ABOUT DUKE JOHNSON

Raised in St. Louis, Missouri by “a huge classic movie fan” family, Duke Johnson grew up absorbing a multitude of creative classes including acting, painting, and sculpture - even a Jim Henson puppet-making workshop.  Picking up a Bolex during a summer session at Columbia College Chicago sealed the deal for his love of filmmaking and led him to his time as an undergraduate at NYU and fellow at AFI, where he made his award-winning live-action short film, “Marrying God."

Johnson made the leap from live-action to stop-motion animation when he was offered to direct an episode of the TV series, “Moral Orel.”  Since then, Johnson’s helming of stop-motion episodes on Cartoon Network's "Mary Shelley's Frankenhole" and NBC's “Community” has led to recognition of his talent as a storyteller and an artist - confirmed by his Annie Award nominations in 2011 and 2012.  

One of Variety’s “10 Directors to Watch (2015),” Johnson’s outstanding vision as a film director can be seen in his recent Charlie Kaufman scribed feature, “Anomalisa,” which has received an Academy Award nomination for Best Animated Feature in the 88th Academy Awards, in addition to winning the Grand Special Jury Prize at Venice Film Festival.