Dean DeBlois
Birthdate: June 7, 1970 (55 Years Old)
Birthplace: Aylmer, Quebec, Canada
Dean DeBlois (birthname: Dean Allan DeBlois) is a veteran animation filmmaker best known as the co-director/screenwriter (with regular collaborator Chris Sanders) of the Disney-backed Lilo & Stitch (2002), starring the voices of Daveigh Chase, Sanders (as Stitch), Tia Carrere, Ving Rhames, David Ogden Stiers, Kevin McDonald, Jason Scott Lee, Zoe Caldwell and Kevin Michael Richardson, marking the start of an animation renaissance at Disney Animation Studio and grossing a robust $273 million (on $80 million costs) after being Oscar-nominated for Best Animated Feature.
DeBlois stepped away from the animation space to direct Heima (2007), the feature-length documentary on Sigur Rós and the Icelandic band’s summer 2006 tour of their country, which was presented at numerous film festivals starting at the Reykjavik Film Festival.
DeBlois reunited as director/writer with Chris Sanders for the enormously successful animated fantasy-adventure, How to Train Your Dragon (2010), co-written by Will Davies and co-starring the voices of Jay Baruchel, Gerard Butler, Craig Ferguson, America Ferrera, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, T.J. Miller and Kristen Wiig, scoring two Oscar nominations (including Best Animated Feature) and nearly $495 million in returns for a dazzling profit for Paramount Pictures/DreamWorks Animation, and spawning a very successful franchise.
DeBlois was then solo director/writer of the subsequent two animated Dragon sequels, the 20th Century Fox-distributed How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014)—co-starring new voice actors Cate Blanchett, Djimon Hounsou and Kit Harington—and the final feature in the trilogy released by Universal Pictures, How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World (2019)—with new voice cast members F. Murray Abraham—both nominated for the Best Animated Feature Oscar, grossing a combined $1.61 billion box office.
Dean DeBlois was for the first time the director/writer/producer of a live-action feature remake adapted from his animated creation, a re-conceived How to Train Your Dragon (2025), starring Mason Thames, Nico Parker, Gerard Butler, Nick Frost, Julian Dennison, Gabriel Howell, Bronwyn James and Harry Trevaldwyn, produced via DreamWorks Animation/Marc Platt Productions and released by Universal Pictures; DeBlois was also director/writer of the live-action sequel, How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2027), reuniting the original cast and released by Universal Pictures.
DeBlois has also been credited as co-head story writer in the animated space for Walt Disney Feature Animation’s musical adventure Mulan (1998), co-directed by Barry Cook and Tony Bancroft and featuring the voices of Ming-Na Wen, Eddie Murphy, BD Wong, Miguel Ferrer, James Hong, Pat Morita, and George Takei. The film delivered a fabulous $304.3 million gross (against $90 million) worldwide for Buena Vista Pictures Distribution.
DeBlois was also a credited co-producer on director/writer/editor/actor Orson Welles’s final, decades-in-the-making film, The Other Side of the Wind (2018)—filmed between 1970 and 1976, edited into the 1980s and recovered and reconstructed until final release—and which starred John Huston, Bob Random, Peter Bogdanovich, Susan Strasberg and Oja Kodar (who also co-wrote).
Personal life
Dean DeBlois was born and raised in Aylmer, Quebec, by his parents. DeBlois attended and graduated from Darcy McGee High School, then from Sheridan College in Ottawa in 1990, where he studied animation in the college’s classical animation program. DeBlois’s height is 6’ 2”. DeBlois’s estimated net worth is $12 million.
Dean DeBlois Movies
Director
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How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World
How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World
When Hiccup discovers Toothless isn't the only Night Fury, he must seek the Hidden World, a secret Dragon Utopia before a hired tyrant named Grimmel finds it first.
Facts About Dean DeBlois
Mentor: Dean DeBlois was hired immediately out of college by Don Bluth Studios in Dublin, Ireland, where he worked under master animator Bluth as a character designer, storyboard assistant, and layout artist.
End of an Era?: DeBlois conceived, with Chris Sanders, that Lilo & Stitch would be a hand-drawn animated movie, and it may be the last one of its kind in the Hollywood studio system.
