Welcome to another edition of a series that I like to call Did You Know?. Inspired a little by the Nostalgia Critic's "What You Never Knew" series, this series will allow me to share with you some interesting tidbits, behind-the-scenes information, and fun facts about an animated movie or TV series. Because I like sharing new information with people.
It's been too long since I've done one of these posts. Since I've already done editions talking about The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast, I think it's time I did one about the FOURTH film in Disney's animation renaissance (I'm guessing there aren't a lot of fun facts about The Rescuers Down Under online, so don't expect a Did You Know? about THAT film) - Aladdin.
Aladdin was the highest-grossing animated film of 1992, and for good reason. It's fun, it's energetic, it's colorful, it's one of those animated films that you can't help but love. And a lot of that is owed to the talented cast and crew that brought it to life. John Musker, Ron Clements, Howard Ashman, Scott Weigner, Alan Menken, and Robin Williams, just to name a few, all contributed to the movie's greatness. Like the Genie of the lamp, it's often-imitated, but never duplicated...
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| My apologies to Will Smith, but he's no Robin Williams. |
...and is still one of the most beloved Disney animated films to this day. And it has a lot of history behind it, too.
You probably already know about the falling-out between Disney and Robin Williams. You probably also know that Pinocchio, Sebastian the Crab, and the Beast all make cameos. You likely don't need to be told about deleted songs like "Proud of Your Boy" and "High Adventure". And if you read my previous post about an early draft of the film's script, you probably know all about scrapped characters like Abbi, Aladdin's mother, and his three idiot friends. But did you know any of THESE things?
1) Technically, this wasn't Disney's first adaptation of the Aladdin story. That honor goes to their 1970-released LP, Disneyland Records' Aladdin and His Wonderful Lamp.
It's not even Disney's SECOND adaptation of the Aladdin story. That would be a 1971 LP from Disneyland Records called The Story of Aladdin and His Lamp. Why they released two LPs adapting the same story so close together, I don't know.
2) While Robin Williams was always the filmmakers' choice for the Genie, they did have some backup options in case he turned it down, or if they couldn't convince Jeffrey Katzenberg it was a good idea - Steve Martin, John Goodman, Martin Short, Eddie Murphy, Albert Brooks, Matt Frewer, and John Candy were all considered. What convinced Robin to accept the role was a bit of pencil animation Eric Goldberg did of the Genie set to a routine from one of Robin's comedy albums.
In addition, Danny DeVito and Joe Pesci were considered for the role of Iago. Patrick Stewart was offered the role of Jafar, but he turned it down due to scheduling conflicts with Star Trek: The Next Generation. Tim Curry, Kelsey Grammer, Christopher Lloyd, Ian McKellen, and John Hurt were also considered to voice Jafar.
3) Y'know all those animals and servants that appear during the "Prince Ali" sequence? Where the heck did they all come from? Well, according to a deleted scene, the Genie created them by transforming bugs, rodents, stuff like that.
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| Concept art of a devious-looking Aladdin and Jasmine. |
4) Initially, Aladdin was modeled after Michael J. Fox. Jeffrey Katzenberg urged the filmmakers to make him look like Tom Cruise. "In all his poses, I noticed there was a confidence, a look in the eyebrows, that gives him intensity and at the same time a smile that has kind of an impish look, like he’s got something up his sleeve," said Glen Keane, Aladdin's supervising animator. He also found inspiration for Aladdin while observing and sketching volleyball players at the beach. Meanwhile, Will Finn, the supervising animator for Iago, designed Iago by drawing a caricature of Gilbert Gottfried and adding feathers (Iago shares Gilbert's squinty eyes and toothy grin). For Jasmine, her supervising animator Mark Henn had two inspirations - his sister Beth and actress Jennifer Connelly. And Aaron Blaise, the supervising animator for Rajah, had difficulty with "the fluidity in the design" until he looked at a Jaguar hood ornament.
5) The film's art style as a whole was inspired by Al Hirschfeld. According to Eric Goldberg, "I look on Hirschfeld’s work as a pinnacle of boiling a subject down to its essence, so that you get a clear, defined statement of a personality. There’s also an organic quality in the way one line will flow into another: It may go along the back of a neck, down the spine, across the behind and the down the leg--all in one single line that is very, very elegant. I wanted the Genie to have that kind of elegance."
Al Hirschfield himself said, "I’m very flattered that the animators say they were influenced by my use of line, but art isn’t a 50-yard dash - it’s more like a relay: You keep handing it on to somebody else, and there’s no beginning or end to it. I didn’t invent the line: That simplification that communicates to a viewer goes back to the cave drawings at Altamira."
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| Concept art for the Genie - the one on the left is the same design Eric used in the aforementioned pencil test. |
6) It's hard to imagine anyone BUT Eric Goldberg - one of my favorite animators - animating the Genie, but before him, the job was offered to independent animator Bill Plympton. "You know, the Robin Williams Genie that does all this crazy stuff. Because I was so good at transforming the head, like in Your Face. They wanted me to do some of that with the Genie," he explained. "But, I had the studio in New York. I had people that I'd have to fire and I'd have to shut down the whole operation." And he was already working on a film called The Tune at the time as well, so he turned Disney down.
"And I say if you want to work for Disney, go ahead," he added. "It's a great opportunity. I'm always the first in line to see a Disney or PIXAR film, because they're really wonderful. But every morning when I get up and I go to my drawing board and I start drawing and there's no one looking over my shoulder saying, 'We don't like that, change it, please,' I say I can draw whatever I want, and to me that's worth more than a million bucks."
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| Concept art of the film's main characters, including Aladdin's mother, who wound up getting cut. |
7) Here's another interesting anectdote about Katzenberg - remember that scene where Abu, after being turned into an elephant, climbs up a tree? In a test screening, Katzenberg complained the accompanying sound effect was "much too cartoony". He later complained that there weren't enough pounding noises during the scene where Elephant Abu climbs up the palace stairs.
8) Caricatures of the film's directors, John Musker and Ron Clements, can be seen in the crowd watching Prince Achmed. Originally, this scene was going to have an appearance from caricatures of film critics Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, but the filmmakers thought they would need to get permission to do that.
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| More concept art for the Genie. |
9) John and Ron aren't the only caricatures in the film. There are actually quite a few, all of them were designed by animator T. Daniel Hofstedt. A few appear during the "One Jump Ahead" song - the jewelry vendor is clean-up artist Marshall Toomey, the fire walker is a CalArts teacher named T. Hee, and Crazy Hakim the fertilizer dealer is animator Tom Sito. Going back to the crowd watching Prince Achmed, there are also caricatures of Eric Goldberg, Glen Keane, and T. Daniel himself with his three-year-old son Daniel.
Another caricature appears at the beginning of the "Friend Like Me" song. One of the Forty Thieves that the Genie summons is a caricature of effects animator Dorse Lampher (he's the tall, pear-shaped one with bare feet and a small sword).
10) Are you familiar with Disney's 1959 live action film Darby O'Gill and the Little People? Well, that film actually had a bit of influence on Aladdin.
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| Let's be honest, most of Disney's 1950s live action films would be at least slightly more well-known if they were animated. |
You see, screenwriters Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio were in a meeting with Ron and John. Ron and John asked if the Genie should be able to grant an unlimited amount of wishes like in the original story, or if it should just be three. According to Terry, "Going down the path of unlimited wishes (which they had done) created what we deemed an 'addiction story' paradigm. Aladdin wishes for more and more stuff, which starts out fine, but eventually gets out of control, and he can't stop - essentially an addiction tale. But limiting the wishes to only three would make each wish crucial, have story purpose, and enhance the opportunity for drama."
What does this have to do with Darby O'Gill and the Little People? Easy - that film was exactly what Terry was thinking of when he was explaining this to Ron and John. I haven't actually seen the film, but Terry filled us in on what happens in it. Darby O'Gill captures the King of the Leprechauns, Brian Connors. And that means Brian has to grant him three wishes. He says, "Three wishes I grant you, great wishes and small, but if you wish for a fourth, you lose them all!" So eventually, Darby's daughter is injured and going to die, and Darby wishes that he could take her place and die instead. And as he's being carried away to the land of the dead in a spectral coach, Brain appears and tricks Darby into making a fourth wish - wishing that he could see the aforementioned daughter get married. And remember that "if you wish for a fourth, you lose them all" thing Brian said earlier? Well, by making that wish, Darby forfeits the other three, and he doesn't have to die.
Terry pitched that they could create a similar crisis for Aladdin if they limited the number of wishes. And wouldn't you know it, Ron loves Darby O'Gill and the Little People, so...
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| Concept art of Aladdin and Abu. Somebody make Abu stop staring at me. |
11) Here's another thing that Terry informed us - why can Iago talk? According to him, the idea was that Jafar took all of his emotions and transferred them into his parrot, leaving him free of distractions and thus more able to conjure magic... but Iago is too small for so many emotions to be bottled up inside, so Jafar wound up with a loud, hot-tempered Angry Bird.
12) As you might recall, Howard Ashman and Alan Menken's original treatment for the film took place in Baghdad. The reason why the final movie doesn't take place in Baghdad? The first Gulf War. Roy Disney told the crew that they couldn't have the film in Baghdad, so John Musker did a "jumbled anagram" and came up with Agrabah.
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| Concept art for Jafar. |
13) So, back to that "three wishes makes for better drama" thing... the story requires Aladdin to use his second wish before the third act starts up so he'd have to decide whether to use his third wish to sort out his own problems or free the Genie like he promised. So somebody came up with the idea of having Aladdin use his second wish to get through some sort of obstacle course designed to test Jasmine's suitors so they could prove they were worthy of being her husband. Alas, the idea didn't work out, and they decided to just have Jafar somehow convince the palace guards to help him throw Aladdin off a cliff and as a result Aladdin has to use his second wish for the Genie to save his life.
14) An early version of the climax was to have Jafar wish not just that he was the sultan, but that he'd ALWAYS BEEN sultan and would always be the sultan, resulting in some sort of magic wave that changed everyone's memories. The magic carpet would wrap itself around Aladdin and Abu and protected them from the wave, so they'd be the only ones whose memories were unaltered. Aladdin would, as in the finished movie, put everything back to normal by tricking Jafar into the lamp. They decided it was "too science fiction-y".
15) Before Aladdin, Robin Williams starred in the Back to Neverland attraction at Disney-MGM Studios (now Disney's Hollywood Studios), a theatrical show about animation. The Genie's outfit at the end, with the hawaiian shirt and the Goofy hat, is a reference to that attraction - Robin wore the same getup at the beginning.
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| Here's a screencap from Back to Neverland with Robin in his tourist getup. |
16) The "Friend Like Me" sequence was the first scene to be animated. In fact, the animation had already been done before they decided to make Aladdin look more like Tom Cruise, so he looks a bit more Michael J. Fox-ish during the scene.
17) The filmmakers went through a couple different songs for Jafar to sing before deciding on his reprise of "Prince Ali". The first was called "Humiliate the Boy", and you can find an animatic for the song on YouTube where Jonathan Freeman voices both Jafar AND Iago (who was originally going to be British, apparently). Then they came up with a song called "My Time Has Come", in which Jafar lamented how much his life stunk and how he was going to make everyone miserable in revenge. Also written for Jafar were "Why Me?" and "My Finest Hour".
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| Concept art for Iago. |
18) As you likely already know, Robin Williams also voiced the Peddler at the beginning of the film. For the scene where the Peddler offers us some of his wares (would YOU buy that combination hookah and coffee maker that also makes "Julienne fries"?), Robin was brought into the soundstage, positioned in front of a table where there were a bunch of random things covered by a sheet, and told to just ad-lib everything.
19) Gilbert Gottfried was allowed to improvise a lot, too. Remember Iago's line as he's packing his bags after Aladdin reveals to the Sultan that Jafar has been hypnotizing him? "I'll bring the guns, the weapons, the knives... and how about this picture? I don't know, I think I'm making a weird face in it." That was an ad-lib, and it got a laugh out of Robin when he heard it.
20) You know that kid from the marketplace who Jasmine gives an apple to? He's got a name. It's Tony:
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| Credit for this goes to havesomedisney.tumblr.com. |
21) You probably recall that the Genie briefly dons a tux and acts like a game show host before turning Abu into a camel. For the movie's release in India, Disney swapped this out for the Genie becoming a "cricket commentator" (don't know if that means a cricket who does commentary or a commentator at a cricket GAME).
22) "A Whole New World" was originally called "The World at My Feet". Tim Rice suggested to Alan Menken that having the word "feet" in a Disney love song wasn't such a good idea.
23) Y'know how the Beast makes a cameo in the film as one of the animal figurines that the Sultan is stacking just before the "Prince Ali" song? Well, he's not the only cameo in there. Somebody on Reddit revealed that, if you look very closely, you can also see the back of Donald Duck's head (it's under the deer and to the left of the pink rhinoceros):
I've also heard claims that Simba from The Lion King is hidden among the animal figurines as well, but I don't see him.
24) While animating the Magic Carpet, Randy Cartwright kept folding a piece of cloth to see how to position it.
25) The movie actually has a color scheme inspired by its desert setting: blue (the color of water) represents good, red (the color of heat) represents evil, and yellow (the color of sand) represents neutral. Notice that Jafar is clad in red and blacks and is entirely red when he becomes a genie, whereas Jasmine wears blue and the Genie IS blue.
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| Concept art for Jasmine. |
26) Aladdin was the first Disney film to be dubbed in Icelandic.
27) Yes, the Peddler at the beginning is indeed the Genie in disguise. The original plan was to have the Peddler show up again at the end and reveal himself to be the Genie, but they replaced it with the "Genie's face on the moon" ending. The Broadway musical removes the Peddler and simply has the Genie introduce the story as himself.
28) During "Friend Like Me", Genie writes Aladdin's order from right to left - which is how Arabic would actually be written. However, what Genie wrote is actually Persian, not Arabic. Specifically, he wrote "Turkey Pilaf" in Persian to match the Middle Eastern setting. However, the list that Genie pulls out of Aladdin's ear IS written in Arabic.
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| Here's a very strange piece of concept art for either the Genie or Jafar. Whoever it's supposed to be, it looks more like Jim Carrey's Grinch. |
29) It's often mentioned that Genie is the only character in the movie with four fingers. This is false. You can see some merchants during the "Prince Ali" song that ALSO have four fingers.
30) The Cave of Wonders scene was originally going to be even longer - there was a scene where Aladdin walked up to the lamp and was about to grab it, but then noticed his shadow on the wall... and many more shadows that once belonged to other fools who stumbled upon the cave and tried to grab the lamp (including the thief from the beginning of the film). He would've stepped away from it, and it would've turned out that the lamp was a fake. And because Aladdin didn't take it, he was allowed access to the real one.
31) During preview screenings, there was a distinct lack of applause after the musical numbers. So they gave the Genie an applause sign on his back after "Friend Like Me". It worked!
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| Concept art of Aladdin discovering the magic lamp. |
32) To promote the film, a parade called Aladdin's Royal Caravan marched down the streets of Disneyland and Disney-MGM Studios in Walt Disney World. The first parade at a Disney park based on a single movie, it featured live actors, inflatable costumes, and puppets. Genie was all over the place, Aladdin and Jasmine rode on the back of elephant Abu, and Jafar was at the end - as a street sweeper. For more information about the parade, I recommend checking out Yesterland and Walt Dated World (they're great sites for Disney Parks afficianados like me!).
After its run, the golden camels featured in the parade were placed outside a restaurant in the park called the Soundstage Restaurant, which (at least in 1992) was themed to the movie as well and featured animation cells and concept art hanging up on the walls, marquettes, and I believe meet-and-greets with the characters while you ate. The restaurant eventually closed (it was where the Playhouse Disney live show was during the 2000s), and the camels now stand nearby the Magic Carpets of Aladdin attraction at the Magic Kingdom, continuing to spit on guests. There was also an Aladdin's Oasis dinner show at Disneyland from 1993 to 1994.
33) Jonathan Freeman went on to play Jafar in the Broadway adaptation of Aladdin. He also played Grimsby in the Broadway adaptation of The Little Mermaid.
34) According to Andreas Deja, Marc Davis didn't like that Robin Williams was allowed to ad-lib dialogue for the Genie. He felt that the ad-libbing would date the film (he did, however, tell Andreas that he enjoyed Jafar). On the flip side, Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnson had "a few quibbles with the story" but were otherwise okay with the film. Chuck Jones loved it, calling it "the funniest animated film of all time".
SOURCES:
- http://www.wordplayer.com/columns/wp53.The.Rules.html
- https://cartoonresearch.com/index.php/celebrating-the-25th-anniversary-of-disneys-aladdin/
- https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2552347/that-time-aladdin-songwriter-alan-menken-had-to-cut-feet-lyrics-out-of-a-whole-new-world
- https://www.thewrap.com/aladdin-25th-anniversary-facts-robin-williams-disney-photos/
- https://www.orartswatch.org/bill-plymptons-animated-imagination/
