Brad Bird
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| Brad Bird | |||||||||||||||
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 Bird with his Academy Award for Ratatouille. |
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| Born | September 11, 1957 Kalispell, Montana |
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| Occupation | Film director Writer Actor |
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| Spouse(s) | Elizabeth Canney | ||||||||||||||
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Phillip Bradley Bird, better known as Brad Bird (born on September 11, 1957), is the two-time Academy Award-winning American director of Disney/Pixar's critical and box office hits The Incredibles (2004) and Ratatouille (2007). He also wrote and directed the 1999 Warner Bros. film The Iron Giant. Reviewing the Ratatouille DVD, Eye Weekly offered this characterization of Bird's work: "It’s hard to think of another mainstream American director with a comparably fluid visual style or such a vise-grip on storytelling mechanics."[1]
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[edit] Early life
Bird was born in Kalispell, Montana.[2] On a tour of the Walt Disney Studios at age 11, he announced that someday he would become part of its animation team, and soon afterward began work on his own 15-minute animated short. Within two years, Bird had completed his animation, which impressed the cartoon company. By age 14, barely in high school, Bird was mentored by the animator Milt Kahl, one of Disney’s legendary Nine Old Men. Bird recalls Kahl's criticisms as ideal: Kahl would point out shortcomings by gently delivering thoughts on where Bird could improve. After graduating from Corvallis High School in Corvallis, Oregon in 1975, Bird took a three-year break. He was then awarded a scholarship by Disney to attend California Institute of the Arts, where he met and befriended another future animator, Pixar co-founder and director John Lasseter.[2]
[edit] Career
Upon graduating from the California Institute of the Arts, Bird began working for Disney. His tenure with Disney was brief, and he left the company shortly after working on The Fox and the Hound in 1981 .
He next worked on animated television series, with much shorter lead times. He was the creator (writer, director, and co-producer) of the Family Dog episode of Steven Spielberg's Amazing Stories. In addition, Bird co-wrote the screenplay for the live-action film *batteries not included. In 1989 Bird joined Klasky Csupo, where he helped to develop The Simpsons from one-minute shorts on The Tracey Ullman Show into a series of half-hour programs. In 1990, he directed the episode "Krusty Gets Busted" (which marked the first speaking role of Sideshow Bob) and co-directed the season three episode Like Father, Like Clown. He served on the show for several more years as an executive consultant. He worked on several other animated television series, including The Critic and King of the Hill before pitching Warner Brothers to write and direct the animated film The Iron Giant. Although The Iron Giant was critically acclaimed, it did not do exceedingly well at the box office—a lack of success attributed by many to limited marketing on its behalf by the studio. Nevertheless, the film impressed his old friend John Lasseter, founder of the computer-animation pioneer Pixar. Bird pitched the idea for The Incredibles to Pixar. (In the finished picture, Bird also provides the voice of costume designer Edna Mode.)[2]
In 2005, Bird won an Oscar in the Best Animated Feature category for The Incredibles, and his screenplay was nominated for the Best Original Screenplay.
In the middle of 2005, Bird was asked by the Pixar management team to take over Ratatouille from its previous director Jan Pinkava. This change was announced in March 2006, during a presentation at a Disney shareholders meeting. The film was released in 2007; like "The Incredibles," the film was a critical and box office success. In January of 2008, Ratatouille won the Best Animated Feature award at the Golden Globes; it was also nominated for 5 Academy Awards, including Best Animated Feature and Best Original Screenplay. On February 24, 2008, Ratatouille won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature Film.
Bird has spoken passionately about animation as an art form. When Bird and John Walker recorded the Director's Commentary for The Incredibles' DVD, he jokingly offered to punch the next person that he heard call animation a genre. Bird believes animation can be used to tell any kind of story—drama or comedy, for an adult audience or children.
[edit] Filmography
[edit] Director
- Family Dog (1987)
- The Iron Giant (1999)
- The Incredibles (2004)
- Jack-Jack Attack (2005)
- Ratatouille (2007)
- 1906 (2009)[3]
[edit] Screenwriter
- Family Dog (1987)
- Batteries not included (1987)
- The Iron Giant (1999)
- The Incredibles (2004)
- Ratatouille (2007)
[edit] Actor
- The Incredibles (2004) voice Edna Mode
- Ratatouille (2007) voice Ambrister Minion
[edit] External links
- Brad Bird at the Internet Movie Database
- Brad Bird Interview at IGN
- DVD Talk: Interview with Brad Bird about The Incredibles
- Brad Bird premieres and discusses the development of "The Incredibles" with CalArts' Character Animation Program
- Brad Bird Interview Brad Bird talks about his career and upcoming film "The Incredibles"
- Brad Bird Interview (Ratatouille)
- The Art of Making Pixar's Ratatouille Interviews with Harley Jessup, Sharon Calahan and Brad Bird accompany an article on the making of the film.
- Brad Bird Interview at Blu-ray.com Interview regarding the release of Ratatouille (film) on Blu-ray.
[edit] References
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