Owen Hurley

Owen Hurley is a dual British and Canadian citizen currently working in Montreal, Canada. He directed Barbie in the Nutcracker (2001), Barbie as Rapunzel (2002), and Barbie of Swan Lake (2003), three direct-to-DVD and video films that have gone on to win many awards. Before directing the Barbie films, Hurley directed television episodes. In 2005, he moved on to working on from Barbie films to video game cinematics and has since not returned to direct any more Barbie films.

Hurley on Barbie films
Hurley described Barbie as a "truly iconic character"and described the three Barbie films he directed as bringing "oppurtunites for characters", "art forms to explore", and "worlds to create". He considered the people he worked with on Barbie in the Nutcracker to have great animation talents, and he enjoyed bringing the story characters, as well as Barbie, to life.

Hurley considered it a big deal to direct Barbie's first feature-length film. His highlights of working on Barbie in the Nutcracker were working with the New York City Ballet and choreographing the dances. Also, he says he has "always liked the title sequence" and thinks the Animation Directors of the film did a great job.

In Barbie as Rapunzel, Hurley enjoyed working with Angelica Huston, who he thinks played Gothel very well. He also enjoyed working with the dragons. Hurley believes that much of the beauty of this film is down to Walter P Martishus, who was the Production Designer. Hurley got to work with the New York City Ballet again in Barbie of Swan Lake, and enjoyed working with Kelsey Grammer. He thinks the scene where Odette and Odile dance with Prince Daniel, switching from Black Swan to White Swan, was a lot of fun, but felt that after directing the three Barbie films that it was time to do something different.