. The Magic Mirror later tells Aqua that the Queen is dead and he is no longer under her control.

Disney Parks
The Queen is a stock character who does make appearances at all Disney Theme Parks. She appears both as a normal human and sometimes as the witch.

Snow White's Scary Adventures
The Queen practically stars in this ride. She is seen more than any other character in all four versions of the ride, recreating classic scenes from the movie including peering out her window at Snow White (and the guests), transforming, creating the apple, and on the cliffs.

Fantasmic!
The Queen appears in the second act of Fantasmic!, and asks the Magic Mirror who the fairest one of all is. The Mirror, voiced by Tony Jay and projected onto water screens, replies that Mickey Mouse's imagination creates fairer things than she. Jealous, the Queen transforms herself into the Witch and uses the Mirror to summon various 'forces of evil', including Ursula, Cruella De Vil (only in Florida), Scar (only in Florida), Judge Claude Frollo (only in Florida), Jafar (only in Florida), Hades (only in Florida), Chernabog and Maleficent, who transforms into a dragon. Mickey is able to defeat the villains with a glowing white sword, which he first uses to defeat the dragon. This causes white sparks to surround every one of the villains. The Witch is the last to be defeated, transforming back into the Queen as she dies.

Walt Disney: One Man's Dream
In the show located in Tokyo Disneyland, The Queen appears alongside Maleficent and Judge Frollo in the villains act of the show. The Queen seems to be the leader of the trio in the show.

Voice
Lucille La Verne was first asked to provide only the voice e Vengeace in A Tale of Two Cities), but read for both parts and was later offered the part of the Queen when no other actress was found. Some at the studio felt that her voice was too deep, but David Hand argued that she "knew how to deliver lines," particularly when adding ingredients to the potion. Bill Cottrell and Joe Grant were in charge of La Verne's recording session. At first they felt that her voice was too smooth for the Witch. Asking herself to be excused, La Verne left the room; upon returning a few moments later, her voice was exactly what Cottrell and Grant wanted. When asked how she had achieved this, La Verne admitted that she had removed her false teeth. Cottrel was so convinced by La Verne's performance that, at the line "a glass of water! Please!" he leaped from his chair to fetch her a drink. Joe Grant noticed La Verne's changing attitude and posture when voicing the Queen and Witch, and sketched these poses down for animation reference.

Design and Animation of the Queen
In the early stages of design, the Queen was drawn as a fat, frumpy, comical character, in the style of the characters of the Silly Symphonies. The Fleisher Betty Boop short Snow White, which, like much of Fleisher's work, had probably been studied by Disney's animators, also has a fat, ugly Queen. However, when Albert Hurter introduced a more realistic style of character design to the Disney animators, it was ultimately decided that the Queen should be more beautiful, regal, cold and sinister, creating a much scarier character than had ever been attempted in animation before. Rather than a comical villain, she became a femme fetale, a type of character with which the Disney artists would have been familiar, through the silent screen; at the same time she is a figure from ancient Europe, viewed by American audiences in the 1930s as a symbol of not only charm and elegance, but also decadence and self-destruction. The Queen's costume is rumoured to be based on that worn by Helen Gahagan in the 1935 film She, though animator Art Babbit and other Disney artists have denied this. At a meeting on October 30, 1934, Disney suggested that the papier mache masks by Art Deco illustrator Vladislav Theodor Benda (an influence on Joe Grant's work) be used as inspiration for the Queen's face. Her 'Hollywood mask' of a face may also draw inspiration from Joan Crawford, particularly in the lips and eyes. The Queen's costume and general silhouette may have been inspired by a column statue at Naumberg Cathedral depicting Uta, wife of the Margrave of Meissen. There are also facial similarities to George de Feure's La Femme au chapeau noir (1898-1900).

Babbit based the Queen on "all of the women I've ever known", and noted that, while the animation of the Queen relied, to an extent, on live-action footage, he felt the need to 'caricature' and 'invent' in order to justify the medium of animation; the animation was not rotoscoped as The Prince's was.

Imprisoning the Prince
It was originally planned that, jealous of the Prince's affections for Snow White, the Queen would have him brought to her, and she would have him locked in her dungeon. As the Witch, she would have made the skeletons in the dungeon (one of whom would have been identified as 'Price Oswald') rise up and dance. She would have left the Prince in the dungeon, and he was to escape in the manner of Errol Flynn, enabling him to reach Snow White and break the spell. The idea was abandoned when it was realised how difficult it was to animate the Prince convincingly, and the character only appeared when he needed to to further the story, which centred primarily around the relationship between Snow White and the Queen.

However, comics released to promote the film include such scenes; the Witch locks up the Prince and tells him of her plans for Snow White, telling him that she will win his affections, while the Prince is defiant. Later, as the animators became more experienced at animating human characters, a similar concept was used in Sleeping Beauty, in which Maleficent has Prince Phillip captured and taken to the Forbidden Mountains, where she shows him visions of the future she has planned for him.

Deleted Scenes
A very short sequence involving the Witch stirring her cauldron was fully animated and completed, and was among the scenes cut from the film by Walt Disney at the last minute. In the sequence, the Raven looks on as the Witch stirs the cauldron with a huge bone. She pauses to see that the smoke rising from the brew is shaped like skulls, and adds a drop of an unknown ingredient to the concoction. At this, smoke from the cauldron fills the room. This sequence would have occurred immediately after the scene of the Seven Dwarfs going to sleep in their cottage; the sequence would have been followed by the scene in which the Witch dips the apple into the brew to make it poisonous.

Deviations from Source Material

 * In the first Brothers Grimm version of the fairy tale, the Queen was Snow White's real mother; however, in all later versions she was the heroine's stepmother, as she is in the film.
 * In the original Snow White fairy tale, the Queen did not drink a potion to transform into a peddler woman, but merely 'painted her face'.
 * The Queen also visited Snow White three times, each time in a different disguise and with a different object; first, she came with a corset, which she used to draw the breath from Snow White (the dwarfs arrive in time to remove the corset); second, she came with a poisoned comb, which she put in Snow White's hair (the dwarfs simply remove it); finally, she came with the poisoned apple, the effects of which the dwarfs were unable to undo.
 * Snow White was not cured in the original story by being kissed; the Prince was amazed at her beauty and had her carried in the glass coffin to his castle; on the way, she was knocked, and the piece of poisoned apple fell out of her mouth.
 * In the fairy tale, the Queen was killed much later, at the wedding of Snow White; she was forced to wear red hot iron shoes, in which she danced until she fell down dead.

Critical response
The Queen is considered one of the greatest movie villains of all time and, along with Cruella De Vil, Maleficent and Ursula is one of Disney's most popular villains, regularly appearing in polls; she was nominated for a place in 'AFI’s 50 Greatest Villains list' (along with Stromboli, Man, Lady Tremaine, Maleficent, Cruella De Vil and Ursula; the Disney Villains to make the final list were the Queen (10), Man (20), and Cruella De Vil (39)) and was ranked fourth in fan site Ultimate Disney's countdown of the most popular Disney Villains. The Witch was voted to seventh place in an official poll for favourite animated Disney Villains (behind Cruella De Vil, Maleficent, Ursula, Captain Hook, Scar and Jafar). The Queen was also ranked as the greatest Disney Villain in the tongue-in-cheek Disney Villains: The Top Secret Files (which includes a photo of her in her 'first modelling job', and a list of foods she contemplates poisoning). The Queen is also one of Terry Gilliam's favorite villains. However, Gilliam noted that her transformation into ugliness in order supposedly to become the fairest of all was "a truly strange thing".

Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston considered the Queen to be one of Disney's greatest villains, citing, as reasons for the good villain-victim relationship, in particular the fact that her motivations were clear, that she had no redeeming qualities, and that Snow White was childlike in her belief that she was safe. The Queen's menace and intensity was considered too frightening for young audiences by some parental group, and the scene in which she transforms into the Witch was initially cut from the UK release. It was voted number 80 in Channel 4's 100 Greatest Scary Moments. Thomas and Johnston felt that Disney restrained his animators from creating such a terrifying villain again.

Al Hirschfeld criticized the design of the Queen, The Prince and Snow White as "badly drawn attempts at realism... Disney's treatment of these characters belongs in the oopsy-woopsy school of art practiced mostly by etchers who portray dogs with cute sayings." Similarly, Michael Barrier considers the Queen "cold and unappealing... even closer to live action than Snow White herself." However, Robin Allan considers her to succeed better than any live action equivalent could because "her character and movement have been distilled until she is the epitome of evil... in animation, nothing that we see is not intended." Barrier praises the Witch as "a striking character", but in an "ultimately false manner."

The sequence in which the Vultures watch the Witch fall to her death, then fly down to her body, impressed Sylvia Moberly-Holland enough to inspire her to apply as an Inspirational Sketch Artist at the Disney studio.

The Queen provided the inspiration for many villains that followed, particularly M.G.M.'s Wicked Witch of the West and Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty. Critics have also noted similarities between the Witch and the cackling, hooded Emperor Palpatine, the ultimate villain of the Star Wars saga.

Trivia

 * In the Japanese version of Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, the Queen uses her own darkness to control the Magic Mirror and force it to battle Terra. In the English version, however, she simply smashes a potion on the Mirror to make it obey.
 * In the English version of Kingdom Hearts Birth By Sleep, the Queen is voiced by Susanne Blakeslee, who also voiced Maleficent, Flora and Lady Tremaine in the same game.
 * Her iconic scene with the Magic Mirror is near-faithfully recreated in the English version, save for changing her term to refer to the mirror from the original film's "slave" to "spirit".