According to a WDAS Facebook post (made on March 3), Zootopia now has two directors (Byron Howard, who I believe has been attached to the project from its announcement, and Rich Moore) and one co-director (Jared Bush). But the film's still a ways off; I seem to remember Jennifer Lee becoming a director on Frozen a relatively short time before it came out. (And let's not forget The Good Dinosaur).Jpcase wrote:But when you look at the studio's upcoming slate of films, you see Zootopia, which has a single director and developed as an idea fairly recently.
I suspect everyone here already knows this, but remember that a few films from Disney's 80s/90s renaissance had director changes as well. Richard Purdum was booted off Beauty and the Beast, George Scribner from The Lion King, and Richard Rich from Oliver & Company.
I suppose the difference is that Eisner, Katzenberg, and Schneider never touted Disney as a director-driven studio at the time. But "director-driven" doesn't always necessarily equate with quality. Sure, The Incredibles and Toy Story were superb, but Cars, while not without its merits, pales in comparison to most of the recent "director-switched" WDAS films.