19-year Disney vet co-directing Angry Birds movie

The upcoming Angry Birds movie will be co-directed by a pair of animation veterans, Rovio Entertainment has announced.

19-year Walt Disney Animation Studios veteran Clay Kaytis and Sony Pictures Animation's Fergal Reilly have been tapped to adapt the popular mobile game for the big screen. Both men will make their directorial debut with Angry Birds.

At Disney, Kaytis served as animation supervisor on Tangled and its follow-up short, Tangled Ever After. He also oversaw the end credits sequence for Wreck-It Ralph and did animation work on that movie.

Kaytis also did animation work on the upcoming Disney movie Frozen as well as the Oscar-winning Pixar short Paperman.

As for Reilly, he joined Sony Pictures Animation in 2003 as a storyboard artist. His credits include Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2, and Hotel Transylvania. He also worked on the movies Spider-Man 2 and The Iron Giant.

"I'm very excited that Fergal and Clay have joined us, bringing with them their vast expertise. They are two of the brightest rising talents in animation, and I'm confident we are building the right team to tell the story of Angry Birds and deliver an amazing movie experience to our fans," Rovio Entertainment CEO Mikael Hed said.

Kaytis and Reilly are not the only TV and film veterans working on the Angry Birds movie. The film's screenplay was written by prolific comedy writer and Emmy-winner Jon Vitti. He wrote for The Simpsons, Saturday Night Live, The Office, Da Ali G Show, and The Larry Sanders Show, among others. Notably, he wrote the 1992 "Mr. Plow" episode of The Simpsons.

The Angry Birds movie will be produced by John Cohen (Despicable Me) and Catherine Winder (Ice Age) and executive produced by David Maisel (Iron Man). The film is due in theaters on July 1, 2016, and will be distributed by Sony Pictures.

The latest Angry Birds game is Angry Birds Star Wars II, which was released in September. A kart racing game called Angry Birds Go is currently in development.