Garth Jennings

GARTH JENNINGS

Date of Birth: 1972

Born in England, Garth Jennings began the innovative music video production and television commercial company Hammer & Tongs with producer Nick Goldsmith after leaving art school. They are best known for music videos such as "Coffee & TV" for Blur, "Right Here, Right Now" for Fatboy Slim, "Pumping on Your Stereo" for Supergrass and "Imitation of Life" for REM. Along the way, they also entered the television commercial world and became equally successful in that arena.

Through the course of their work they met American director Spike Jonze. Jonze had been asked to direct The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy but turned it down, suggesting that Jennings and Goldsmith take it on instead. After viewing samples of their work, the movie company agreed to consider them and sent them the script. Both had been fans of the TV series and the books when they were younger and were reluctant to look at the script at first, for fear that it would have been turned into a typical Hollywood movie. When they finally read it, they were pleasantly surprised and decided to give it a shot.

Goldsmith and Jennings storyboarded about half of the film, shot tests, made models of space ships and burned their presentation onto a DVD. They then flew to L.A and presented it to Disney. The presentation, especially the storyboards, went down so well that the movie was green lit on the spot, with Jennings signing on to make his feature film directorial debut and Goldsmith as producer.

Most recently, Jennings directed the animated musical Sing (2016), which features the vocal talents of Matthew McConaughey, Reese Witherspoon, and Scarlett Johansson, among others.

Jennings lives with his wife in England.

Filmography:

Sing (2016)
Son of Rambow (2008)
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005)