Kelly Asbury is no stranger to the animation world. He boasts work on a long list of animated movies including Toy Story, Frozen and Wreck-It Ralph. He also directed the Oscar-nominated Shrek 2 and Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron for Dreamworks. Most recently, Asbury directed UglyDolls, the animated feature which is currently on wide digital release. He sat down with Creative Screenwriting Magazine in Uglyville and discussed his creative process to translate dolls into a feature film.

Kelly was initially attracted to the story of UglyDolls after seeing the character designs of the dolls. The characters were created by David Hovarth and Sun-Min Kim. The genesis of the plush doll range which launched in 2001 is based on a love letter Howarth sent Sun-Min after her visa expired and forced to leave America. He drew an image of Wage (one of the characters) on the bottom of the said letter and toy history was born. Their dream was to tell stories through the eyes of the citizens of Uglyville. Next to the image of Wage he wrote, “working hard to make our dreams come true so we can be together again soon.”

Wage

After we wiped away our tears, we asked director Kelly Asbury what first attracted him to the project.

“They were adorably ugly and I had never dealt with plush dolls before,” he said. “I liked the general style of the movie and it was something I could really have fun with.”

UglyDolls had a relatively short production schedule compared with other animated studio feature films. “The opportunity to work quickly was enticing because it provided the opportunity to see it in theaters sooner than normal,” he added.

Prior to boarding the project, there had been around fourteen months of development on UglyDolls, “but it was not firing off as the studios wanted. It was also moving at a slow pace,” recalled the director.

Fortunately, the basic story was previously worked out and one story reel was put together, so Asbury didn’t have to start from scratch.

“The existing animatic told a very complex story that was a little too dark. The studio wanted something more light-hearted.” This is the stage when Kelly Asbury boarded UglyDolls. While the tone changed in the final film, the story can be still reduced to a simple thematic of kindness. “Let’s all try to be kinder to each other and accept each other a little more.” A theme we can all relate to.

It certainly takes a village to produce a film. It can take longer to fine-tune the story. In this case, it involved many screenwriters.

The screenplay for UglyDolls was written by Alison Peck from a story by Robert Rodriguez (From Dusk Till Dawn, El Mariachi). Rodriguez was also credit as the producer of the film. Asbury worked closely with Peck and Jane Hartwell (producer) to further develop the screenplay. Despite the remote story conferences and tight deadlines, they managed to contour the story elements into shape.

When the director came on board, he examined the previous work already done on the film. “The first thing I noticed was that there were too many characters in the film,” he said. This posed budgetary and logistical concerns, given our short production schedule. “Most of my early script notes were about simplification, clarity, and maintaining the narrative flow,” said the filmmaker.

One of the misconceptions of the animation process is “that you can go crazy and do anything that you want and it will all be fine.” That is not true. “Animation has structure and you need to consider the level of complexity, the amount of time you have to tell the story, and the number of characters,” advised Asbury. This forces the filmmakers to make decisions about what’s vitally important to the storytelling process.

Kelly Asbury

The core story is a complex issue. Asbury used songs to convey the many facets of acceptance quickly. “Audiences will listen to a song more than dialogue. This is especially true for exposition. Audiences won’t listen to the characters as much as they watch them.”

Kelly Asbury was asked for comparisons between directing live-action and animation movies. “Most of the time it’s the same job, but in animation, you’re making the movie twice. There is much more planning in animation and less working on the fly. Animation has to be completely planned out to the nth degree. It’s slower and more concentrated than live-action.”

When Kelly first considered the screenplay to potentially direct, he first reads it in one sitting at a pace that he feels the movie might move at. “That gives me a sense of the length, pace and general tone of the movie.” He advises screenwriters to make the screenplays a gripping read. “If you haven’t captured me in the first forty pages, I will move on. You need to hook me so I want to know what’s going to happen next. If I’m not engaged with the characters in the early pages, or rooting for someone, I tend to not proceed any further.”

When he decided he liked the screenplay, he initially broke it down into its natural act breaks. “Where do I think there’s a statement? Each act break is a reminder to the audience that things are changing. We know the setup, we know where things are going, and we’re intrigued to know what happens next.” This speaks to the underlying rhythm and flow of the film.

The main advice he gives to animation writers is “think how to best tell your story visually and don’t get too caught up in expositional dialogue. There is a part of animation that is very much like silent film. Look for moments when a story can be told in a purely visual way. Describe it in simple terms in your script. The storyboard artist can then broaden and enlarge it.”

In many respects, the storyboard artist is an additional level of screenwriting and editing. “Your work will be reinterpreted and changed at every stage of the animation process.“