John Lasseterco-founder of Pixar, the history-making computer animation studio, chief creative officer of Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios; and the principal creative advisor to Walt Disney Imagineering is one busy guy. Always at the forefront of what can be accomplished within animation, Lasseter is so excited for Walt Disney Animation Studios release, THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG – on DVD and Blu-ray June 21st – which marks the return of the musical fairytale with a Princess at the centre.
John, how did THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG come about?
Ed Catmull and I, the day I returned to the Walt Disney Animation Studios, said that we wanted to bring back John Musker and Ron Clements. So, once we brought them back, I empowered them to come up with their own project. I mentioned to them one idea that I had, just a nugget of an idea at Pixar. I love the story of The Frog Prince, and I love New Orleans. And I thought that it would be a great place to set a story like that
and thats all I mentioned to them. We always ask for the directors to come back to us with not just one idea, but three ideas
and they came back with nine ideas. These guys were so prolific, theyre fantastic. And one of them was THE PRINCESS AND THE FROGthey had this wonderful twist on the story, where the main character, Tiana, kisses the frog, but shes not a real princess, she gets turned into a frog as well. That was their clever twist on it. They wanted it to be a musical, set in New Orleans, and they wanted Randy Newman to write the music which, of course, I loved, because Ive worked with Randy Newman on all of the movies that Ive directed. Randy grew up in both New Orleans and Los Angeles. He would go every summer to New Orleans, so he knows the city and its music. Its like he was born with it. Its in his DNA, and so I think he was a phenomenal choice for it.
Why the return to fairy tale animation now?
Ive always loved animation its the reason why I do what I do for a living – the films of Walt Disney. This art form is so spectacular and beautiful. And I never quite understood the feeling amongst animation studios that audiences today only wanted to see computer animation. Its never about the medium that a film is made in, its about the story. Its about how good the movie is. And so one of the first things that I did when I came back to the Walt Disney Animation Studios was to ask John Musker and Ron Clements to come back to the studio and just empowered them to say, Come up with a movie that you really want to tell. And THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG was born. In glorious Disney fairy tale animation. Its just spectacular.
How is THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG a continuation of this incredibly rich legacy that is Disney Animation?
You know, whats exciting about THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG, is that its the return to the sincere fairy tale. Its a return to the musical, which hasnt been done in quite a while. You know, its so classically Disney in every way, yet its brand new, its something youve never seen before. And thats whats so exciting about this. When you sit and watch THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG, I mean, I helped make the movie, but I sit there and I watch it and I think, I forgot how much I love this! Its all those things combined, the animation, the sincere fairy tale, the musical, the great characters, the talking animals, the princess, the prince, all these things combined, its so classically Disney yet its so completely original.
Tell me a little bit more about the story of THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG
The story of THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG is about a fantastic character named Tiana. She is such a strong character. Shes a waitress, but she wants to own her own restaurant. It was her fathers dream that shes carried on, and she works double, triple shifts to raise money to buy this old sugar mill that she thought would make a great great restaurant right in New Orleans. And on the verge of getting her restaurant, someone buys it out from under her and her entire dream is just pulled out from under her.
So at this moment, she does what she said she would never do, she wishes on the evening star, which is what her best friend Charlotte always does, because Charlotte only wants to marry a princeTiana is more practicalbut she finally does wish upon an evening star. And then, she looks down and sees a frog and thinks, Oh great, a practical joker, you know. And shes at a masquerade ball and shes dressed as a princess. She looks down and she says, I take it you want a kiss now, and the frog answers, [IN A FRENCH ACCENT] Kissing would be nice, yes?
And it freaks her out because this frog is talking, and she finds out this is a frog that claims hes actually a prince. So he cons her into kissing her. But instead of the frog turning into a prince, she actually turns into a frog, because shes not a real princess, it was a costume party. So now heres a prince, and heres Tiana as a frog, and they have to travel the Bayou to turn this spell around, they have to find this voodoo fairy godmother named Mama Odie to reverse the spell that Dr. Facilier, the evil voodoo practitioner, has put on the prince, and now, Tiana.
Along the way they meet this fantastic alligator named Louis, whos a jazz trumpet-playing alligator, and hes hilarious, hes fantastic. And they also meet a firefly, a Cajun firefly named Ray. And these two become close friends with Tiana and Prince Naveen. And it turns into this fantastic journey for them to become human again. And along the way, they might fall in love. I dont want to give away the ending. And Im not gonna say anymore than that.
Could you talk about the filmmakers?
It was really exciting to get John Musker and Ron Clements to come back to the Studio. I went to College with John Musker, so weve known each other for a long, long time. I think they are Disney. When you think about the movies they made, especially THE LITTLE MERMAID and ALADDIN, I mean, those are two of the great Disney animated films. And I think that it was so exciting to get them to come back to the Disney Studios.
In the end, when they came back, we just wanted them back at the Studio, because they belong at the Disney Studios. So when they came back, I said, I want you to do a movie that you really want to do, something from your heart. And so we had talked about a bunch of ideas and there was just a nugget of an idea that I have had up at Pixar, which is to do a retelling of The Frog Prince set in New Orleans, and thats all I had.
And so I just mentioned that to them and they took it and created the most original and fresh twist to the story, and they came up with THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG. And they wanted it set in New Orleans and they wanted it to be a Musical. So it was so exciting. I think John Musker and Ron Clements are just phenomenal in their leadership, their storytelling, their creativity, their knowledge of animation, their knowledge of filmmaking, its just fantastic.
Tell us about Tiana –
Im so proud of Tiana. Tiana is such a strong character. She is the newest Disney Princess, but unlike the other Disney Princesses, shes not waiting around for a Prince to come. She starts out not even a Princess. Shes a waitress that wants her own restaurant. Its a dream her father had and she works so hard for this, and what she learns through this adventure is that life is a balance of things, of hard work, but also love. You cant live without love and she just grows tremendously as a character through this movie. And shes so beautiful, the way shes designed and the way shes drawn. Im so proud of this character.
And Prince Naveen?
Every fairy tale needs to have a Prince and we have a fantastic Prince. Prince Naveen, from the mythical country of Maldonia, and he is terrific. Hes so fun. Hes sort of this playboy, a rich kid character, but he has been turned into a frog by the evil Dr. Facilier. But through being a frog, he learns a lot from Tiana. He learns a lot about responsibility and he falls truly in love for the first time in his life. And hes just such a funny character.
Talk about the two sides of magic.
One of the things I love about putting the film in New Orleans is the magic. And we have both sides — the dark and the light — side of magic in New Orleans. And so we have Dr. Facilier, the bad guy and he is, I tell you, he is one of the best Disney villains thats ever been done. Hes so charismatic, charming. He has a musical number and it just stops the show, its so beautifully animated. Then we have the sort of Fairy Godmother, you might say. Mama Odie, and she is just so funny and so charming. And she lives in the deepest, darkest part of the bayou in this shrimp boat thats stuck up into this tree. And she has her seeing-eye snake, Ju Ju with her. Shes really funny, she steals the show.
And the two characters they meet in the bayou?
After Tiana and Prince Naveen are turned into frogs, they travel the bayou looking for Mama Odie to turn them back into humans. On the way, they meet two characters who are just phenomenal. One is an alligator that is a jazz playing alligatorhe plays a trumpet, his name is Louis. And he is so sweet, so funny, and he wants to be human, too, so he could play jazz with all the big bands. Hes kind of a scaredy cat, but thats what so charming about him. Hes so funny.
And they also meet a Cajun firefly named Ray, and hes got so much hearthes lovesick, hes so madly in love with the love of his life. The main characters learn a lot about true love from Rayhe’s really just so funny and so sweet.
You returned in 2006 and now its 2009. It took you only three years to make this beautiful film?
Yes.
Is it a risk to bring back a classic animated movie?
Animation, for me, its a wonderful art form. I never understood why the studios wanted to stop making animation, you know? Maybe they felt that the audiences around the world only wanted to watch computer animation. I didnt understand that, because I dont think ever in the history of cinema did the medium of a film make that film entertaining or not. What Ive always felt is, what audiences like to watch are really good movies. And my partner at Pixar, Andrew Stanton, said thisand I thought it was truethat it seemed like 2D animation became the scapegoat for bad storytelling. What I dont want to watch are bad movies. I believe that if theres a studio in the world that should be doing the highest quality classic animation, its the studio that started it all, the Walt Disney Animation Studios. This is a gorgeous art form. Now, there are subject matters that lend themselves to classic animation, and subject matters that lend themselves to computer animation. And at Pixar, weve always prided ourselves on choosing the right subject matter for computer animation at that place and time, because computer animation is constantly growing in what we can do. And thats why back in 1991, when we started Toy Story, everything that was produced by computer animation looked like plastic, so why not make the main characters plastic, you know, toys? Its perfect, right? And so its that kind of knowledge. Knowledge of what the computer can and cant do. And the same goes for classic animation. To be honest, look at Snow White, newly out on HD and Blu-Ray DVD. Honestly, look at the dwarfs, like Dopey, at how brilliant those dwarfs are, with the squash and stretch. Even today, that would be really, really hard to do in computer animation. There is some things you can and cant do. And I think when you watch, for instance, the character Louis in THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG, the way hes animated, that would be very hard to do in computer animation. Plus, I think the painted backgrounds are absolutely stunningly beautiful. Theres something really special about this medium. I dont believe audiences have grown past it. I think what audiences love is to be entertainedthoroughly, deeply entertained, and thats what Ive always set out to do. And I think theres something really special about a sincere fairy tale, and something special about a musical, and we havent seen that in a while. I think its really great, so Im excited.
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