RIP J. Todd Anderson

 

J. Todd Anderson, ‘The Nice Guys’ and ‘The Big Lebowski’ Storyboard Artist, Dies at 67

He was a frequent collaborator of the Coen Brothers, storyboarding ‘Fargo,’ ‘Drive-Away Dolls’ and ‘The Tragedy of Macbeth,’ among other films.

J. Todd Anderson, who worked as a storyboard artist on dozens of films from The Nice Guys and The Tragedy of Macbeth to Hail, Caesar! and The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, has died. He was 67.

The Hollywood Reporter

By Carly Thomas

October 4, 2026

 

Anderson died Thursday at a hospital in Orange County, California, after a years-long battle with cancer, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.

Born John Todd Anderson in Springfield, Ohio, he started working in Hollywood in the late 1980s. The first film he storyboarded, 1987’s Raising Arizona, launched a long-running collaboration with filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen.

Since then, he storyboarded every one of their movies, including 1990’s Miller’s Crossing (1990), Fargo (1996), The Big Lebowski (1998), The Ladykillers (2004), True Grit (2010), Hail, Caesar! (2016) and The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018). He also worked on Ethan’s Drive-Away Dolls (2024) and Honey Don’t! (2025) and Joel’s The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021).

Anderson worked with several other auteurs and A-list stars on such projects as George Clooney’s Leatherheads (2008); Drew Barrymore’s Whip It (2009); David Lowery’s The Old Man & the Gun (2018); The Dictator (2012), starring and co-written by Sacha Baron Cohen; and three Shane Black pics: The Nice Guys (2016) starring Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling, The Predator (2018) and Play Dirty (2025), starring Mark Wahlberg and LaKeith Stanfield.

His other storyboard credits included Twister (1989), The Addams Family (1991), Nadja (1994), Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002), The Big Bang (2010), Warcraft (2016) and Fool’s Paradise (2023).

Anderson also directed two films, The Naked Man (1999), which he wrote with Ethan, and My Mummy (2008), and made onscreen appearances in Fargo, Leatherheads, The Nice Guys and American Violence (2017), among other films.

Survivors include by his mother, Donna Lou, sister Kimberly and niece Haley.

ANDERSON, J. Todd (John Todd Anderson)

Born:  3/?/1959, New Carlisle, Ohio, U.S.A.

Died: 10/1/2026, Orange County, California, U.S.A

 

J. Todd Anderson’s westerns – storyboard artist:

True Grit – 2010

A Night in Old Mexico - 2013

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs – 2018