Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio

Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio are American screenwriters. They are primarily known for writing screenplays for animated films, including Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who, Despicable Me, Dr. Seuss' The Lorax, Despicable Me 2, The Secret Life of Pets and Despicable Me 3. Paul is also the creator, executive producer and songwriter for the 2021 Apple TV+ musical comedy series Schmigadoon!.

The pair adapted Bubble Boy into a stage musical featuring original songs, for which an original cast recording was released on Sh-K-Boom Records in 2017 produced by Paul, Justin Goldner & Kurt Deutsch. Paul is also developing an original musical, A.D. 16, with playwright Bekah Brunstetter centered on the relationship between teenage Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene. On January 29, 2018, Paul and Daurio were hired to a film adaptation of Birthright for Universal Pictures and Skybound Entertainment.

Hitting it off, having similar senses of humor, they formed a band called the Otter Pops, playing at local outdoor malls. Within a year they sold their first script, and a year later their second script, Bubble Boy, was made into a film, which was a critical and commercial failure. To get noticed, they used to sing story pitches to film producers. Although not always successful, this strategy resulted in several produced films, including Bubble Boy and College Road Trip (2008).

They were personally chosen by Audrey Geisel, the widow of Dr. Seuss, to write a computer-animated feature film adaptation of Horton Hears a Who! for Blue Sky Studios via 20th Century Fox Animation, led by Chris Meledandri. In 2007, when Meledandri founded a film production company named Illumination Entertainment, Paul and Daurio followed him.

Paul and Daurio have been collaborating since 1999. They met when Paul wrote a musical for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' 150-year celebration of the pioneers' arrival in Utah, in which Daurio had one of the leads.

Paul was named after Cinco de Mayo, a celebration held on his birthday. After graduating from Yale University, Paul served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Tokyo. Shortly after returning from his mission he married his girlfriend whom he had met at Yale and to whom he was engaged just before leaving on his mission. He then won a short film competition and received a fellowship at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, where he graduated in 1993 from the Graduate Screenwriting Program. The following year, he sold his first screenplay to Columbia Pictures.