From director Zach Parrish, the Walt Disney Animation Studios short Us Again weaves dance and music with an emotional story that will surely tug at your heart. Set in a vibrant city, an elderly man rediscovers the youthful passion his young-at-heart wife never let go of, as they dance and reminisce together.

During a virtual junket for the short, Collider got the opportunity to chat 1-on-1 with the animator-turned-director about what an honor it was to get to direct Us Again, how he grew more confident in the ownership of his voice as a storyteller, how this story evolved, how he involved dancers/choreographers Keone and Mari Madrid (World of Dance), and the desire not to use any dialogue. He also talked about his hope that there will be more opportunities for Big Hero 6 content (he was head of animation on the film), and that he’d like to direct again.

Collider: How exciting is it to be responsible for the first new theatrical short from Walt Disney Animation Studios in five years?

ZACH PARRISH: It’s crazy. It’s a huge honor. I’m such a big fan of all of the short films that we’ve had the opportunity to make, as a studio. It’s a lot of pressure because they’re all amazing films. Any artist would be nervous to measure up, but we have this incredible support at the studio, as far as our studio leadership, but also the crew underneath the film, that is just insane. It’s a huge honor and I’m incredibly grateful.

You were first hired at Disney as an animator. Did you always have an eye on directing even then, or was it something that evolved later, as you kept working?

PARRISH: I think I did. I don’t know if I ever knew it was possible. I was so happy to be at Disney and to get to be a part of the creation of these incredible stories that we get to tell. And then, I got to be an animation supervisor on Wreck-It Ralph and head of animation on Big Hero 6, so I got to see more of how the entire filmmaking process worked and started gaining more perspectives on who I was and what kinds of stories I would want to tell and what I would want it to look like. I started to feel more confident in the ownership of my voice, and then my Short Circuit short gave me the opportunity to try out my own voice. I don’t know if there’s any going back now.

How did you come to direct this short?

PARRISH: They came to me and said, “We’re interested in reviving the theatrical shorts program, but we want to change it a little bit. We want it to feel a little bit more like our theatrical experience, as far as how we pitch our films.” And so, they had us go through the entire development process. We pitched multiple story ideas and Us Again was just the one that was selected. I don’t know why they picked me. I’m just incredibly lucky to have been chosen.

How did this story itself come about?

PARRISH: Everything at Disney really comes from the filmmaker. This was an idea that I had, about a year or so before I even knew that I was getting this opportunity. I had been mulling this around and thinking it’d be a cool short to make and that I would enjoy making, if I made it for myself. It was a time in my life when I was bemoaning my aging body, if you will. And then, that sparked these conversations with my mother and we were talking about my grandparents, and realizing that there were all of these different perspectives on what it means to get older and how you can live that life and what life is actually about. This dichotomy that I have between my two different sets of grandparents – one who sold their home and bought an RV and traveled the United States and went to all the national parks, and one that didn’t and just mostly stayed at home and was fairly sedentary. That all combined into this passion of mine to tell a story about aging and what life is about.

How did the dancing then become a part of things?

PARRISH: Originally, it was just going be that in Act 2, they’d become young and they’d go dancing. But really, as I started thinking about the characters, specifically, and thinking about Art’s journey and how we could use the world to contrast him, then the idea came to me of making the entire world one of dance, where it’s this exaggerated world where everyone’s young, and everyone can dance and jump and do all of these crazy things, and how much more alienating that might feel for an older person. From pretty much the very first pitch, really, it was this world of dance. I used Keone and Mari as my reference for what I wanted this world of dance to feel like. I felt like we could use it as entertainment, but also an exaggeration for the world and therefore the emotion.

RELATED: 'Raya and the Last Dragon' Screenwriter on Asian Representation: "No Story's About Us Without Us"

Why Keone and Mari, specifically? What made you want to get them involved?

PARRISH: The first video I saw of them was one that went viral years ago, of them dancing to Bob Marley’s “Is This Love,” where they’re actually dancing as an older couple. I was just blown away by their performance and their emotion and their connection as a married couple, and then I followed their career. I’d seen them on World of Dance. I had been to their live performance in San Diego — I was actually at their opening night in San Diego. I just love their level of storytelling and their level of emotion while also being incredible athletes. Their storytelling was really captivating, and that was something that I felt could support the emotion of a Disney short.

Did you always know this story would be told entirely without dialogue? Are there earlier versions where it had dialogue?

PARRISH: Yeah, I always wanted it to be without dialogue. Dance came in pretty early, so it was pretty much always dance. Even in the making of the film, when we would talk through the different scenes with Keone and Mari, we actually called them conversations – the conversation in the apartment, the conversation on the bridge, or whatever – because we wanted the dance to be their words. So, there was never any need for words because the dance was gonna represent that for them. I really just wanted it to be that music and movement was the entire dialogue of this.

us-again-headshot-zach-parrish
Image via Disney

Going back to Big Hero 6, are you surprised that with as much love as that film got and has continued to have that there hasn’t been a sequel? Do you still hold out hope for a sequel?

PARRISH: There have definitely been stories told beyond. I hope with Disney+ that there’s even more opportunities for Big Hero 6 content. I thought I saw a rumor about that. I think there’s still a lot of potential. There’s still plenty of time. The beauty of animation is that can pick up the story at the very end of Big Hero, or we could jump in time. We could go wherever we want, since it’s animation.

You’ve animated full-length features, but so far you’ve only directed shorts. Is directing a full-length feature the next step? Is that the ultimate goal?

PARRISH: It’s definitely something I would love to do. Right now, I’m mostly focused on the fact that my wife’s about to have a baby. I’m really just focused on helping in any way that I can at the studio, in whatever capacity that I can. I’ve held a wide variety of roles at Disney and they’ve all been enjoyable because we get to work as a team to create stories that impact the world. I’m happy to play in that sandbox in any way that I can, but I would love to direct again. It’s an incredibly fun experience. I really enjoyed it.

Us Again is in theaters with Raya and the Last Dragon, starting on March 5th, and will be available at Disney+ in June.

KEEP READING: Here’s Everything New to Disney+ in March 2021