Josh Cooley

Joshua Cooley (born May 23, 1979) is an American animator, screenwriter, director and voice actor. He is best known for working on the 2015 Pixar animated film Inside Out and directing the short film Riley's First Date? that was included in its home video release. He made his feature film directorial debut in 2019 with Toy Story 4, the fourth installment of the Toy Story franchise, which won him the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature.

Cooley was recruited by Joe Ranft at Pixar, where he started his career as an intern, mostly working as a storyboard artist on films including The Incredibles in 2004, Cars in 2006, Ratatouille in 2007, Up in 2009, and Cars 2 in 2011. In 2009, Cooley wrote and directed a short film George & A.J. for Pixar and Walt Disney Pictures.

In 2015, Cooley worked as a screenwriter and storyboard supervisor on the film Inside Out, which was released to critical acclaim. Cooley received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay for his work on the film, alongside Pete Docter (the film's director), Ronnie Del Carmen (co-director), and Meg LeFauve. The same year, he wrote and directed another short film titled Riley's First Date?.

Following the success of Inside Out, Cooley was tapped by John Lasseter and screenwriter Andrew Stanton to co-direct Toy Story 4. Lasseter ended up setting aside his directorial duties in 2017, making Cooley the sole director. Toy Story 4 was Cooley's directorial debut. Upon release, the film received critical acclaim, and Cooley took home his first Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. Cooley left Pixar during March 2020.

Cooley is set to direct an animated Transformers film at Paramount Pictures. The film, which will be "separate and apart from" the Michael Bay-directed franchise and the stand-alone Bumblebee, will focus on Optimus Prime and Megatron's relationship. In May 19, 2020, it was reported that Cooley will write and direct a live-action adaptation of the children's book Malamander for Sony Pictures, marking his first live-action film, following the footsteps of other animation veterans who tried live action, such as the Academy Award-winning filmmaking duo of Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois, Chris McKay, Rob Minkoff, Clay Kaytis, Shrek helmers Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson, Monsters Vs. Aliens and Shark Tale co-director Rob Letterman, and French animation veteran Sylvain Chomet as well as fellow Pixar veterans Andrew Stanton, Brad Bird, Kevin Lima, his wife Brenda Chapman, her fellow The Prince of Egypt co-director Simon Wells, his fellow Amblimation colleague David Bowers (director) and Laika (company) president, CEO and director of the Oscar-nominated Kubo and the Two Strings, Travis Knight.