WWTW Interview: ‘Despicable Me’ screenwriters Ken Daurio and Cinco Paul – Part II

The first wave of trailers for the new 3-D animated film “Despicable Me” didn’t look your typical film tease.

A dash of Burt Bacharach music here and a whole lot of mystery gave us mini-movies which barely hinted at the story in question.

“We’re opening in a summer with huge animated movies all around us,“ says “Despicable Me” co-screenwriter Ken Daurio of the marketing strategy behind the film. “It helps us stand apart.”

“Despicable Me,” due in theaters July 9, concerns a super-villain named Gru forced to deal with a trio of children even though he’d rather be plotting to steal the moon.

It’s hardly a surprise to learn the film will be shown in 3-D, and that was the plan all along.

“If you know a movie’s gonna be in 3-D, it does open up your mind a little bit,” Daurio says. “You start to think about not just across the screen but out over the audience. It’s fun to write.”

In one sequence Gru floats over the audience – “we never would’ve gone there without 3-D,” says co-screenwriter Cinco Paul.

Daurio adds today’s 3-D films rely less on gimmicks – like spears heading straight toward the audience – then during the medium’s 1950s beginnings.

Daurio and Paul work on both animated and live-action features, but the former is far more demanding.

They can take up to three years to shoot, Paul says, and almost any aspect of the film can change during that window of time.

“It wears you out,” Paul says. “It’s also totally magical when you see things come to life.”

Daurio says animated films force a screenwriters to push themselves in a way that isn’t necessary with live-action films.

“In scenes where two people are talking back and forth, we say ‘what can we do to make things different?‘”

“We ask ourselves often, ’why is this animated?’ You don’t want to write anything that can be done live action,” Paul says.

(Photo: Top Right: “Despicable Me” screenwriters Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio. Bottom Left: A scene from the new 3-D animated film “Despicable Me.”)

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1. WWTW Interview: ‘Despicable Me’ screenwriters Ken Daurio and Cinco Paul – Part I
2. WWTW Interview: ‘Official Rejection’ director Paul Osborne
3. WWTW Interview: Animation expert Ellen Besen
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