Phil Lord and Christopher Miller | |
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Miller (left) and Lord (right) at the 2015 WonderCon
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Born | Philip A. Lord July 12, 1975 Miami, Florida, United States Christopher Robert Miller September 23, 1975 Everett, Washington, United States |
Alma mater | Dartmouth College |
Occupation | Film directors, producers, screenwriters, actors, animators |
Years active | 1998–present |
Spouse(s) | Robyn Murgio (Miller) |
Children | 2 (Miller) |
Philip A. "Phil" Lord (born July 12, 1975) and Christopher Robert Miller (born September 23, 1975) are American film and television writers, producers, directors, actors and animators. Lord and Miller met at Dartmouth College. They are known for directing and writing the animated films Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and The Lego Movie (2014), as well as directing the live-action comedy film 21 Jump Street (2012) and its sequel 22 Jump Street (2014). Their films have received critical and commercial success.
According to The New York Times, Lord is from Miami; his mother is a Cuban-born psychologist, and his father recently retired from the aviation business and before that directed a dance company, Fusion, for 10 years. Miller is from the Seattle area, where his father runs a lumber mill.
Lord and Miller both grew up making short films with an affinity for animation. They met freshman year of college at Dartmouth and quickly bonded after an incident where Chris set fire to Phil’s then-girlfriend’s hair. On campus, the two had separate columns in the school newspaper. Lord was a member of Amarna, a co-ed undergraduate society while Miller was a brother at Alpha Chi Alpha. During his time in college, Christopher met his girlfriend, now wife.
During their time at Dartmouth, the school paper published a profile on Miller, which caught the attention of then chairman of Disney Michael Eisner. According to Lord, Eisner brought the profile to the attention of his fellow Disney executives who then offered to set up a meeting with Miller. Miller agreed to the meeting as long as he could bring Lord. After three months, the two moved to Los Angeles and after one meeting were offered a two-year development deal for Disney Television Animation.
Though nothing they pitched made it to air, they produced the pilot to Clone High, which was subsequently dropped by Fox. After they wrote and produced on a series of sitcoms, MTV informed the duo that they were interested in purchasing a 13-episode season of Clone High. Although the show was met with acclaim, MTV canceled the series after hunger strike protests occurred in India over the show’s portrayal of Gandhi as a motor-mouthed partier.