Walt Dohrn

Walt Dohrn (birthname: Walter Dohrn) has played key creative roles in several major animated features for DreamWorks Animation, particularly with the Shrek and Trolls franchises, rising from story artist and voice actor to director. After his feature debut as a layout artist on Mr. Magoo (1997), Dohrn was a writer, voice actor (as Rumplestiltskin), and story artist on Shrek 2 (2004).

Dohrn was then an additional story artist on Shark Tale (2004) and Madagascar (2005). Dohrn rejoined the Shrek feature film team for Shrek the Third (2007), on which he voiced several small roles, was a story artist, and contributed additional screenplay material as a writer. On the sequel, Shrek Forever After (2010), Walt Dohrn was promoted to head of story, while again voicing Rumpelstiltskin and a few minor roles.

Dohrn was an additional story artist on DreamWorks Animation’s Rise of the Guardians (2012), and then served as head of story and voiced a supporting role in DreamWorks Animation’s Jay Ward-based Mr. Peabody & Sherman (2014). For the first time in a feature animation project, Dohrn was a voice actor only on DreamWorks Animation’s Madagascar spinoff, Penguins of Madagascar (2014).

Walt Dohrn stepped to the director’s plate for the first feature in DreamWorks Animation’s Trolls series, Trolls (2016), on which he was co-director with Mike Mitchell, while voicing several supporting roles in a cast including Anna Kendrick, Justin Timberlake, Zooey Deschanel, Russell Brand, James Corden, Gwen Stefani, leading to a hit box-office run of $347 million globally.

In between Troll’s projects, Dohrn also worked on DreamWorks Animation’s Boss Baby franchise as a voice actor only, first on The Boss Baby (2017) and then on The Boss Baby: Family Business (2021). Dohrn was lead director for the first time on Trolls World Tour (2020), with David P. Smith as co-director, and starred in the voice cast of Kendrick, Timberlake, Rachel Bloom, Corden, Kelly Clarkson, Anderson Paak, Sam Rockwell, George Clinton, and Mary J. Blige, but losing money for distributor Universal Pictures with a $48 million return.

Dohrn again jumped over to his voice acting talents to join the cast of the amusing Pierre Perifel-directed animated heist comedy, The Bad Guys (2022). Dohrn was lead director for his third Trolls feature, Trolls Band Together (2023), with new cast members Eric André, Kid Cudi, Daveed Diggs, Camila Cabello, Amy Schumer, and RuPaul.