PROFILE: Byron Howard

Continuing our celebration of LGBT Pride Month, we look at Walt Disney Animation Studios animator and director Byron Howard.

Howard began his career at Disney in 1995 as an Inbetweener on Pocahontas. He would then move on to be an Animator on Mulan in 1998. He was a Supervising Animator on Lilo & Stitch, Brother Bear, John Henry and, in part, on Zootopia. And, he was a story artist on Chicken Little.

In 2008, he started directing on the film Bolt. He directed on Tangled, Tangled Ever After and Zootopia. He even served as Executive Producer on both Super Rhino and Frozen 2. He is currently working on Encanto, a story set in Brazil.

Howard has been married since 1988 but came out publicly in the Fusion documentary Imagining Zootopia. He expressed how, as a gay man, he could relate to Zootopia's themes of prejudice.