Kirk DeMicco (born May 15, 1969) is an American filmmaker. He is best known for writing and directing Space Chimps, The Croods and Vivo. Raised in Wyckoff, New Jersey and a former resident of Franklin Lakes, DeMicco attended Ramapo High School. Journalism After graduation in 1991 from the University of Southern California, where he double majored in economics and political science, he spent three years in Italy, where he worked as a journalist, interviewing individuals involved in the Italian movie industry for an Italian film-business magazine. After returning to the United States, he worked for the William Morris Agency in New York City, before relocating to the firm's office in Los Angeles in a transfer arranged by talent agent Lee Stollman. Career DeMicco's first script sale was called "A Day in November" which he sold to Warner Bros. and producer Arnold Kopelson for $1 million before signing to write Quest for Camelot. Later he wrote and co-produced Racing Stripes for director Frederik Du Chau. John Cleese and DeMicco co-wrote the film adaptation of the Roald Dahl's children classic The Twits. He also wrote "Splitting Adam" a movie that was set up at United Artists. He then worked as a writer on Here Comes Peter Cottontail: The Movie and later worked on Casper's Scare School. While working at Warner Bros., he and Du Chau also wrote a script for the upcoming live-action–animated film based on the Hanna-Barbera character, Hong Kong Phooey, which they sold to Alcon Entertainment. He adapted the Jack Kirby comic New Gods, and collaborated with filmmaker Barry Sonnenfeld on an adaptation of an Elmore Leonard novel. He has also done many production rewrites for Disney, Warner Bros., DreamWorks and Spyglass. In television, he is the creator and executive producer of the Discovery Channel documentary HALO: Freefall Warriors. Space Chimps In 2008, he wrote and directed the movie Space Chimps for John H. Williams and his company Vanguard Animation; the film is inspired by the first chimpanzee to go to space, Ham. The Croods In 2013, DeMicco co-wrote and co-directed DreamWorks Animation's The Croods with Chris Sanders. DeMicco began writing the film with John Cleese in 2005. The Croods grossed over $582 million worldwide at the box office, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. It was also nominated for a Golden Globe. DeMicco and Sanders then worked on The Croods sequel for three and