Director Andrew Stanton, co-director Kenna Harris, and producer Lindsey Collins discuss how they arrived at their film’s ‘technological’ playtime threat, Lilypad, and the uneasy question driving Pixar’s fifth ‘Toy Story’ outing: what happens when toys stop being needed? In theaters today, June 19.
After four films built around what it means for a toy to matter to a child, Disney and Pixar’s Toy Story 5 asks what happens when playtime itself is no longer a given.
Directed by Andrew Stanton, co-directed by Kenna Harris, and produced by Lindsey Collins, Toy Story 5, hitting theaters today, June 19, tackles a reality many families already know firsthand: screens now compete with toys for children’s attention. For Woody, Buzz, Jessie and the rest of Bonnie’s toys, which raises an unsettling possibility — what if they are no longer at the center of playtime? What if, in fact, they are no longer needed at all?
The film’s challenge arrives in the form of Lilypad, a smart tablet that immediately becomes Bonnie’s favorite. But Stanton says the filmmakers realized the story wasn’t really about toys competing with technology. “Tech just wins,” he says. As Stanton notes, devices are showing up in children’s hands at younger and younger ages, making them impossible to dismiss as a passing phase. For the filmmakers, that reality opened the door to a new kind of Toy Story conflict. As the director points out, the toys don’t really change, but childhood does.
Making a fifth Toy Story film comes with its own challenges. Harris says the pressure isn’t intimidating so much as it is a responsibility, given how much audiences care about the characters. Collins notes that Pixar approaches sequels with a healthy amount of skepticism, with filmmakers asking the same question many fans ask: Why make another one? As she explains, the toughest audience to win over is often the one inside the studio.
Animation World Network recently spoke with Stanton, Harris, and Collins about returning to Toy Story, why technology became the right threat for this chapter, and how Pixar approaches a sequel to one of its most closely held films.
But first, enjoy the film’s final trailer and a clip of Jessie’s first formal meet and greet with Lilypad:
Dan Sarto: Andrew, Lindsey, 10 years ago, we spoke about Finding Dory dealing with tough issues of separation and loss. And here we are again: same old same old. How did you determine how far to take your characters’ rather sad back stories, as well as the inherent issues of “disposable toys” that are actually alive and get cast aside. How did arbitrate how deep to take those emotional moments?
Andrew Stanton: It was easier for me to think about who these characters are in parallel with the kids’ development, what’s going on at the time, and then sort of make decisions based on that. So, it was really about Bonnie. Bonnie, being at this age where socialization is a big deal and making friends presents high, high stakes. And all the toys have always been surrogate parents. And this device has now come in with a sort of new way of looking at parenting. Everything’s concerned about the betterment of the child. It’s always been the case in all the movies, but now, we just put it front and center. And so that kind of helped us navigate and gave us guidelines about where to emphasize things, where to let things go into the background, and where not to address things. That’s always the arbiter.
DS: You probably couldn’t find something more topical than kids’ lives being taken over by digital devices. I mean, that feels true for everyone, certainly kids.
AS: We started this movie four years ago. Even four years ago, it was clear it wasn’t a fad; it wasn’t going away. So, I think that’s what made us decide that, “Yeah, we can trust this isn’t just a weird phase.” It was like, “No, there are devices in kids’ hands at younger and younger ages.” So, it’s a dilemma. But what better way to take on that topic than with toys? Because their shelf life is literally shrinking and it’s hard not to take that personally.
Kenna Harris: Most of the threats they’ve taken on before this film, it’s not like those threats were literally going to wipe playtime off the face of the planet. Right? There was always a little bit of hope. You know, you could find a new kid. There’s going to be some solve. And for Lilypad, it’s unclear if there is a solve.
AS: And it’s a bit misleading that it’s toy versus tech. Tech just wins. Like that was the big epiphany for us early on. It was like, “Oh, wait a minute. You put a phone in my hand, it’s over. It’s over. There’s no competition from the devices standpoint. They’re like, “I’m the one driving and the rest of you have to either follow or get out of the way.” So that made it even more interesting.
DS: Toy Story is the studio’s most important franchise. Woody and Buzz, arguably the most memorable and visible characters Pixar has ever created. Andrew, you’ve been one of the foundational creative voices at the studio from day one. You’ve created many of these characters, designed them, given them lives and stories. And here you are again at the helm of an incredibly important film not just for the studio, but for filmmaking right now, which is undergoing this tremendous readjustment, which is a kind word. Do you feel any more pressure on this film than you have in any other film you’ve made?
AS: No. The weird thing is, the pressure kind of normalized for me a long time ago. It’s like every mountain is impossible to climb, the stakes are incredibly high, and it’s going to hurt if you fall. And so, I just know what to expect now. But I must say that there’s a little bit of comfort, not confidence, but comfort in the fact I know this world really well because I’ve lived in it for so many years. And when you add it all together, and I’ve directed other things for so long that it felt like the right time to combine those two. And so, I wasn’t any less nervous than I ever have been. But I wasn’t more nervous.
DS: Kenna, what about for you? Do you ever have a day where you’re like, “Oh my goodness, this is nuts?”
KH: I definitely feel that even though I’m newer to the studio, Toy Story is just very particular in that folks have a high bar for Pixar films, and that bar is even higher for Toy Story films. All the critiques or thoughts that we get just stem from a place of intense love and feeling of how precious these characters are. So, while I don’t think I feel intimidated, I think I feel responsible and I just want to do a good job for all of those people. What about you, Lindsey?
Lindsay Collins: Yeah, I would agree. Sequels are tricky. They’re tricky because for us, there’s a skepticism at Pixar, which I think is healthy, which we always kind of bring to a sequel. And when I say Pixar, I mean everybody, to a degree, goes into thinking, “All right, why are we doing it? We have to make sure that it’s worthy.” Because there’s so much love internally for our original films that when we’re going to do a sequel, they always want to make sure that it’s worthy. With a sequel, you’re kind of coming in with a little bit of a headwind internally. And it’s a healthy thing because the hardest audience to convince is internal. And so that’s a good, healthy thing for us.
AS: The best response we’re going to get is you didn’t mess it up.
LC: Yeah, exactly. So, I think it’s a good thing.
AS: Really unrewarding but oh, well.
LC: But then it’s so rewarding when you start to win them over and they’re like, “Okay, we’re really loving it. And we’re starting to see.”
AS: We have to watch these movies for four years ourselves. So, it’s got to please us.
DS: On Inside Out, with Pete Doctor’s initial designs for Joy, she had long hair. And the team asked him if she had to have long hair because of how much more difficult it made the animation. And he said, “Sure, change it. No problem.” It wasn’t really a big deal to change the design. When it comes to the studio’s technical prowess, and the sophistication of the production pipeline, do you feel that now, pretty much anything you can visualize, it can be created without much problem?
AS: I felt that way on Finding Dory. To me, the paint set’s been figured out. It’s just about how good the artist is as a painter. So, if you’re impressed with a CG movie, at least something we’ve made, you’re impressed with how the artists that worked on it used that paint. I’m simplifying, but that’s how I feel about it.
DS: Last question. What was new for you on this film that was different than any of the other films you’ve made at the studio?
AS: Yeah, well, I’m no spring chicken, and I don’t take it for granted that I’m going to ever do another one. I wasn’t sure I was going to make another animated film after Dory. So, you never say never, But you treat every film like this is your last hurrah. I really tried to savor everything every day. No matter if it was a hard day or an easy day. It’s still a very rarified space that we get to make these movies in up at Pixar, and the way we get to work with each other and. And the more I’ve been around, the more I know that it’s even rarer. And so, what was new for me was sort of appreciating it almost to the level I did as a rookie on the first one.
DS: Kenna?
KH: What was new for me? Don’t get embarrassed.
AS: Oh boy.
KH: I’ve never gotten to have a real true partner. Part of that is the nature of the roles we had. We co-wrote the movie. We literally split the writing in half, every single screening we had, every review together, every brainstorm. For better or worse, I was attached to you, and I haven’t had that kind of experience yet at a studio on a film. And it was just awesome. It was so awesome to be able to, maybe by luck or fate, be matched with someone who I felt was working at the same pace as me, who liked the same things I liked, who could finish my sentences for me. And I don’t know if I expected that at the beginning of the process.
AS: Moviemaking is a team sport. It’s not as auteur a thing as people think it is. And so, it has an ideal sweet spot when you’re all in sync together.
KH: Yeah, it was pretty sweet.
Dan Sarto is Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Animation World Network.
