Pete Docter to Take Over Pixar

[Jules]

This is good news, though the Cartoon Brew comments do somewhat mirror my own doubts re Lee. We'll see.

Here's hoping Jennifer likes stylised and unconventional designs and feels comfortable with differing animation styles. *fingers crossed*

[Rumpelstiltskin]

Sad but true, but sometimes being a boss means the ability to put your foot down. Just hope Lee and Docter aren't afraid to do so.

https://www.fastcompany.com/40587764/fo ... nnifer-lee

Sources say both Docter and Lee were chosen because of their strong track records as well as their people skills—both play well with others, something that is particularly important given the internal tensions that Lasseter stirred and that have been made public in recent months.

The only question is, will Disney and Pixar’s new leaders have the ability to not play nice when necessary? As one source says, “John could be tough and say, ‘This is not working.’ He pissed people off. Do either Pete or Jennifer have that in them?”

(And will Docter start wearing Hawaiian shirts now when he's the Pixar studio's new chief?)

I'm finding it a little annoying that media keeps claiming he was Pixar's tenth employee. No he was not. He was the tenth employee at Pixar's animation group.

[Rose Dome]

Congratulations to the new leaders

They deserve their promotions

[Sotiris]

Pixar’s Pete Docter Honored at CalArts REDCAT Gala
https://variety.com/2019/scene/news/pix ... 203165240/

[Sotiris]

Reanimating 'Pixar': How Pete Docter Steered the Studio Out of Scandal
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/featu ... of-scandal

[Sotiris]

Which movies get made at Pixar is now decided by Pete Docter, Peter Sohn, Dan Scanlon, and Domee Shi. Oddly, Andrew Stanton or other Pixar vets are not part of that decision-making process.

And [Domee Shi] would know, having been promoted to creative vice president of the studio last spring, where she now works alongside mentor Pete Docter, Peter Sohn and Dan Scanlon in mapping out the studio’s slate.

Source: https://variety.com/2022/film/features/ ... 235389199/

[Disney's Divinity]

Thank God. Love Shi and Docter, never could stand Stanton. Who knows, if she comes up with more films as good as Turning Red, hopefully Shi will be running PIXAR one day.

[Rumpelstiltskin]

What's wrong with Stanton? I have hard before that he is disliked by some, but so far there has not been any examples that explain why.

As for why none of the vetarans have joined Docter, it is a conscious and partly political choice.

[Disney's Divinity]

I hope it means most of Lasseter's friends will be exiting stage right slowly but surely. I don't buy that it has to do with politics and there's definitely no proof of that... How would we know what party Docter votes for, for example???

Anyway, it's funny this topic popped up. I had received another offer to re-start my DMC account a week or so ago, and I planned to get Luca and Turning Red as part of my picks (along with Encanto). I feel so weird, but I really want to see them again, especially TR. I had previously got Finding Dory via DisneyMovieInsiders already, but that was free. IDK, a lot of my animosity with PIXAR has dissipated with Lasseter's firing and the slow changes that have come since. I mean, some shifts away from the buddy roadtrip formula, for one, but also the design aesthetic of their newer films. I love the look of Luca, Turning Red, and Elio. I don't know, it gives me a feeling of quaintness similar to what I feel when watching Aardman or Ghibli.

Even though a part of me still resists old PIXAR properties enmeshing with Disney, I'm less annoyed by that possibility with some of these newer films, I admit. Either way, I'll never be with PIXAR like I am with WDAS, as far as the completionist tendencies (well, other than Chicken Little and The Wild, I have zero interest in ever owning those, even if I could them from DMI for free). I'll be more picky with them, just like Dreamworks films. I think really just the aforementioned three films (TR, Luca, FD) + The Incredibles, Incredibles 2, Toy Story 1-3, Ratatouille, Inside Out, and Monsters, Inc. are the ones I'd like to get over time. It feels very strange after all these years of being anti-PIXAR, having my interest opening to them somewhat. While on the subject of changes, I don't even dislike Miranda as much as I used to since In the Heights and Encanto, although it still bubbles up on occasion when he's extra cringey.

[Rumpelstiltskin]

Three years ago Jim Morris claimed that "ten years from now" the veterans at Pixar would no longer direct movies.

I wasn't referring to the political views of Docter and the others, I meant the decision to make the team more diverse regarding genders and ethnicity seems politically based.

[Disney's Divinity]

Oh, okay, I get what you mean. I definitely think creating original films featuring more diversity is a focus of Disney's going forward, although I wouldn't call that political exactly and I see it as a good thing, personally. As long as the people chosen are talented like Shi or Lee. I'm still so disappointed Estrada left WDAS. I think an example of it going awry would be Julia Michaels on Wish simply because they wanted the composer to be Latina. I mean, Michaels is talented for pop hits, she may have been a good pick for one of the remakes, but a full-blown musical with nobody else with more experience in that assisting as with Menken and Pasek & Paul?? It would be one thing if it was going to be like TLK, Tarzan, TENG, etc., with the songs playing in the background, but we know Wish is going to be a straight-out musical where the characters sing.

On that subject, I think they should confront their misogynist history with Chapman, for example, and invite her back for some story work or a Brave sequel perhaps.

[Sotiris]

Stanton is directing a movie for Searchlight. He just doesn't seem very involved with Pixar these days.

Andrew Stanton to Direct Epic Sci-Fi Drama ‘In the Blink of an Eye’ for Searchlight
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movie ... 235235733/

[Farerb]

Pete Docter Opens Up About the Past, Present and Future of Pixar
https://www.thewrap.com/pete-docter-int ... y-story-5/

[Sotiris]

Pete Docter: “I Don’t Think of Pixar as Making Children’s Programming”
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movie ... 235508382/

[Farerb]

The Troubling Pixar Paradox
https://puck.news/the-troubling-pixar-paradox/

[Sotiris]

Beyond Disney+, there are two huge factors impacting Pixar right now. One is Docter’s management of the studio. Instead of making one movie every couple of years, the studio is now cranking out at least one movie a year, sometimes two, plus all of the additional supplemental content for Disney+, including “Win or Lose,” a full-fledged animated series coming later this year. The workload has never been greater and those at Pixar have never been stretched so thin, according to those we spoke with.

Those who have worked for both creative leaders describe Docter’s style as more cerebral than Lasseter’s, with Docter putting a premium on the filmmaker’s personal experiences over movies with more outward scope and commercial appeal. Those interviewed by TheWrap, all of whom admire Docter, noted that his style is in stark contrast to Lasseter’s, who would throw out constricting frameworks and force filmmakers to rise to the challenge to make them great. (He famously had a rule about never allowing nonhuman and human characters to verbally communicate.) But some have suggested the importance Docter puts on personal stories has robbed the studio of some of its ambition and appeal, which is a problem when the movies cost so much.

Can Pixar sustain $200 million personal stories that double as therapy sessions for their very talented directors? Sohn admitted, when we spoke to him a few weeks ago, that there were times when he felt too close to the story of “Elemental.” In contrast, those earlier, more successful Pixar movies often hinged around simple, ingenious concepts that were childlike in their fantasy: What if toys came to life when you weren’t looking? What if there really were monsters in your closet? What if humans left Earth but forgot to turn off the last robot?

The other problem is that the institutional knowledge of the company has eroded over time. “It has always been my goal to create a culture at Pixar that will outlast its founders,” wrote Ed Catmull, one of Pixar’s co-founders, in his book “Creativity, Inc.” Catmull left the company in 2018 and stayed on as an advisor until the end of 2019. It’s hard to know if Catmull has achieved that goal. He and Lasseter are gone. (Towards the end of his tenure, Disney paid out $100 million to settle accusations that Catmull had orchestrated a wage-fixing scheme to cap animators’ salaries.)

Docter is now running the company. Stanton is away making a live-action feature for Searchlight and also directed episodes of Netflix’s upcoming “3 Body Problem.” Unkrich is mostly gone but occasionally consults. Bird is at Skydance Animation, reunited with Lasseter. MacLane, longtime producer Galyn Susman — the one who saved “Toy Story 2” — and director Steve Purcell (co-director of “Brave”) have all been forced out during a recent round of layoffs.

There are a new crop of filmmakers currently making movies at Pixar and the group is both younger and more diverse. According to the studio’s slate, there are movies scheduled through at least 2026. As an animation historian who recently co-wrote a two-volume book about Imagineer and animator Marc Davis, Docter realized how badly Disney Animation suffered when the Nine Old Men, Walt’s original group of animators, outstayed their welcome and lost their touch.

Some have already been elevated to leadership positions, like “Turning Red” producer Lindsey Collins, now senior vice president of development, and Shi and Sohn, who are creative vice presidents. The tight working relationship between Shi and Collins is rare these days, but it speaks to the effectiveness of the partnership that it produced one of the greatest Pixar movies ever in “Turning Red.” Collins, who also worked on “Wall-E,” is a 26-year veteran of the company. But some insiders worry that many of Pixar’s younger, more inexperienced filmmakers don’t have the necessary guidance and leadership. Instead of close-knit teams working throughout a single production, the sheer volume of content that Pixar is now responsible for and the highly competitive environment mean that key creative people will usually not stay on a project all the way through completion. Instead, they’ll hop onto the next thing, leaving that original project to suffer and the filmmakers in charge of the projects even more adrift.

“Win or Lose,” the new longform Pixar series, is set to debut in December on Disney+. We’ve seen some of it and it feels like one of the bolder things the studio has produced in years. It’s using a lower budget and simplified designs to its advantage without losing any of the trademark Pixar emotionality. It is striking. And it was conceived and directed by Carrie Hobson and Michael Yates, two talented young storyboard artists from “Toy Story 4” who represent the younger, more diverse new crop of talented filmmakers at the studio. But the creative success of the show is not an indication that the relationship between Disney+ and Pixar has gotten any easier. A follow-up series from Pixar has been quietly canceled. It might get reworked as a feature film later.

Source: https://www.thewrap.com/pixar-existenti ... lightyear/

Rival studios believe that Disney’s animated efforts have become too twee and lack the more populist edge of “Mario” or Paramount’s upcoming “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” reboot. “Pixar is becoming an anemic brand,” notes Verna. “It’s fallen so far from the days in in which anything it released would blow the doors off.”

Source: https://variety.com/2023/film/news/disn ... 235660409/

[Patricier21]

What is the follow up series that was canceled? For elemental?

[PatchofBlue]

So this writer thinks that Pixar films are flopping because ... they're too personal?

Did they pick that out of a hat or something?

[Disney's Divinity]

I think that's a general attack line against diversity in Disney's recent product, that they're too "personal" and lacking in "general appeal." It's a veneer for the real meaning, at least that's what I always thought. At least I remember it first cropping up to attack Turning Red, but I identified with that film despite how I differ from the characters as far as religion, race, etc. go. I thought it channeled the '90s pretty well for the most part.

[Sotiris]

I think that's a general attack line against diversity in Disney's recent product, that they're too "personal" and lacking in "general appeal." It's a veneer for the real meaning, at least that's what I always thought.

But Luca was also a personal story based on the director's experiences.