Fox is riding high in animation, first with the DreamWorks distribution deal and now with the continued growth of its own Blue Sky slate, adding Charles Schultz’s beloved Peanuts gang to its arsenal. That’s right: Charlie Brown and his pals will be coming to the big screen in CG on Nov. 25, 2015, just in time for the 65th anniversary.
After tackling Dr. Seuss, Blue Sky, under the direction of Steve Martino (Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who!, Ice Age: Continental Drift), will now get to figure out how to translate the graphic simplicity of Schultz’s drawings and the popular hand-drawn TV classics.
“We have been working on this project for years,” says Craig Schulz in the announcement. “We finally felt the time was right and the technology is where we need it to be to create this film.” Craig (Charles’ son) co-wrote the script with Bryan Schulz (Charles’ grandson) and Cornelius Uliano.
Indeed, technology is at a point where you can finally get some of the warmth and pliability of hand-drawn in CG (witness Sony’s successful Hotel Transylvania and Disney’s upcoming Wreck-It Ralph). Even DreamWorks is adapting hand-drawn classics to CG with Mr. Peabody & Sherman and a slew of other features as a result of its recent Classic Media library purchase.




