Troy Quane: Last News

Ben Croll Long before celebrating the world premiere of “Nimona” at a hilltop castle high above Annecy, ND Stevenson devised the character out of sheer necessity. “I was an extremely depressed art student, I was 19 years old, and I was struggling,” he tells Variety.  “I was really trying to find myself and figure out who I was, and Nimona was this character who kind of embodied everything I wanted to be. She was a shapeshifter, able to change her appearance with the click of a finger, and she could be anything, any person, as big as a dragon or as small as a cat.  There was really no limit to her power, and that gave me an emotional language to talk about my feelings at a time when I really needed to.”

After a whirlwind journey to even get made, Nimona received an Oscar nomination for Best Animated Feature on Tuesday morning, much to the delight of directors Nick Bruno and Troy Quane. “This movie was dead, it was not even going to exist, and now here it is, standing shoulder to shoulder with the top films of the year,” says Quane. “It’s crazy and incredible.”

Deadline’s Read the Screenplay series spotlighting the year’s most talked-about scripts continues with Nimona, Netflix‘s animated feature based on ND Stevenson’s 2015 National Book Award-nominated graphic novel about finding friendship in the most surprising situations and accepting yourself and others for who they are.

Nimona has had quite a journey before arriving on Netflix. After Disney acquired Blue Sky Studios, the film was repeatedly delayed before being canceled in 2021 when the studio was dissolved. Directors Nick Bruno and Troy Quane, along with the creator of the graphic novel ND Stevenson, liken the experience to the story of Nimona, the “scrappy underdog” fighting against the superpower looking for conformity. The fight paid off the following year, where Annapurna Pictures and Netflix picked up the film and gave it a new chance at life.

Jazz Tangcay Artisans Editor Animated feature directors of “Elemental,” “Nimona,” “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem” and “Trolls Band Together” will attend the second annual “Sketch to Screen: Top Animated Contenders” panel at SCAD Savannah Film Festival. Hosted by Clayton Davis, senior awards editor for Variety, the panel will take place on Tuesday, Oct. 24.

Terry Flores The Italian premiere of Illumination and Universal Pictures’ upcoming animated feature “Migration” rounds out the lineup for this year’s VIEW Conference in Turin, Italy. The conference, which brings together top industry professionals, thought leaders and enthusiasts to celebrate the latest achievements in animation, VFX and games, runs from Oct. 15 through Oct.

She-Ra reboot — can draw his bustling life into a frame, one panel at a time.Filling the pages of candid, witty webcomic I’m Fine I’m Fine Just Understand with expressive line-drawn vignettes, or, say, early sketches for his award-winning science fantasy graphic novel Nimona, Stevenson, who is trans and married to fellow author/creative Molly Knox Ostertag, chronicles his own adventures in simply getting through the day.It’s a safe space, he writes, “to post little comics and updates about transition, mental health, career, and life in general.”“I just feel like comics is something that I kind of can’t not do,” Stevenson tells Metro Weekly, zooming in — before the current WGA and SAG strikes — to chat about Netflix’s new animated feature adaptation of Nimona, starring Riz Ahmed as interstellar knight Ballister Boldheart and Chloë Grace Moretz as the beloved, shape-shifting title character.Traveling the globe on behalf of the film, directed by Nick Bruno and Troy Quane, Stevenson has recently devoted several amusing pages of I’m Fine I’m Fine to recounting his “adventures from the Nimona press tour.” The webcomic travelogue marks a full-circle moment for the artist and the character who helped lead him out of a self-described time of darkness.“I think the character specifically was at that particular time in my life,” Stevenson recalls. “I was 19 and in a very transitional period, as I think most young adults are at that age.

Chloe Grace Moretz is mixing up her look!

Peter Debruge Chief Film Critic Once upon a time, animated movies made it easy to tell the heroes apart from the villains. Now, the trend is for princesses to remain happily unmarried (“Frozen”), for kids to know better than their elders (“Encanto”) and for monsters to be revealed as misunderstood allies (“Luca”). For a while, those twists on the Disney fairy-tale formula felt surprising to audiences, aligning nicely with where the cultural conversation was headed. Through repetition, however, such enlightenment has become its own cliché. Enter Nimona, who brings a fresh dose of attitude to such inclusive messaging. She’s a monster, but doesn’t like to be called that. (And who can blame her?) Apparently the only one of her kind in a fictional kingdom where medieval customs and flying cars aren’t mutually exclusive, Nimona is capable of shape-shifting into practically any species — be it a shark, a rhinoceros or a ginormous dragon — though her hot pink hair/fur/skin makes it kind of hard to blend in. When she first appears in the rowdy Netflix animated feature that bears her name, Nimona is sporting a pixie-punk haircut, piercings and an insatiable desire to do maximum damage to the society that’s been demonizing her for roughly a millennium. She is not what anyone would call a good girl, and that makes her a far more interesting character than practically any princess.

The long-awaited animated feature adaptation of ND Stevenson’s cult graphic novel Nimona enjoyed a triumphant world premiere at the Annecy International Film Festival on Wednesday evening ahead of its launch on Netflix on June 30

Carole Horst “Nimona” took a twisty road to the big screen. But now it’s ready for its debut at Annecy Animation Film Festival. Pictured above is an exclusive still from the anticipated fantasy adventure. Based on the graphic novel by N.D. Stevenson, the feature follows Ballister Boldheart, a knight in a futuristic medieval world who is framed for a crime he didn’t commit. The only one who can help him prove his innocence is Nimona, a mischievous teen who happens to be a shapeshifting creature he’s sworn to destroy. “Nimona” started out at 20th Century Fox’s animation shingle Blue Sky Studios, which optioned the novel in 2015. Nick Bruno and Troy Quane were brought onboard in 2020 when creative direction of the film changed. The film continued production apace even after Disney completed its $71.9 billion merger with 20th Century Fox in 2019.

K.J. Yossman Netflix has unveiled its slate for Annecy International Animation Film Festival with highlights including “Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget” and “Nimona.” The streamer is returning to the French animation festival next month with a range of events including panels, screenings and Q&As. They include a panel titled “From Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget to Blue Eye Samurai – See What’s Next @ Netflix” and a special screening of graphic novel adaptation “Nimona” with the project’s directors Nick Bruno and Troy Quane as well as creator ND Stevenson, which will be followed by a “making of” session. Netflix’s main panel promises to give fans a sneak peek at a number of upcoming projects including:

Netflix has unveiled a packed line-up of animated feature films and series that it will be taking to France’s Annecy International Animation Film Festival in June.

Former Disney animation execs Robert Baird and Andrew Millstein have joined Megan Ellison’s Annapurna to establish and co-lead an Animation division at the independent studio. 

Sasha Urban editorAfter Disney shut down Blue Sky Studios in 2021, it seemed all hope was lost for the highly anticipated animated feature “Nimona,” based on indie darling comic series from creator ND Stevenson’s comics of the same name. But fear not, as Netflix announced that it will release the previously scrapped film in 2023, with Chloë Grace Moretz (“Kick-Ass”), Riz Ahmed (“Sound of Metal”) and Eugene Lee Yang (“Spring Bloom”) in the leading roles.“Nimona’s always been a spunky little story that just wouldn’t stop,” Stevenson wrote in a tweet Monday.

Chloë Grace Moretz (Mother/Android), Riz Ahmed (Sound of Metal) and Eugene Lee Yang (Spring Bloom) will lead the animated film Nimona, based on ND Stevenson’s New York Times bestselling graphic novel, which is heading to Netflix in 2023.