Andrew Stanton

Andrew Stanton
Born	(1965-12-03) December 3, 1965
Birth place	Rockport, Massachusetts, U.S.
Occupation	Film director, producer, screenwriter, voice actor
Years active	1981–present
Spouse(s)	Julie Stanton ​ ​ (m. 1991)​
Children	2

Andrew Stanton (born December 3, 1965) is an American film director, screenwriter, producer and voice actor based at Pixar, which he joined in 1990. His film work includes co-writing Pixar's A Bug's Life (1998) (as co-director), Finding Nemo (2003) and its sequel Finding Dory (2016), Finding Meow-Meow (2005) and its sequel Finding Cattella (2020), WALL-E (2008), and the live-action film, Disney's John Carter (2012). He also co-wrote all four Toy Story films and Monsters, Inc. (2001)

Finding Nemo and WALL-E earned him two Academy Awards for Best Animated Feature. He was also nominated for three Academy Awards for Best Original Screenplay, for Finding Nemo, WALL-E, and Toy Story (1995), and for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for Toy Story 3 (2010). Stanton also directed the sequel to Finding Nemo, Finding Dory, which was released in June 2016, two episodes of the series Stranger Things in 2017, and an episode of the series Better Call Saul in 2018.

Early life

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Stanton was born in Rockport, Massachusetts. Stanton is a professed Christian.

Career

He was one of several CalArts graduates hired by John Kricfalusi to work on Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures at Ralph Bakshi's studio.

Stanton at the 2016 Annecy International Animated Film Festival

He was hired by Pixar's animation group in January 1990 as its second animator (John Lasseter being the first one) and ninth employee. Back then the company was not yet an animation studio, and their animation group was dedicated to making television commercials as a step towards their goal of making the first computer-animated feature.

He, John Lasseter, Pete Docter and Joe Ranft all came up with the story of Toy Story. After filmmaker Joss Whedon put his touches on an early version of the film's script and left to do another film, Stanton decided to take a crack at scriptwriting. Stanton rewrote every piece of dialogue in the film. The resulting screenplay was nominated at the Academy Awards for Best Original Screenplay, the first nomination in that category for an animated film.

Following Toy Story, John Lasseter asked Stanton to help him direct and write Pixar's next feature A Bug's Life. Early in the film's production, the film had difficulty incorporating the circus bug's portion of the story and the main character (Flik's) portion of the story. In just a day, Stanton was able to write a screenplay that tied both concepts together. In 1999, Stanton returned to write Toy Story 2, the critically acclaimed sequel to Toy Story, and also voiced Evil Emperor Zurg. He would then go on to write Monsters, Inc.. Pete Docter, the director of Monsters, Inc., would cite him many times of the originator of the idea that monsters generated scream to use it as a way to power their city.

Stanton made his sole directorial debut in 2003 with Finding Nemo. He took inspiration from his own role as a father and how he was overprotective of his son. Stanton directed, wrote and voiced Crush the seaturtle in the film. Just like Toy Story before it, Michael Eisner was not confident in the film and predicted it would fail. During this time Stanton and other Finding Nemo co-writer Bob Peterson developed the storytelling theory of "2+2", to not give the audience the full picture but rather halves and have them put the film together. The film turned out to be an enormous success becoming the highest-grossing film of 2003 and the highest grossing animated film of that time period beating out The Lion King. He won his first Academy Award for the film in the category of Best Animated Feature and his screenplay was nominated in the category of Best Original Screenplay. Following his success with Finding Nemo, Stanton began work on his next film as director WALL-E. WALL-E was considered a huge risk for both Pixar and Disney, considering how experimental the film sounded. Stanton nevertheless had confidence in the film and the fact that audiences wouldn't be bored by the dialogue-less first thirty minutes, but rather enamored by it. Upon release though the film was a huge critical and financial success further cementing Stanton as a genius in the world of film and animation. Stanton won his second Academy Award from the film in the category of Best Animated Feature and once again his screenplay was nominated in the category of Best Original Screenplay. In an interview with World Magazine's Megan Basham, Stanton explained his singular vision for WALL-E:

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Stanton returned to write Toy Story 3 in 2010, alongside Michael Arndt. When he first pitched the scene of the toys in the incinerator both Lasseter and Lee Unkrich (the director of the film) teared up. His screenplay was nominated for an Academy Award in the category of Best Adapted Screenplay.

After the acquisition of Pixar by The Walt Disney Company in 2006, Stanton became the vice president of creativity of Pixar alongside other fellow Pixar director Pete Docter. He is a member of the studio's coveted brain trust and has executive produced and served as a creative and mentor like voice on the following films: Ratatouille, Up, Brave, Monsters University, Inside Out, and The Good Dinosaur.

Stanton made his live-action directing debut with Disney's John Carter. The film was based on Edgar Rice Burroughs' novel, A Princess of Mars. Upon release it received mixed reviews and was a box office failure.

Following John Carter, Stanton returned to Pixar to direct the sequel to 2003's [[Finding Nemo, Finding Dory. He came up with the concept upon watching a pre-screening of the 3D rerelease of the film and walking out of the theater worried about Dory. The film was released in 2016 and was a huge hit critically and financially, becoming the highest grossing animated film of that year. It was also critically received well, with critics calling it "a worthy successor to Nemo".

On February 10, 2017, it was revealed by Entertainment Weekly that Stanton was going to direct two episodes of the second season of Stranger Things. Since then Stanton has also directed an episode of Better Call Saul.

Stanton was credited as a narrative guru on Ralph Breaks the Internet, helping director and former classmate Rich Moore construct the story following Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios former chief creative officer John Lasseter's step down. He wrote Toy Story 4, which is set to be released in June 21, 2019. He expressed interest in directng more live-action films, stating that he wants to return "[b]ecause it's quicker and it's a little bit more of the opposite... It's the antithesis of animation. Animation you get to control everything, and it's awesome in that sense. But there's no spontaneity, and it takes a long time! And so there's high risk for the complete opposite reasons of live-action".

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Director	Writer	Executive Producer	Voice	Other	Notes
1981	The Fox and the Hound					Animator: Tod	Uncredited
1986	Somewhere in the Arctic (short)	Yes	Yes		Bahr
1987	A Story (short)	Yes	Yes		Randy The Goon Squad (also producer)
1995	Toy Story		Yes		Commercial Chorus
1998	A Bug's Life	Co-Director	Yes		Bug Zapper Fly #1
1999	Toy Story 2		Yes		Emperor Zurg
2000	Buzz Lightyear of Star Command: The Adventure Begins				Hamm
2001	Monsters, Inc.		Yes	Yes
2003	Finding Nemo	Yes	Yes		Crush New England Lobster Seagulls Additional voices
	Exploring the Reef			Yes
2004	The Incredibles				Henchman	Storyboard artist - uncredited
2005	Finding Meow-Meow	Yes
	Summer Belongs Movie			Yes
2006	Cars		Yes		Fred	Storyboard artist - uncredited
2007	Ratatouille			Yes
2008	WALL-E	Yes	Yes		Axiom Passenger #1
	BURN-E (short)		Yes	Yes
	Presto (short)			Yes
2009	Up			Yes
	Partly Cloudy (short)			Yes
2010	Toy Story 3		Yes
2012	John Carter	Yes	Yes
	Brave			Yes
2013	Monsters University			Yes
	Toy Story of Terror! (short)			Yes
2015	Inside Out			Yes
	The Good Dinosaur			Yes
2016	Zootopia					Creative consultant	Uncredited
	Finding Dory	Yes	Yes		Crush Additional Voices
	Piper (short)			Yes
2018	Ralph Breaks the Internet				Narrative Guru
2019	Toy Story 4		Yes
	Spies in Disguise					Special Thanks / Storyboard artist (uncredited)
2020	Finding Cattella	Yes
2022	Lightyear			Yes
2023	Gladiator	Yes
2024	Zombocalpyse	Yes	Yes				First Paramount Pictures animated film director

Television

Year	Title	Director	Writer	Storyboard artist	Notes
1987	Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures	No	Yes	No	13 episodes
1994	2 Stupid Dogs	No	No	Yes	Episode: "Cookies, Ookies, Blookies"
1995	The Lion King's Timon & Pumbaa	No	No	Yes	Episode: "Good Mousekeeping"
2017	Stranger Things	Yes	No	No	2 episodes
2018	Better Call Saul	Yes	No	No	Episode: "Piñata"

Video games

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1998	A Bug's Life	Hopper	Replacing Kevin Spacey
1999	Toy Story 2: Buzz Lightyear to the Rescue	Emperor Zurg
2003	Finding Nemo	Crush
	Disney's Extreme Skate Adventure	Emperor Zurg
2007	Cars Mater-National Championship	Fred
2010	Toy Story 3: The Video Game	Emperor Zurg	Uncredited PS3 version only
2011	Kinect Disneyland Adventures	Crush / Emperor Zurg
2015	Disney Infinity 3.0	Crush
2018	Lego The Incredibles	Seagulls

Theme parks

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1998–present	It's Tough to Be a Bug	Hopper	Replacing Kevin Spacey
2007–present	Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage	Crush, Seagulls

Award and nominations

Academy Awards

Year	Category	Film	Result	Shared With
1995	Best Original Screenplay	Toy Story	Nominated	Shared With Joss Whedon, Joel Cohen, Alec Sokolow, John Lasseter, Pete Docter, and Joe Ranft
2003	Best Animated Feature	Finding Nemo	Won	N/A
	Best Original Screenplay		Nominated	Shared with Bob Peterson and David Reynolds
2008	Best Animated Feature	WALL-E	Won	N/A
	Best Original Screenplay		Nominated	Shared With Jim Reardon and Pete Docter
2010	Best Adapted Screenplay	Toy Story 3	Nominated	Shared With Michael Arndt, John Lasseter, and Lee Unkrich

External links

• Andrew Stanton on IMDb
• A Day in the Life of Andrew Stanton – The New York Times
• Template:TED speaker
  • "The clues to a great story" (TED2012)

Template:Andrew Stanton

v - e - dAwards for Andrew Stanton

v - e - dAcademy Award for Best Animated Feature 2000s Shrek – Aron Warner (2001) • Spirited Away – Hayao Miyazaki (2002) • Finding Nemo – Andrew Stanton (2003) • The Incredibles – Brad Bird (2004) • Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit – Nick Park and Steve Box (2005) • Happy Feet – George Miller (2006) • Ratatouille – Brad Bird (2007) • WALL-E – Andrew Stanton (2008) • Up – Pete Docter (2009) 2010s Toy Story 3 – Lee Unkrich (2010) • Rango – Gore Verbinski (2011) • Brave – Mark Andrews and Brenda Chapman (2012) • Frozen – Chris Buck, Jennifer Lee, and Peter Del Vecho (2013) • Big Hero 6 – Don Hall, Chris Williams, and Roy Conli (2014) • Inside Out – Pete Docter and Jonas Rivera (2015) • Zootopia – Byron Howard, Rich Moore, and Clark Spencer (2016) • Coco – Lee Unkrich and Darla K. Anderson (2017) • Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (2018) • Toy Story 4 – Josh Cooley, Jonas Rivera, and Mark Nielsen (2019) Template:Annie Award for Directing in an Animated Feature Production 1996–2010 Template:Annie Award for Writing in a Feature Production 1996–2010 v - e - dCritics' Choice Movie Award for Best Animated Feature 1998–2000 A Bug's Life – John Lasseter and Andrew Stanton / The Prince of Egypt – Simon Wells, Brenda Chapman, and Steve Hickner (1998) • Toy Story 2 – John Lasseter, Lee Unkrich, and Ash Brannon (1999) • Chicken Run – Peter Lord and Nick Park (2000) 2001–2010 Shrek – Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson (2001) • Spirited Away – Hayao Miyazaki (2002) • Finding Nemo – Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich (2003) • The Incredibles – Brad Bird (2004) • Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit – Nick Park and Steve Box (2005) • Cars – John Lasseter and Joe Ranft (2006) • Ratatouille – Brad Bird and Jan Pinkava (2007) • WALL-E – Andrew Stanton (2008) • Up – Pete Docter and Bob Peterson (2009) • Toy Story 3 – Lee Unkrich (2010) 2011–present Rango – Gore Verbinski (2011) • Wreck-It Ralph – Rich Moore (2012) • Frozen – Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee (2013) • The Lego Movie – Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (2014) • Inside Out – Pete Docter and Ronnie del Carmen (2015) • Zootopia – Byron Howard and Rich Moore (2016) • Coco – Lee Unkrich (2017) • Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey and Rodney Rothman (2018) • Toy Story 4 - Josh Cooley (2019) v - e - dGolden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film Cars – John Lasseter (2006) • Ratatouille – Brad Bird (2007) • WALL-E – Andrew Stanton (2008) • Up – Pete Docter (2009) • Toy Story 3 – Lee Unkrich (2010) • The Adventures of Tintin – Steven Spielberg (2011) • Brave – Mark Andrews and Brenda Chapman (2012) • Frozen – Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee (2013) • How to Train Your Dragon 2 – Dean DeBlois (2014) • Inside Out – Pete Docter (2015) • Zootopia – Byron Howard and Rich Moore (2016) • Coco – Lee Unkrich (2017) • Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey and Rodney Rothman (2018) • Missing Link – Chris Butler (2019) v - e - dNebula Award for Best Script/Ray Bradbury Award Nebula Award for Best Script Soylent Green – Stanley R. Greenberg (1973) • Sleeper – Woody Allen (1974) • Young Frankenstein – Mel Brooks and Gene Wilder (1975) • Star Wars – George Lucas (1977) • The Sixth Sense – M. Night Shyamalan (1999) • Galaxy Quest – David Howard and Robert Gordon (2000) • Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon – James Schamus, Kuo Jung Tsai, and Hui-Ling Wang (2001) • The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring – Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, and Peter Jackson (2002) • The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers – Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Stephen Sinclair, and Peter Jackson (2003) • The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King – Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, and Peter Jackson (2004) • Serenity – Joss Whedon (2005) • Howl's Moving Castle – Hayao Miyazaki, Cindy Davis Hewitt, and Donald H. Hewitt (2006) • Pan's Labyrinth – Guillermo del Toro (2007) • WALL-E – Andrew Stanton, Jim Reardon, and Pete Docter (2008) Ray Bradbury Award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation Terminator 2: Judgment Day – James Cameron (1992) • Babylon 5 – J. Michael Straczynski (1999) • 2000X – Tales of the Next Millennia – Yuri Rasovsky and Harlan Ellison (2001) • Joss Whedon (2008) • District 9 – Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell (2009) • Inception – Christopher Nolan (2010) • Doctor Who: "The Doctor's Wife" – Richard Clark and Neil Gaiman (2011) • Beasts of the Southern Wild – Benh Zeitlin, Lucy Alibar (2012) • Gravity – Alfonso Cuarón and Jonás Cuarón (2013) • Guardians of the Galaxy – James Gunn and Nicole Perlman (2014) • Mad Max: Fury Road – George Miller, Brendan McCarthy, and Nico Lathouris (2015) • Arrival – Eric Heisserer (2016) • Get Out – Jordan Peele (2017) • Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – Phil Lord and Rodney Rothman (2018)