“It was myself, an assistant, and a borrowed office, and today we’re over 800 people.” Fueled by the success of first release Despicable Me, Illumination’s films have grossed $3.2 billion, and hatched the Minions theme park attraction. It is an ambitious slate for a company that started with a Universal deal eight years ago, in a most modest fashion. Universal Pictures CinemaCon Presentation: Trey Parker To Play 'Despicable Me 3' Bad Guy (See the latest trailers for Pets and Sing below.) He also showed a short film, Mower Minions, that will be shown with Secret Life Of Pets. Not to be outdone, the Minions got their moment too: Meledandri showed some early footage from Despicable Me 3 featuring South Park‘s Trey Parker as the new villain Balthazar Bratt - looking like a refugee from a mid-’80s MTV video - and Steve Carell voicing a new role as well in the threequel to be directed by Pierre Coffin and Kyle Balda and co-directed by Eric Guillon. Meledandri during Universal’s presentation teased some footage of that and also showed the first 10 minutes of the July 8 release The Secret Life Of Pets, directed by Despicable Me’s Chris Renaud with a voice cast that includes Kevin Hart and Louis C.K., and the first 20 minutes of the December 21 release Sing, directed by Son Of Rambow’s Garth Jennings, with a voice cast headed by Matthew McConaughey, Scarlett Johansson, Reese Witherspoon and Taron Egerton. Chris Meledandri and his Minions factory Illumination Entertainment took the stage at Cinema-Con to wow exhibitors with new footage and project revelations that included setting Benedict Cumberbatch to voice the title character in How The Grinch Stole Christmas, the Pete Candeland-directed animated feature based on the Dr Seuss creation that Universal releases November 10, 2017.

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