Directed by: Chris Wedge, designed by illustrator William Joyce
Written by: Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel
Production Started On: March 24, 2003
Released in: March 11, 2005 (international release announced
for Spring 2005)
Rodney
Copperbottom... Ewan McGregor
Cappy... Halle Berry
Big Weld... Mel Brooks
Mrs. Copperbottom, Rodney's mom... Dianne Wiest
Mr. Copperbottom, Rodney's dad... Stanley Tucci
Member of the Rusties gang... Drew Carey
Member of the Rusties gang... Amanda Bynes
Elder robot not used for many years... Eugene Levy (rumored)
Jamie Kennedy
Jim Broadbent
and Paul Giamatti, Jennifer Coolidge, Dan Hedaya, Harland Williams,
D.L. Hughley and Sofia Vergara
The story concerns a young inventor who seeks to create a race of robots to help make the world a better place. Along the way he starts to fall in love with a female business exec robot and must stop a devious businessman and aid another inventor. The story is from an idea developed by Wedge and children's book novelist David Lindsay-Abaire.
Set in a world composed entirely of robots--designed by William Joyce (Rolie Polie Olie)--Robots centers on Rodney Copperbottom, a young genius inventor who dreams of making the world a better place.
Berry voices Cappy, a sexy executive rebot with whom Rodney is instantly
smitten. Other lead voices include the nefarious corporate tyrant Ratchet
(yet to be cast), who locks horns with Rodney, and Big Weld (Brooks), a
master inventor who has lost his way. Other characters include a group
of misfit robots known as the Rusties.
It was first announced
in November 2001 that William Joyce was working with Blue Sky Studios on
their follow-up to Ice Age.
Fox Animation
and its Blue Sky Studios officially announced on March 25, 2002 that they
had launched development on
Robots, following their impressive success
with CGI comedy Ice Age, which had grossed
close to $90 million in 10 days by then. Work so far on Robots had
included extensive visual development, early animation and preliminary
storyboarding. A release date will likely be several years out given the
complicated nature of CGI work.
Director Chris
Wedge describes the humorous collaboration with children's book author
and illustrator William Joyce (Rolie Polie Olie) as "colorful, whimsical,
clanky and fun." Joyce's stories "have a golden era of Hollywood nostalgia
to them," Wedge said on June 10, 2003. "The robots aren't futuristic or
spacey transformers. They ooze personality and personify objects that we
know in our world, whether a car, an outboard motor or a washing machine.
Rodney grows up on the outskirts of a huge metropolis and wants to work
with the most influential character in the city, an inventor." In Robots,
"people are judged by what they are made of. Many themes weave in and out
that comment on the state of our technical snowballing and upgrading. We're
not looking at what we've left behind."
Fox Animation's
Chris Meledandri said the development of Robots was not tied to
the success of Ice Age and noted the first animation tests on Robots
came in early 2001--it was widely reported that Fox was indeed waiting
to see how Ice Age would perform at the box office before they green
light any future projects. He did admit though the strong performance by
Ice
Age certainly has not hurt. "The success of Ice Age is something
that gives us additional momentum," he added.
Director Chris
Wedge revealed in a November 2002 interview that he was deep into preproduction
on his next computer-animated film, which has the working title Robots.
"It's being written by Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel [Multiplicity],
and it's being designed by William Joyce [A
Bug's Life]," Wedge said in an interview. "So it's a real fun,
big collaboration, and it's going to be a really colorful, funny movie.
It's not [science fiction]. It's a completely fresh take on the world of
mechanical people." Wedge expects Robots to reach theaters sometime in
2004.
Fox International
set some early dates for International Release at the 2003 ShoWest convention,
and announced the new Chris Wedge movie for Spring 2005, with Ice Age
II following in 2006.
Voice talent was
expected to sign on to Robots in March 2003, and was announced officially
on June 10, 2003 along with plot details. Fox and Blue Sky revealed at
the same time that an armada of licencees would be branding their products
with Robots imagery including Burger King, Hewlett Packard, Vivendi
Universal Games and Mattel.
"The story has
real heart but is also extremely clever and really funny," Fox animation
president Chris Meledandri said. "It's not futuristic and is not science
fiction; it's a far more complex movie to make than Ice Age with
the creation of this entire world that appears as though someone just took
a camera and found this world with an imagery that is so unique and compelling."
While Wedge has
a budget beyond Ice Age's estimated $60
million, "it's still far below the films that people compare us to," meaning
other digitally animated hits like Finding
Nemo or Shrek. But while money
constraints led to Ice Age having a stylized look, the director
vows that Robots will be more realistic. "We don't want it to look
like animation, but to feel as if you went to a fantastic place and shot
a film there."
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