‘Lion King’ co-director Rob Minkoff reacts to Roger Allers' death at 76

Roger Allers’, who has directed some of Disney’s most iconic movies, surprisingly died at 76 and one of his collaborators Rob Minkoff has broken his silence on the tragedy.

The duo was responsible for co-directing The Lion King, and the late playwright’s passing was announced on Facebook by producer Dave Bossert.

In a statement to Daily Mail, the Stuart Little director broke his silence on the unexpected death announced of his friend and collaborator.

“It came as a terrible shock, Roger was a one-of-a-kind, eccentric creative spirit who touched many lives deeply, including my own,” the 63-year-old stated.

Rob added of Roger, “His work will continue to delight and inspire generations to come. I had lunch with Roger a couple weeks ago and he was in fine health.”

Meanwhile the cause of death for the Open Season co-director is yet to be made public as Dave also revealed in the announcement post that he had been in contact with the now-deceased director as well.

The producer also called Roger a pillar of the Disney Animation Renaissance and opened up about the duo’s emails while the latter was in Egypt.

Notably, Disney’s current CEO Bob Iger also paid tribute to the late contributor in a social media post calling him a creative visionary.

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