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Anyone who’s ever had their funny bone tickled by those raw and raunchy TV Funhouse parody cartoon sketches that ran on Saturday Night Live from 1996-2008 knows the hilariously inventive work of directors Robert Marianetti and David Wachtenheim, who animated and produced the segment conjured by the comedic sorcery of writer Robert Smigel.
‘We love the adult comedy, but It’s nice to finally do something you could be proud to show your kids. When our kids were little, I didn’t even want to show them anything we were doing.’
— Director Robert Marinetti
Now those twisted directors are toning things down several notches for Leo, Netflix’s new PG-rated animated musical comedy arriving this fall that carries an air of nostalgia for all of our favorite class pets growing up. The story is centered around a slightly neurotic 74-year-old lizard named Leo (Adam Sandler) who is living the easy life in Florida at Fort Myers Elementary School as a fifth-grade homeroom pet along with a box turtle named Squirtle (Bill Burr).
After the lovable lizard undergoes a mortality crisis and hatches a plan to escape his boring terrarium and venture forth into the bright, beautiful world, his bucket-list freedom scheme is interrupted when he’s drawn into the youngsters’ lives by offering them sage advice about school, friendships and growing up.
A Sandler Family Affair
Leo was created by Happy Madison, Adam Sandler’s production company, and was penned by Sandler, Smigel and Paul Sado. Sandler’s wife, Jackie, and his two daughters, Sunny and Sadie, are also onboard voicing characters in the film. Rounding out the main vocal cast are Cecily Strong (Ms. Malkin), Jason Alexander (Jayda’s dad) and Rob Schneider (Principal),
Animation Magazine caught up with Marianetti and Wachtenheim, two-thirds of the crew that delivered all the TV Funhouse chuckles, to hear how this sweet, family-friendly film was crafted.
“The legend is that Adam watched Grease with his daughters when they were younger,” recalls Wachtenheim. “He realized that this wasn’t really for kids and wanted to do something that was relatable to middle-schoolers — not a period piece like Grease, but something about school for their age. Robert Smigel got involved and he pitched the class pet idea. So, he and Adam wrote this movie that was about the lizard who thinks he’s dying and wants to escape and live his life and ends up helping the kids, and it’s about listening and mentorship and caring. We hope that it’s not just for kids but also for adults reaching that age [where they’re] thinking about their own mortality a bit.”
With a full vote of confidence from Robert Smigel, the creative team developed further thanks to Adam Sandler holding true to a promise made years earlier.
“We’ve worked with Robert on and off for 20-plus years, and we share a similar sense of comedy with him,” Marianetti adds. “He introduced us to Adam, and we worked on Hotel Transylvania 2 as heads of story and contributing to ideas. At the end, he said, ‘I’m gonna do a film with you guys someday,’ and that was back in 2015-16. Paul Sado and Adam worked on the script originally and a couple of years later Robert and Adam showed us their version of the screenplay, and we couldn’t keep our mouths shut tossing out gags and jokes to put in there. Adam was a man of his word, and we eventually got the gig after the Netflix interview process.”
‘Robert Smigel had sent us these demo tapes of him singing into his phone in his bathroom and under the covers of his bed to give us a taste of what they were going to be like.’
— Director David Wachtenheim
Coming from New York where they’ve been a humble mom-and-pop studio since 1999, doing everything from writing to animation to recording voices to painting cels, Marianetti and Wachtenheim’s transition from shorts to a feature wasn’t as challenging as one might think.
“We knew the pipeline of the whole process,” explains Wachtenheim, “It was just the scope and scale of it, working on something from soup to nuts and the huge amount of detail that there is involved and being on top of everything. That was probably the most daunting.”
Leo is sprinkled with a surprising number of lively songs and musical numbers that add to the characters’ inner feelings and provide a sustained levity to this upbeat coming-of-age affair.
“Going with the Grease idea, songs were always going to be part of it,” he continues. “The songs were always intended to be a mixture of making fun of songs in musicals and some very touching tunes. There were more songs originally. Smigel had sent us these demo tapes of him singing into his phone in his bathroom and under the covers of his bed to give us a taste of what they were going to be like.”
Shifting gears from adult-toned SNL fare to this candy-colored world of children and classroom pets was a seamless departure for the directing duo, since they related to the material and had done work for Sesame Street and Cartoon Network programs.
“We all have kids and families,” notes Marianetti. “I think Adam really wanted to do a film from the heart that spoke to kids in all audiences, and that’s one of the things that made the film what it is. We love the adult comedy, but It’s nice to finally do something you could be proud to show your kids. When our kids were little, I didn’t even want to show them anything we were doing.”
Wachtenheim emphasizes that the creative team endeavored to concoct a very grounded animation style and didn’t want it to look too cartoony, to the point where the kids were designed to project little individual quirks that you could recognize in real kids you see every day.
“So, we had to tone down the generic look,” he says. “Everyone wants to be very ‘squash-and- stretch’ and ‘arcs.’ Stylistically, we got this Dutch designer, Wouter Tulp, who is a portrait artist and caricature artist, and his stuff is just so specific in his designs. We purposely sought him out, and he was luckily available to do most of our main kids and helped with Leo and Squirtle.”
He adds, “Leo takes place in Florida, so Adam wanted people to look at it and say that they’d want to go to school there and be there in the movie. He kept pushing for it to be big and bright and beautiful.”
That Animal Logic Touch
The deliberate sunny look and feel to Leo was accomplished after long preproduction sessions that resulted in smart character design and an animation process completed by Animal Logic.
“It was a great experience working with Animal Logic out of their Vancouver studio primarily,” Marianetti adds. “They were coming off of doing DC League of Super-Pets, and we knew Animal Logic could do comedy. One of the hardest things was translating our style of comedy to others. We love Disney also, but we were purposely avoiding the cutesy stuff and Disney arcs. It was a young crew from Vancouver, and it was a great working experience. Netflix really wanted Leo to look big and look lush and have an impact, and they didn’t skimp.”
Leo will premiere on Netflix on November 21.
