CONRAD VERNON

I'm as self-promoting as the next guy.

The opportunity to re-imagine a favorite cult-classic from my high school years is an honor. Toxie is an underground icon. My favorite kind.

When I was a kid, I used to stay up after 'Saturday Night Live' to watch the horror shows.

When you work in animation that's all for a family audience, as an adult you desperately want to break out of that.

I wanted to do an R-rated cartoon since I watched 1981's 'Heavy Metal.'

Even in the Pixar and DreamWorks animated movies, there are themes that could be taken into an adult area very easily. 'Zootopia,' I think, is the closest so far; I love that movie because they really did push the envelope as far as the ideas and writing of an animated film for families.

I was a huge fan of monster movies.

Maybe 'Vicky Cristina Barcelona' didn't have a lot of visual effects in it, but most movies have some sort of visual effects.

I was one of those kids who moved around a lot, but in every town I ever lived in, there was always that after-midnight horror show. It was hosted by Elvira when I lived in L.A. There were other ones. I can't remember the rest of them. They were always able to pull out the sense of humor in the movie.

I was a huge fan of monster movies.

Even in the Pixar and DreamWorks animated movies, there are themes that could be taken into an adult area very easily. 'Zootopia,' I think, is the closest so far; I love that movie because they really did push the envelope as far as the ideas and writing of an animated film for families.

When I was a kid, I used to stay up after 'Saturday Night Live' to watch the horror shows.

The opportunity to re-imagine a favorite cult-classic from my high school years is an honor. Toxie is an underground icon. My favorite kind.

When you work in animation that's all for a family audience, as an adult you desperately want to break out of that.

I wanted to do an R-rated cartoon since I watched 1981's 'Heavy Metal.'

I was one of those kids who moved around a lot, but in every town I ever lived in, there was always that after-midnight horror show. It was hosted by Elvira when I lived in L.A. There were other ones. I can't remember the rest of them. They were always able to pull out the sense of humor in the movie.

I'm as self-promoting as the next guy.

Maybe 'Vicky Cristina Barcelona' didn't have a lot of visual effects in it, but most movies have some sort of visual effects.