Rodney Rothman - Misplaced Pages

American filmmaker and author

Rodney Rothman
Rothman at the 2018 San Diego Comic-Con
Born	United States
Occupation(s)	Filmmaker, writer

Rodney Rothman is an American filmmaker and author. He is known for his work on Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping, 22 Jump Street, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Get Him to the Greek, Undeclared, and Late Show with David Letterman.

He has been nominated for five Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Writing for a Variety Series, and also wrote the scripts for Grudge Match, 22 Jump Street and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, which served as his feature directorial debut.

Rothman is the author of the best-selling nonfiction humor book Early Bird: A Memoir of Premature Retirement. His writing has also appeared in The New Yorker, GQ, The New York Times, The New York Times Magazine, and McSweeney's Quarterly. His piece "My Fake Job" was included in The Best American Nonrequired Reading.

His work on Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse earned him the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, the Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film and Annie Awards for Directing and Writing in a Feature Production.

Career

In 2005, Rothman wrote the book Early Bird: A Memoir of Premature Retirement. He has been nominated for five Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Writing for a Variety Series, and also wrote the scripts for Grudge Match, 22 Jump Street and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, which served as his feature directorial debut. He co-directed the film with Bob Persichetti and Peter Ramsey, and co-wrote with Phil Lord. His work on the film earned him the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, the Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film and Annie Awards for Directing and Writing in a Feature Production.

In 2021, Rothman partnered with former MGM Co-President of Production Adam Rosenberg to form Modern Magic, a media company focused "on creating event entertainment for the 21st-century audience, across animation and live-action". Upcoming projects include collaborations with Stephen Curry, Billie Eilish, Finneas O'Connell, Neal Stephenson, Ricky Williams, Junji Ito, an original animated feature inspired by the music of the late rapper Juice WRLD, an animated feature based on the SXSW award-winning short film Nuevo Rico, another animated series with hour-long episodes based on Wendy and Richard Pini’s influential comic series Elfquest, and a live-action feature that Quinta Brunson is currently scripting for Sony Pictures.

In August 2022, Rothman revealed on Twitter that he was the person who Chris Farley picked up and threw into a dumpster during Farley's appearance on Late Show with David Letterman in February 1996. Rothman was a writer at the Late Show at the time.

Filmography

Television

Year	Title	Writer	Producer	Notes
1995–2000	Late Show with David Letterman	Yes	Yes	Apprentice writer (1995–1996); Staff writer (1996–1998); Head writer (1998–2000); Producer (1999–2000)
2001–2002	Undeclared	Yes	supervising
2004	Game Over	No	consultant
2004	$5.15/hr.	Yes	executive	TV pilot for HBO
2005	Early Bird	No	executive	Creator; TV pilot for NBC
2005	Committed	Yes	supervising
2006	Help Me Help You	Yes	executive
2006	The 78th Annual Academy Awards	Yes	No
TBA	The Promised Neverland	No	executive	Director

Film

Year	Title	Director	Writer	Notes
2013	Grudge Match	No	Yes
2014	22 Jump Street	No	Yes
2018	Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse	Yes	Yes	Co-director with Bob Persichetti and Peter Ramsey

Executive producer

Forgetting Sarah Marshall (2008)
Year One (2009)
The Five-Year Engagement (2012)
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023)
Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse (TBA)

Producer

Get Him to the Greek (2010)
Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping (2016)
Goat (2026)

References

'Something' Discovered in Space... It's a Horror/Comedy!
Grobar, Matt (July 20, 2021). "Modern Magic: Adam Rosenberg & Rodney Rothman Launch Company Focused On Event Animation And Live-Action". Deadline.
@rodneyrothman (August 15, 2022). "Register" (Tweet). Retrieved August 29, 2023 – via Twitter.
Modest Proposal Interview
Sherman, Jennifer (June 11, 2020). "Amazon Develops The Promised Neverland Live-Action Series". Anime News Network. Retrieved August 5, 2020.
D'Alessandro, Anthony (May 30, 2024). "'Goat': Sony Pictures Animation Sets Release Tied To 2026 NBA All-Star Weekend From Director Tyree Dillihay; Stephen Curry & Erick Peyton's Unanimous Media". Deadline. Retrieved May 30, 2024.

External links

Rodney Rothman at IMDb

Awards for Rodney Rothman

Academy Award for Best Animated Feature

Shrek (2001)
Spirited Away (2002)
Finding Nemo (2003)
The Incredibles (2004)
Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005)
Happy Feet (2006)
Ratatouille (2007)
WALL-E (2008)
Up (2009)
Toy Story 3 (2010)
Rango (2011)
Brave (2012)
Frozen (2013)
Big Hero 6 (2014)
Inside Out (2015)
Zootopia (2016)
Coco (2017)
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
Toy Story 4 (2019)
Soul (2020)
Encanto (2021)
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio (2022)
The Boy and the Heron (2023)

Annie Award for Outstanding Achievement for Directing in a Feature Production

John Lasseter (1996)
Ron Clements and John Musker (1997)
Tony Bancroft and Barry Cook (1998)
Brad Bird (1999)
John Lasseter, Ash Brannon and Lee Unkrich (2000)
Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson (2001)
Hayao Miyazaki (2002)
Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich (2003)
Brad Bird (2004)
Nick Park and Steve Box (2005)
Tim Johnson and Karey Kirkpatrick (2006)
Brad Bird (2007)
Mark Osborne and John Stevenson (2008)
Pete Docter (2009)
Dean DeBlois and Chris Sanders (2010)
Jennifer Yuh Nelson (2011)
Rich Moore (2012)
Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee (2013)
Dean DeBlois (2014)
Pete Docter (2015)
Byron Howard and Rich Moore (2016)
Lee Unkrich and Adrian Molina (2017)
Bob Persichetti, Rodney Rothman and Peter Ramsey (2018)
Sergio Pablos (2019)
Tomm Moore and Ross Stewart (2020)
Mike Rianda and Jeff Rowe (2021)
Guillermo del Toro and Mark Gustafson (2022)
Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers and Justin K. Thompson (2023)

Annie Award for Outstanding Achievement for Writing in a Feature Production

Brenda Chapman (1994)
Andrew Stanton, Joss Whedon, Joel Cohen and Alec Sokolow (1996)
Rita Hsiao, Chris Sanders, Philip LaZebnik, Raymond Singer and Eugenia Bostwick-Singer (1998)
Brad Bird and Tim McCanlies (1999)
John Lasseter, Pete Docter, Ash Brannon, Andrew Stanton, Rita Hsiao, Doug Chamberlin and Chris Webb (2000)
Ted Elliott, Terry Rossio, Joe Stillman and Roger S. H. Schulman (2001)
Hayao Miyazaki (2002)
Andrew Stanton, Bob Peterson and David Reynolds (2003)
Brad Bird (2004)
Steve Box, Nick Park and Mark Burton (2005)
Dick Clement, Ian La Frenais, Christopher Lloyd, Joe Keenan and William Davies (2006)
Brad Bird (2007)
Jonathan Aibel and Glenn Berger (2008)
Wes Anderson and Noah Baumbach (2009)
Chris Sanders, Will Davies and Dean DeBlois (2010)
James Ward Byrkit, John Logan and Gore Verbinski (2011)
Phil Johnston and Jennifer Lee (2012)
Hayao Miyazaki (2013)
Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (2014)
Pete Docter, Meg LeFauve and Josh Cooley (2015)
Jared Bush and Phil Johnston (2016)
Adrian Molina and Matthew Aldrich (2017)
Phil Lord and Rodney Rothman (2018)
Jérémy Clapin and Guillaume Laurant (2019)
Pete Docter, Mike Jones and Kemp Powers (2020)
Mike Rianda and Jeff Rowe (2021)
Dean Fleischer Camp, Jenny Slate, Nick Paley and Elisabeth Holm (2022)
Robert L. Baird and Lloyd Taylor (2023)

v t e Critics' Choice Movie Award for Best Animated Feature
1990s	A Bug's Life – John Lasseter and Andrew Stanton / The Prince of Egypt – Simon Wells, Brenda Chapman, and Steve Hickner (1998) Toy Story 2 – John Lasseter, Lee Unkrich, and Ash Brannon (1999)
2000s	Chicken Run – Peter Lord and Nick Park (2000) Shrek – Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson (2001) Spirited Away – Hayao Miyazaki (2002) Finding Nemo – Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich (2003) The Incredibles – Brad Bird (2004) Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit – Nick Park and Steve Box (2005) Cars – John Lasseter and Joe Ranft (2006) Ratatouille – Brad Bird and Jan Pinkava (2007) WALL-E – Andrew Stanton (2008) Up – Pete Docter and Bob Peterson (2009)
2010s	Toy Story 3 – Lee Unkrich (2010) Rango – Gore Verbinski (2011) Wreck-It Ralph – Rich Moore (2012) Frozen – Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee (2013) The Lego Movie – Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (2014) Inside Out – Pete Docter and Ronnie del Carmen (2015) Zootopia – Byron Howard and Rich Moore (2016) Coco – Lee Unkrich (2017) Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman (2018) Toy Story 4 – Josh Cooley (2019)
2020s	Soul – Pete Docter and Dana Murray (2020) The Mitchells vs. the Machines – Mike Rianda (2021) Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio – Guillermo del Toro and Mark Gustafson (2022) Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse – Joaquim Dos Santos, Justin K. Thompson, and Kemp Powers (2023)
In 2020, the category was transferred to the Critics' Choice Super Awards.

Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film

Cars (2006)
Ratatouille (2007)
WALL-E (2008)
Up (2009)
Toy Story 3 (2010)
The Adventures of Tintin (2011)
Brave (2012)
Frozen (2013)
How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014)
Inside Out (2015)
Zootopia (2016)
Coco (2017)
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
Missing Link (2019)
Soul (2020)
Encanto (2021)
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio (2022)
The Boy and the Heron (2023)

Nebula Award for Best Script/Ray Bradbury Award

Nebula Award
for Best Script

Soylent Green – Stanley R. Greenberg (1973)
Sleeper – Woody Allen (1974)
Young Frankenstein – Mel Brooks and Gene Wilder (1975)
Star Wars – George Lucas (1977)
The Sixth Sense – M. Night Shyamalan (1999)
Galaxy Quest – David Howard and Robert Gordon (2000)
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon – James Schamus, Kuo Jung Tsai, and Hui-Ling Wang (2001)
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring – Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, and Peter Jackson (2002)
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers – Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Stephen Sinclair, and Peter Jackson (2003)
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King – Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, and Peter Jackson (2004)
Serenity – Joss Whedon (2005)
Howl's Moving Castle – Hayao Miyazaki, Cindy Davis Hewitt, and Donald H. Hewitt (2006)
Pan's Labyrinth – Guillermo del Toro (2007)
WALL-E – Andrew Stanton, Jim Reardon, and Pete Docter (2008)

Ray Bradbury Award
for Outstanding
Dramatic Presentation

Terminator 2: Judgment Day – James Cameron (1992)
Babylon 5 – J. Michael Straczynski (1999)
2000X – Tales of the Next Millennia – Yuri Rasovsky and Harlan Ellison (2001)
Joss Whedon (2008)
District 9 – Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell (2009)
Inception – Christopher Nolan (2010)
Doctor Who: "The Doctor's Wife" – Richard Clark and Neil Gaiman (2011)
Beasts of the Southern Wild – Benh Zeitlin and Lucy Alibar (2012)
Gravity – Alfonso Cuarón and Jonás Cuarón (2013)
Guardians of the Galaxy – James Gunn and Nicole Perlman (2014)
Mad Max: Fury Road – George Miller, Brendan McCarthy, and Nico Lathouris (2015)
Arrival – Denis Villeneuve and Eric Heisserer (2016)
Get Out – Jordan Peele (2017)
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – Phil Lord and Rodney Rothman (2018)
Good Omens: "Hard Times" – Neil Gaiman (2019)
The Good Place: "Whenever You're Ready" – Michael Schur (2020)
WandaVision – Jac Schaeffer and writing staff (2021)
Everything Everywhere All at Once - Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (2022)
Barbie - Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach (2023)

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