Alex Hirsch

Alexander Robert Hirsch (born June 18, 1985) is an American animator, writer, producer, and voice actor. He is best known as the creator of the Disney Channel and Disney XD animated series Gravity Falls, for which he voices its characters Grunkle Stan, Soos, and Bill Cipher, among others. The show has won several BAFTA and Annie Awards.

In 2016, Hirsch co-authored Gravity Falls: Journal 3 which debuted as a No. 1 New York Times Best Seller and remained on The New York Times Best Seller list for forty-seven weeks. In 2018, Hirsch wrote Gravity Falls: Lost Legends which also appeared on The New York Times Best Seller list. In 2024, Hirsch wrote The Book of Bill, which appeared on the Amazon and New York Times Best Seller's list.

Early life and education

Hirsch's father is Jewish, but he was raised agnostic, celebrating both Christmas and Hanukkah. Between the ages of 9 and 13, Hirsch and his twin sister would go stay with their great-aunt (or "graunty") Lois, at her cabin in the woods during the summer. These experiences later served as Hirsch's inspiration for Gravity Falls. He graduated from Piedmont High School where, as a junior, he won the school's annual Bird Calling Contest in 2002 and appeared on the Late Show with David Letterman.

Hirsch went on to attend the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) where he created a variety of projects and short films including his senior film, Off The Wall, which combined animation and live action and "Cuddle Bee Hugs N'Such" with Adrian Molina, which was chosen by Nicktoons Network for their original series Shorts in a Bunch. He also spent the summer of 2006 in Portland, Oregon, storyboarding a later-scrapped animated film for Laika. He graduated in 2007 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree.

Career

Alex Hirsch with a Grunkle Stan puppet at San Diego Comic-Con in 2013

Hirsch's first job after graduating from CalArts was as a writer and storyboard artist for the Cartoon Network series The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack, where he worked alongside CalArts alumni J. G. Quintel, Pendleton Ward (who was his writing partner on the show), and Patrick McHale. He would go on to develop the pilot for the Disney Channel series Fish Hooks along with Maxwell Atoms and future Rick and Morty creator Justin Roiland.

In 2012, Hirsch created the series Gravity Falls for Disney Channel. The series, set in the fictional town of Gravity Falls, Oregon, premiered in June 2012 with a voice cast including Jason Ritter, Kristen Schaal, and Hirsch himself. Over the course of the series, he provided the voices of Grunkle Stan, Soos, Old Man McGucket, Bill Cipher, and various minor characters. The series was moved to Disney XD in 2014. It would go on to win a BAFTA Children's Award and an Annie Award in 2015 and was nominated for several other awards (including a Peabody Award in 2016). Hirsch ended Gravity Falls in February 2016 to pursue other projects.

In July 2016, Hirsch hosted a global treasure hunt (known as the "Cipher Hunt") for Gravity Falls fans with clues hidden throughout the world including in the United States, Japan, and Russia. The goal of the hunt was to find a statue of the Gravity Falls character, Bill Cipher. After two weeks, fans of the series discovered the statue in Reedsport, Oregon. The hunt coincided with the release of Hirsch's tie-in book, Gravity Falls: Journal 3, which was released on July 26, 2016 and eventually became a No. 1 New York Times Best Seller and appeared on The New York Times Best Seller list for nearly a year. A special edition of the book was released on June 13, 2017, and limited to 10,000 copies. The Gravity Falls: Journal 3 Special Edition contains blacklight writing, parchment pages, a monocle, removable photos and notes, and other features that were not included in the regular edition of the book. Marketing for The Book of Bill revealed that Gravity Falls: Journal 3 has sold more than 1.3 million copies as of January 2024.

In February 2018, Hirsch used his Twitter account to announce an official Gravity Falls graphic novel, through a series of puzzle pieces that he would release throughout the day. When put together, the puzzle pieces revealed the cover of Gravity Falls: Lost Legends; 4 All-New Adventures! which was written by Hirsch was released on July 24, 2018 and also became a New York Times Best Seller.

Outside of Gravity Falls, Hirsch has done voice work for a number of projects including Phineas and Ferb, Rick and Morty, and as the announcer for the Chelsea Peretti special, One of the Greats. In August 2016, it was announced that Hirsch was in negotiations to co-write the live-action Pokémon film, Detective Pikachu, alongside Guardians of the Galaxy and Captain Marvel writer Nicole Perlman, but he later revealed on Twitter that he had no involvement with the film. Hirsch was a story contributor to Sony's animated Spider-Man film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018).

On August 27, 2018, Hirsch signed a deal with American streaming company Netflix for a multi-year deal, according to Variety. Alex is currently in development on an unknown adult animated series for the company that remains NDA protected as of 2022 with no known release or announcement date as of yet. As of 2022, the show remains stuck in development.

Hirsch also co-executive produced the series Inside Job alongside creator and show-runner Shion Takeuchi. The first half of the first season premiered on October 22, 2021, with the second half releasing on November 18, 2022, with a second season being order on June 8, 2022. However, on January 8, 2023, Takeuchi announced that the series was cancelled, which a representative from Netflix confirmed.

Hirsch is the voice of King, Hooty, and additional voices in the Disney Channel animated series The Owl House, created by Dana Terrace. The show premiered on January 10, 2020.

In 2024 Hirsch wrote The Book of Bill, a Gravity Falls novel targeted at an adult audience. The book is written from Bill Cipher's perspective, and shows his origins and what happened to him after the end of the series. The Book of Bill debuted as an Amazon and No. 1 New York Times Best-Seller.

Personal life

Gravity Falls was inspired by Hirsch's childhood and his relationship with his twin sister, Ariel Hirsch, growing up during their summer vacations. He placed many of his real-life experiences in the show, such as living in Piedmont and trick-or-treating with his sister as kids. Dipper Pines, one of the lead characters of Gravity Falls, is based on Hirsch's memory of how it felt to be a kid. When Hirsch was around Dipper's age, he attempted to teach himself backward speech by reversing recordings of his own voice. Hirsch described himself as "that neurotic kid who would carry 16 disposable cameras everywhere I went." The character Mabel Pines was inspired by Ariel. According to Hirsch, Ariel "really did wear wacky sweaters and have a different ridiculous crush, every week" in a similar fashion to Mabel. In the series Mabel acquires a pet pig, just like Ariel had always wanted when she was a child. The character of Grunkle Stan was inspired by Hirsch's grandfather Stan, who according to him "was a guy that told tall tales and would frequently mess with us to get a rise out of us."

From 2015 to sometime before April 2022, Hirsch was in a relationship with The Owl House creator Dana Terrace. Hirsch has praised The Owl House for its LGBTQ+ characters, stating that he had been prohibited from incorporating explicitly LGBTQ+ characters into Gravity Falls.

Hirsch has been publicly critical of the Walt Disney Company, and has argued that, while Disney claims to support LGBTQ+ content, it does not live up to these claims. Hirsch has argued that Disney diminishes LGBTQ+ content by censoring or removing it to appeal to conservative viewers; by giving it less care, quality assurance, and merchandise; and limiting creative freedom in its television animation studios.

In November 2020, Hirsch prank-called Rudy Giuliani's voter fraud hotline set up by the Donald Trump campaign, by using the voices of multiple Gravity Falls characters to report Hamburglar-esque ballot theft.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Writer	Actor	Other	Role	Notes
2018	Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse	Template:Partial	Template:No	Template:Yes		Story Contributor
2019	The Angry Birds Movie 2	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Steve Eagle (voice)
2021	The Mitchells vs. the Machines	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Dirk (voice)	Story Consultant
2023	The Super Mario Bros Movie	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes		Special Thanks
	Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Scumbug, Boss Goon (voices)
TBA	I, Chihuahua	Template:Partial	Template:No	Template:No

Television

Year	Title	Creator	Executive Producer	Writer	Voice actor	Other	Role	Notes
2002	Late Show with David Letterman	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes		Guest appearance as winner of Piedmont High School's Birdcaller Competition Episode aired on June 19, 2002
2008–2009	The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Template:Yes		Also storyboard artist
2010–2014	Fish Hooks	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Clamantha, additional voices	Also creative consultant, storyboard artist and co-developer
2012–2016	Gravity Falls	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Template:No	Grunkle Stan, Soos Ramirez, Old Man McGucket, Bill Cipher, additional voices
2013	Phineas and Ferb	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Officer Concord the Juice Time Juice Box Flavor Cop	Episode: "Terrifying Tri-State Trilogy of Terror"
2015	Rick and Morty	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Toby Matthews	Episode: "Big Trouble in Little Sanchez"
2016	Wander Over Yonder	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Old Man, Soosy Du, additional voices	Episode: "The Cartoon"
2018	Star vs. the Forces of Evil	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Ben Fotino	Episode: "Booth Buddies"
	We Bare Bears	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Internet Troll	Episode: "Charlie's Halloween Thing 2"
2019	Big City Greens	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Wyatt	Episode: "Park Pandemonium"
2020–2023	The Owl House	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	King, Hooty, additional voices	Also creative consultant
2020	Amphibia	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	The Curator, Frog Soos	Episode: "Wax Museum" Special thanks, Episode: "The Hardest Thing"
2021	Kid Cosmic	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Partial	Template:No	Template:No		2 episodes
	The Simpsons	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Bill Cipher	Episode: "Bart's in Jail!"
2021–2022	Inside Job	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Template:Yes	Template:No	Grassy Noel Atkinson, additional voices
2024–present	Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles	Template:No	Template:No	Template:No	Template:Yes	Template:No	Scumbug
Template:Tba	Untitled Alex Hirsch Project	Template:Yes	Template:N/a	Template:N/a	Template:N/a	Template:N/a		Confirmed series in development at Netflix

Video games

Year	Title	Role
2014	Disney Infinity: Marvel Super Heroes	Additional voices
2015	Disney Infinity 3.0	Additional voices
2022	The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe	New Content announcer

Web

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2022	Homestar Runner: Strong Bad Emails	Himself	Episode: "Parenting"
2023	Bigtop Burger	Munkustrap	Episode: "Up"
TBA	BoxTown	Detective Tim Standing	Adult animated indie web-series Main Role

Bibliography

Year	Title	Original publisher	ISBN	Notes
2016	Gravity Falls: Journal 3	Disney Press		Co-written with Rob Renzetti No. 1 New York Times Best Seller A special edition was released on June 13, 2017, and limited to 10,000 copies
2018	Gravity Falls: Lost Legends			New York Times Best Seller A Barnes and Noble exclusive edition with 16 additional pages of production art was also released.
2024	The Book of Bill	Hyperion Avenue Books		This is the first Gravity Falls book written specifically for adults. A Barnes & Noble Exclusive Edition featuring 16 extra pages was also released. It is an Amazon and No. 1 New York Times Best-Seller.

Nominations and awards

Year	Award	Category	Nominee	Result	Ref.
2015	42nd Annie Awards	Best Animated TV/Broadcast Production For Children's Audience	Gravity Falls	rowspan="2" Template:Won
	20th British Academy Children's Awards	Best International Series
2016	43rd Annie Awards	Best Animated TV/Broadcast Production For Children's Audience		rowspan="4" Template:Nom
		Best Writing in an Animated TV/Broadcast Production	Alex Hirsch
	75th Annual Peabody Awards	Excellence in Children's/Youth Programming	Gravity Falls
2017	44th Annie Awards	Best Writing in an Animated TV/Broadcast Production	Alex Hirsch

External links

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