While “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” is one of the most acclaimed films of the year, seemingly on track to land a second Best Animated Feature Oscar for the franchise, the film did have a bit of controversy after its release. You see, there were reports from folks who worked on the film that said the filmmakers involved treated animators poorly and overworked them. This highlighted an issue that seems to be prevalent in Hollywood, which is not ensuring animators are treated with respect and given a proper work-life balance. This is a situation the filmmakers behind “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem” took very seriously.
Speaking to Insider, Jeff Rowe, the co-director of “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem,” discussed the issue of treating animators properly and explained that a conversation he had with producer Seth Rogen helped guide him throughout the production of the animated film.
“That was the thing that was really important to us on this film, and I learned it from Seth and Evan because in getting to know Seth, I’m like, ‘He has a really good work-life balance and everyone at Point Grey does,'” Rowe said. “And I asked him about that and he is like, ‘Well, we’re like when you’re doing live action, sometimes you’re on a set for 40 days in a row and it is exhausting and tiring. And we want to make sure that our people have time away from that and that it doesn’t become their entire lives.'”
He added, “I really took that to heart and wanted to make sure that when we made this film, we did it ethically.”
Of course, we can’t say for certain that Rowe and his filmmaking cohorts followed through with that promise, but there haven’t been any bombshell reports of abuse during the production of ‘Mutant Mayhem,’ so it seems like everything was good. Obviously, this is now going to be an issue that filmmakers face when making animated features. Since there has been a spotlight on the treatment of animators, folks will definitely have to adopt a similar philosophy as Rowe, otherwise there could be a heap of bad press, in addition to other professional consequences.
“Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem” is in theaters now.