Exclusive Interview with ZOOTOPIA Directors Byron Howard & Rich Moore

By now you know that we are huge fans of everything Disney, especially the parks in Orlando and the amazing animated movies they have been producing throughout the many, many years since Walt Disney founded his studio. Anyways, as I mentioned yesterday in our interview with Jason Bateman, it never ceases to amaze me how long these movies productions take to make from beginning to end. Throughout the years, I have had the opportunity to speak to several different directors and producers and my takeaway from those conversations is always very similar. The dedication these filmmakers have for their productions is beyond admirable, it’s almost like raising and nurturing a baby from infancy to adulthood in a matter of just a few years. When we sat down with Zootopia directors Byron Howard and Rich Moore, I couldn’t wait to hear how Zootopia was born from their original pitch. So, let’s get started, below is our exclusive interview with Zootopia directors Byron Howard and Rich Moore.

Exclusive Interview with ZOOTOPIA Directors Byron Howard & Rich Moore

Zootopia was born a few years ago from a pitch, well from a few pitched ideas, made by Byron Howard to John Lasseter. Byron Howard talked to us about how a pitch is done. When you walk in to see John Lasseter and the story truss, you should bring with you several ideas (at least 3), this way John gets an idea on how passionate your are about the project. Howard pitched about four different ideas, however, all of them had one thing in common: they all had something to do with anthropomorphic animals. You know that Disney has a long history of animal movies and John was pretty excited about what he was hearing to the point that, as Howard told us, John told him “I will do anything to support a film that features animals running in tiny clothing.” And he got so excited, he hugged Howard and picked him up off the ground. With that, you know that the ideas that gave way to the production of Zootopia were that good. It has been a long time since Disney has produced a movie of this kind, especially using CG.

Zootopia is the first Disney production to use CG technology and to have enough computer power to be able to animate these characters and to actually groom them as they would be in the wild. Long ago, animal characters were groomed with something that was just kind of like human hair. Which posed a challenged for the Zootopia filmmakers, the characters in Zootopia not only have fur but they have weather conditions that affect their fur and clothing. Plus, they also had to consider how that fur and clothing would interact with each other. After the research done at Animal Kingdom and Africa, it helped them to bring it all together from the way animals look in the wild to their distinct personalities.  Pretty groundbreaking to say the least, right?

Creating the world of Zootopia took a lot of research but creating its human-like residents was fun. The sloths at the DMV were the result of a story session where the filmmakers were figuring out what kind of jobs the different characters would be good at. And it went something like this…

Well, how about sloths working for DMV? You know, that could be a funny scene.  And it was kinda one of these things where everyone was quiet for a moment.  And thought like, has this been done before?  You know, it seems like such an obvious joke.  You know, or situation.  And we quickly went to the Internet and like, sloth at the DMV.

A funny fact about a particular sloth: One of the sloths, Priscilla the Sloth to be exact, is voiced by Kristen Bell. Not only does Kristen loves sloths, but she got her two-word-line character via a text! This is so true, casting director, James Roberts actually texted Kristen Bell and she agreed to do it. That’s beyond cool in my book.

Zootopia is a multi-dimensional movie with an amazing message, not only will kids understand the subject matter but the movie will also appeal to parents. This is important for both directors, as Rich Moore stated: “That’s what I loved growing up were shows or movies or cartoons or books, I knew I was enjoying it.  But I knew that my brother was getting it on some level. And that my parents were laughing at something. And it made me feel like, well, someday I’ll get that.” Personally, I think this is the reason why all parents take kids to the movies, to make memories together. Thanks to directors  Byron Howard & Rich Moore for taking the time to seat with us. Stay tuned for more #ZootopiaEvent adventures coming up this week.

Disney’s Zootopia hits theaters March 4, 2016!

Zootopia Trailer

The modern mammal metropolis of Zootopia is a city like no other. Comprised of habitat neighborhoods like ritzy Sahara Square and frigid Tundratown, it’s a melting pot where animals from every environment live together—a place where no matter what you are, from the biggest elephant to the smallest shrew, you can be anything. But when rookie Officer Judy Hopps (voice of Ginnifer Goodwin) arrives, she discovers that being the first bunny on a police force of big, tough animals isn’t so easy. Determined to prove herself, she jumps at the opportunity to crack a case, even if it means partnering with a fast-talking, scam-artist fox, Nick Wilde (voice of Jason Bateman), to solve the mystery.

Disclosure: I was be provided with an all-expense paid trip to Orlando Florida to attend the #ZootopiaEvent. No additional compensation was received.