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Pixar Ignores Wage Fixing Scandal by Karl Cohen
Pixar head Ed Catmull and Jim Morris (lf), president of Walt Disney Animation, costume up for the premiere of Pixar's 'Brave' at the 2012 Los Angeles Film Festival. photo: courtesy LAFF
PEOPLE TELL ME THAT IF YOU WORK AT
Pixar, you have a good job, you get a decent wage and darn good benefits. The wage fixing scandal was real, sure, but it certainly didn’t create poverty wages.
Indeed, if you work for Pixar, count your blessings, what with PDI DreamWorks Animation closing its facility in Redwood City, and deluxe local animation gigs outside of Pixar getting scarce.
Pixar was pleased to announce recently that “Toy Story 4” will be a romantic story. The film will not be a continuation of ”Toy Story 3” nor part of that trilogy.
Their hype says, “It will be a love story. It will be a romantic comedy. The focus is not going to be placed on the interaction between the characters and children."
Rashida Jones, youngest daughter of media mogul Quincy, and Will McCormack have already written the script based on ideas proposed by Andrew Stanton, Pete Docter, and Lee Unkrich. John Lasseter will direct and it will open on June 16, 2017.
Why make a new and different film under the “Toy Story“ banner? The “Toy Story“ trilogy has grossed $1.94 billion worldwide and the third film grossed over half of that amount, $1.1 billion. It became the highest-grossing animated film of all time until “Frozen“ surpassed it last March.
Also the licensing of toy based on the films has added millions more to Pixar’s annual income. Hopefully the new film will carry on Pixar’s winning streak and the line of successful sequels will be endless.
I wonder how many girlfriends Andy and Buzz will have before the public gets bored with their romances. Then those lovable literal boy toys can get married and no doubts they will have lots of adorable tiny tots—meaning the “Toy Story“ franchise could last for decades and lots of employment for the Bay Area, albeit only if the bulk of it stays here.
Buzz and Woody, two of the most lovable and box-office generating characters in the history of show biz. photo: courtesy Pixar
In recognition of the animation industry’s successes, Variety honored Pixar’s John Lasseter and Ed Catmull with awards recently along with ten up-and-coming people in the animation industry. The “Creative Impact in Animation Awards” went to people already on Variety’s “Top Animators to Watch” list. They also honored Dana Lamb of Cal State Fullerton as their Animation Educator of the Year award.
The up-and-coming animation talents are Pixar's head of story Josh Cooley (“Inside Out“ and co-director of “Toy Story 4“); Disney’s development artists Lorelay Bove (“Big Hero 6“) and Brittney Lee (“Frozen) “; DreamWorks' Thomas Grummt (“How to Train Your Dragon 2“); Warner Bros. Animation character designer Phil Bourassa (“Justice League: Throne of Atlantis“); Paramount Animation's Dylan Brown (a former Pixar vet); Blue Sky's Nick Bruno (“Epic“); Illumination’s Miguel Jiron (“Despicable Me“); the Layzell Brothers: Matt, who works at Nickelodeon (“Sanjay and Craig“), and Paul, a freelance illustrator; Disney Channel’s Daron Nefcy (“Sailor Moon“); and Timothy Reckart (“Head Over Heels“).
At the ceremony Lasseter talked about giving artists artistic freedom as they develop; something he wasn’t given at Disney after he graduated from CAL Arts. He wasn’t allowed to explore the capabilities of the computer. He left Disney and was hired by George Lucas’ ILM. The rest is history.
Karl Cohen is an animator, educator and director of the local chapter of the International Animation Society and can be reached .Posted on Mar 20, 2015 - 05:32 AM