Cover Story
Disney Is Banking On Sequels to Help Get Pixar Back on Track
After duds and missteps, the famed animation studio sees Inside Out 2 as key to restoring the magic.
Across the bay from San Francisco, some 400 miles up the coast from Walt Disney Co.’s headquarters in Burbank, sits the Steve Jobs Building, an industrial amalgam of glass and red brick that’s home to Pixar Animation Studios. Between hula-hoop classes, lengths in the outdoor heated pool, sword-fighting tutorials and seminars on drawing the perfect goose, the workforce of about 1,000 employees who created Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo and Up is scrambling to restore Pixar’s status as the vanguard of computer animation technology and storytelling.