‘BEAUTY’ MAKES PAY-TV BOW

“Sleeping Beauty,” Walt Disney’s classic 1959 animated film, had its world television premiere on the Disney Channel cable-TV program service Saturday. It airs again Thursday and seven more times this month and next. With a $6-million budget, “Beauty” was the most expensive animated movie ever made when it was filmed 28 years ago. More than 300 artists and technicians created more than 1 million drawings and sketches for the film, which was begun in 1950 but--due to cost overruns, Disney’s preoccupation with his company’s new network television series and theme park and technical considerations--not released until nine years later. When “Sleeping Beauty” finally opened, it did only mediocre business at the box office, prompting Disney to avoid fairy tales for animated subject matter thereafter.