previous page
TOC
TV/Streaming
for Bob’s Burgers, we felt like the Hugh Grant character in Notting Hill. We thought, there’s no way she’s going to fall in love with us. And we ended up getting Julia!” “We thought Bob’s Burgers was the funniest thing we had seen,” says Lizzie. “There’s no way they are going to hire us. But here we are, and we’ve been doing it for 10 years now. I think animation is such a fun medium to work in. It gives you so much freedom and you meet a lot of different, talented people. It’s amazing to see your idea for a work come to life visually two or three years later. You can go anywhere and do anything — if the artists don’t kill you for giving them so many backgrounds to work on!” Wendy explains that because both she and her sister come from the writing side, they are constantly impressed by what the artists and animators are able to do. “I cannot draw at all, for me it feels like I’m working with wizards. I tell them, ‘Oh my God. You are a witch. How can you draw that? It’s magic!’ I mean, you can dream up this elaborate fantasy sequence and then you see it rendered and it’s a thousand times better than you imagined with colors that you can’t even think of. Our artists really blow our minds every day!” The sisters also praise Bento Box and Bouchard for having the vision and insight to promote diversity at the studio. “There is diversity across the board,” says Wendy. “The studio recruiters have done a great job in terms of opening the doors and bringing in people and growing them. The demographics have changed drastically. People are hungry to see different points of view. There were always lots of women working in Loren’s camp. Animation used to have a reputation for being a forbidding place for women, but the more women are hired, the friendlier it gets for everyone.” Lizzie adds, “There used to be this assumption that women are not as interested in watching animation. As someone who has grown up watching animation and loved it, I know that’s not true. We know that a lot of women are watching it. Younger women are identifying more with characters like Tina on Bob’s Burgers. There are lots of female fans of animation who want to see characters like
themselves on shows and to work on them. Things have improved over the past few years, and it’s true that animation is a world for anyone.” The siblings, who were also tapped to write the third Deadpool movie (with Ryan Reynolds acting and producing) hope they can bring some laughs and humor into people’s lives with their new animated family. “We are in the middle of a pandemic and everyone’s stuck at home,” says Wendy. “Our number one
goal is to make people laugh and make them feel more relaxed.” Lizzie chimes in, “We hope people can turn to this family and find a show that has a lot of heart. That’s what we loved about our time on Bob’s Burgers. So we took what we know and hope that we were able to create this world that feels similar in tone and sweetness.” ◆ The Great North debuts on FOX on Sunday Feb. 14 at 8:30 p.m., 7:30 p.m central.
www.animationmagazine.net 32
TOC
march 21
previous page
