Newcastle Writer Helps Animated Epic ‘DAVID’ Come to Life

When writer-director and former film professor Kyle first toyed with the idea of working on an animated version of the story of David, he had no guarantee it would ever amount to anything.

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“I was a university professor in Texas and I had created an animated short film [and] I took that to a couple of festivals,” Kyle told Hope 103.2’s UNDISTRACTED podcast.

That short, made as a creative outlet with his students, was eventually picked up by PBS and led to an Emmy win for Kyle, which became the first stepping stone to his involvement with David.

A chance conversation at a festival with someone who worked on Big Hero 6 – and happened to be in the same faith community as Kyle – ultimately opened the door.

“A couple of weeks later he was like, the guys [from David] are looking for someone to help write, would you be willing [to] have a chat with them?

David is an animated musical reimagination of the life of David, and his years as a warrior, shepherd, poet and king.

“All of a sudden [I’m] in Cape Town, and then all of a sudden [I’ve] moved there with my family.”

What followed was an extraordinary creative journey.

“You write something and then you hand it over to storyboard, and then storyboard will present something, and then [that leads] to adjusting something in the screenplay.”

Kyle describes the flow of inspiration between writers, storyboard artists, character designers and technical teams as “a collaborative puzzle” that eventually became the film David.

Designed by Sunrise Animation Studios in Cape Town and produced in partnership with Angel Studios, David is an animated musical epic that reimagines the life of the biblical figure David, and his years as a warrior, shepherd, poet and king who became a national hero defined by faith and courage.

Some of the production team went to Israel and got a new understanding of what David meant when he wrote about going through “the valley of the shadow of death” and how it affected him.

Researching for the movie, some of the production team went to Israel and got a new understanding of what David meant when he wrote about going through “the valley of the shadow of death” and how it affected him.

“You would find yourself walking through a wadi, which is essentially like a dried-up riverbed or a little stream,” Kyle said.

“And above you there’s just a towering wall [with] the remains of dead sheep up there [because there’s no vegetation].

“You’re legitimately walking through the valley of the shadow of death.

“[Israel] gave us constant inspiration push to find who this character called David was and why he did what he did.”

Listen to the full conversation with Kyle Portbury in the player above.

David was “a regular person who [believed in] an irregular God and because of that, it inspired him to take action.”

“I’ve got kids who are 11 and 13 [and] I want them to feel that freedom of, ‘I can try things, I can do things’, within that framework of a God who can see well outside anything I have control over,” Kyle said.

David is in cinemas December 18.

Listen to the full conversation with Kyle Portbury in the player above.

Feature image: Supplied (Angel Studios)