Chris Sanders

Christopher Michael "Chris" Sanders is an American director, screenwriter, producer, animator, illustrator, storyboard artist, and voice actor.

For Disney, he was the co-creator, star, and director of the 2002 animated feature film Lilo & Stitch alongside Dean DeBlois, and he has provided the voice of Stitch in most Western installments of the franchise, as well as the live-action adaptation. He also voiced 627 in Lilo & Stitch: The Series and Leroy in Leroy & Stitch. Additionally, he provided the voice of Little Brother in Mulan, Baby Baboon in Tarzan: Activity Center and Tarzan Action Game, and Peanut in SuperKitties.

Early life[]

Sanders was born in Colorado Springs, Colorado, into an artistic family and is the middle of three children. As a child, he was completely surrounded by art. His family used to paint together and encourage drawing. Sanders, however, also enjoyed writing short stories and sharing them with his family. At age ten, he became interested in animation after seeing Ward Kimball animated shorts on The Wonderful World of Disney. While attending Arvada High School, his storytelling skills enabled him to serve as the school newspaper cartoonist. He had a huge obsession with cartoons as a kid, as he grew up watching Disney cartoons.

It wasn't until Sanders heard about the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) that he considered art as a means of making a living. After applying to CalArts' Animation Program, he was accepted to the program and majored in character animation. Sanders completed his education at CalArts and graduated in 1984.

Career[]

Sanders began his career as a character designer for Muppet Babies. He also served as a storyboard artist, artistic director, production designer, and character designer for Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King, and Mulan before ultimately bringing to life Lilo & Stitch.

On December 16, 2006, several Internet animation fan sites, including AnimatedNews.com, reported that Sanders had been removed as the director of the then-upcoming Disney animated film American Dog by John Lasseter. A New York Times interview with Lasseter later revealed that Sanders was negotiating his exit from Disney. After the departure of Sanders from Disney, directing duties were handed to Chris Williams and the film was retitled Bolt. Sanders has since worked for DreamWorks Animation, directing How to Train Your Dragon (2010) and The Croods (2013), as well as serving as an executive producer for How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014) and How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World (2019). Sanders worked for 20th Century Studios on a film adaptation of The Call of the Wild, which was released in February 21, 2020. Due to Disney's official acquisition of Fox in March 2019, the film marks the first time since the 2000s that Sanders directed a film under the Walt Disney Company. However, his return was only under the circumstances of the acquisition and not intended to be permanent, as he was hired by the suggestion of one of the film’s producers, making it his first freelance directorial gig as a Independent filmmaker. He would return to DreamWorks to work on an animated film adaptation of The Wild Robot, unknowingly at the same time that Lilo & Stitch was being filmed in Hawaii for a live-action remake.

Despite his departure from Disney, Sanders still reprises the voice of Stitch in new Disney projects when needed. However, he did not voice the character in either Stitch! or Stitch & Ai, both of which were produced in East Asia, despite the latter Chinese series having American animators contribute to its production. Ben Diskin replaced Sanders as the English voice of Stitch for these shows. This is likely due to Sanders being only signed to Disney Character Voices to reprise his role of Stitch in media outside of film and television, as Disney had to negotiate with him to reprise the role for the live-action film.