From Who Framed Roger Rabbit? to Harry Potter: An Interview with animator Alex Williams

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Alex Williams is the head animator at Escape Studios, and the son of Richard Williams (the animation director for Who Framed Roger Rabbit). Perhaps consequently, he has been in this profession since childhood. Alex has worked on Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, The Lion King, The Iron Giant and the final three Harry Potter films. ‘My father is an animator, my grandmother was an illustrator, my great-uncle is a photographer in Canada, my grandfather was a painter, and his father was a sculptor, so we all are kind of arty-farty’, says Alex. RENDERU.COM met him at London’s VFX Festival. He told us about his involvement in these legendary projects, his thoughts on the future of stop motion animation, and speculated about whether we might ever see a digital reincarnation of Marilyn Monroe.

RENDERU.COM: I think that (considering your family) there is no point in asking you how you began your career in animation, but maybe there was a particular movie that was a starting point?

Alex Williams: Dad had an animation studio when I was a child, so I very much grew up with animation. Dad was working on a film, The Thief and a Cobbler, for many, many years, so I grew up with that, and I guess that that was always my inspiration in a way. Of course, it was a really great movie, and I did get to work on it for two years. Obviously, all Disney movies as well; I loved Disney movies as a child – like everybody does.


RENDERU.COM: Tell us more about your first movie, Who Framed Roger Rabbit? What are your memories from that time?


A.W.: I was a betweener. I was literally putting in-between drawings, just very simple things.

It was a great movie. I’ve never worked on anything where there was such a strong sense that it would change the industry – that we had something really amazing and special. Everyone who worked on that film knew that it was going to be huge, and in fact it kick-started so many careers in the industry: mine, and almost everyone who worked on it. We were very lucky to be on it. We knew it.


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RENDERU.COM: You said that one of your favourite movies was The Lion King. Why is that?


A.W.: Again, because I could tell that it was going to be a really good film. You could see it was really strong; especially the opening sequence – “The Circle of Life”. I remember seeing the storyboards and thinking, “Ok this will work”. I didn’t know how big it was going to be, but I could see that it would work, and it was just a great privilege to work for Disney: a really great company. That was in the days when Jeffrey Katzenberg was running it. In 1994 (when I was working on Pocahontas) he left Disney to found Dreamworks, and I was there when he left. He called this big meeting in a local park just around the corner from Disney studios, and then I remember him saying to animators, “You are Camelot”. I think it was just a great moment. What he was saying was, “You guys are the best”, and they were the best. Not necessarily me, I was just a lowly junior animator, but the senior guys like Glen Keane; they were Camelot. There was an amazing depth of talent in that company.’


RENDERU.COM: How do you think the industry has changed throughout the years?


A.W.: It’s gone digital, and that’s a big change. It’s technology driven now.


RENDERU.COM: Do you like it, or you prefer the old style?


A.W.: I think the audience wants new stuff. We are in the entertainment business, and the trouble with our industry is that everyone can download our stuff for free – whatever we make – so you have to give people a reason to pay 10 pounds of their income to go and see it in a movie theatre on a Friday night. You have to give them a very good reason. They want to see something special. They want to see the world explode. They want to see things that they have never seen before, because otherwise they just download it at home. Everything has to be more amazing than the last thing we do. In saying that, I really love the hand-drawn animation from the 1970s: it was great. It was a beautiful thing, but it’s not what audiences will pay to go and see. They want to see something incredible, so we have to make something better than last week.


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RENDERU.COM: How about stop motion? If you look at what Laika is doing, do you think that that will last?


A.W.: The box offices say no. Box offices have not been kind to stop motion animation – even to Laika who do it at an incredibly high level. I mean, Kubo is a really terrific movie (they did a lovely job on that) but I looked at the box office one day and it was something like 80 million dollars worldwide. They created incredible stuff, and I’m sure it cost them more than that. It [stop motion] has an artistic future, but not as much of a commercial future. You can go and buy handmade pots or hand blown glass, but it’s not an industry anymore.


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RENDERU.COM: How do you see the future of the industry then?


A.W.: Honestly, I don’t know. I would say that there will be an awful load of what was done in Star Wars: bringing actors back to life, like Peter Cushing and Carrie Fisher. That’s a pretty incredible trick, and these will get better: there will be more of that. Maybe one day you’ll be able to go and see Marilyn Monroe on a screen. I don’t know, it might be a bit creepy, but you know, they used that to great effect in a prequel of the original Star Wars where they had to bring these actors to life, and that’s great. I’m sure there will be a lot more stuff that people have not seen before. You have to show people something new.


RENDERU.COM: Are you familiar with Russian or Soviet animation?


A.W.: A little bit: I know that there is a Soviet version of Snow White. I’ve seen some bits here and there. I worked on a Coca Cola commercial with a Russian director and animator, Alexander Petrov (he won an Oscar for The Old Man and the Sea). It was a funny collaboration, because he spoke no English and I speak no Russian. I don’t know the state of Russian animation now, because sanctions it make it difficult for co-production – I know that some projects with Ukraine were cancelled. A lot of this stuff is co-produced, and it must be difficult with the political situation.


RENDERU.COM: In keeping with RENDERU.COM’s tradition, would you please say a few words of encouragement for the aspiring artists who will read this interview?


A.W.: Pursue your dream, and do the best work that you possibly can. Obviously, you know that you can do great work in any country regardless of politics, and you can do anything you want to.


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