Interview - Simon Otto for That Christmas
Director Simon Otto is here to chat failed Christmas gifts, formative films, and finding the balance of a multithreaded storyline story and having to take into account theatrical experience versus streaming consumption. This interview contains mild spoilers for That Christmas. More about Simon Otto Simon Otto is the Director of That Christmas. He started his directing career on the Netflix animated series Dragons: Race to the Edge and Trollhunters: Tales of Arcadia. Most recently, he directed the Love, Death & Robots episode ‘The Tall Grass’ and developed, executive produced and served as the Supervising Director on the successful Netflix series, A Tale Dark & Grimm. Prior to turning to directing, he spent over 20 years working at DreamWorks Animation, most notably as the Head of Character Animation on the Oscar-nominated How to Train Your Dragon trilogy. In that role, Simon oversaw the character animation and was instrumental in designing and developing the look of the characters, their personalities, and the overall style of the animation, while also working in the story department as a story artist. He first joined DreamWorks in 1997 to work on the groundbreaking The Prince of Egypt and worked as a Supervising Animator both in hand-drawn and CG animation on many of the studio’s features including, Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron and the Aardman co-production Flushed Away. Born and raised in Switzerland, Simon studied animation at the prestigious Les Gobelins Animation School in Paris, France. More about That Christmas Based on the charming trilogy of children’s books by beloved multi award-winning writer/director Richard Curtis (FOUR WEDDINGS AND A FUNERAL, NOTTING HILL, LOVE ACTUALLY, YESTERDAY), THAT CHRISTMAS follows a series of entwined tales about family and friends, love and loneliness, and Santa Claus making a big mistake, not to mention an enormous number of turkeys! This heartwarming comedy from Locksmith Animation marks Curtis’ first foray into animation, serving as the film’s writer and executive producer, and also the feature directorial debut of renowned animation veteran Simon Otto (LOVE, DEATH & ROBOTS, HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON FILMS). Nicole P. Hearon (MOANA, FROZEN) and Adam Tandy (THE THICK OF IT, DETECTORISTS) are producers. Starring Brain Cox, Fiona Shaw, Jodie Whittaker, Lolly Adefope, Alex Macqueen, Katherine Parkinson, Bill Nighy, Rhys Darby That Christmas is streaming now on Netflix Find us at www.werewatchingwhat.com instagram.com/werewatchingwhat tiktok.com/@werewatchingwhat THEDHK can be found at instagram.com/thedhk , twitter.com/thedhk, and facebook.com/thedhkmovies