In February, Gary Wright wrote about the rumored possibility of Roger Rabbit and Mickey Mouse working together in a spoof of the 1952 film called The Stooge. While this film is still in the proposal stages at Disney/Pixar, we now have more information via the Examiner on what that proposal entails.
If all goes well in the proposal process, there will actually be TWO Roger Rabbit films with TWO completely different feels about them AND 3 short films. One of the films is the aforementioned The Stooge, the second is a sequel to Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and the shorts are spoofs on famous Hitchcock films: The Birds, Rear Window Rabbit, and The Rabbit Who Knew Too Much.
Though little is known about the potential sequel (other than it “is going to be similar to the first movie”), there is quite a bit of info on The Stooge. For one, it is a re-make so one need only look up the plot summaries. For two, Roger Rabbit creator Gary K. Wolf is a bit keen on revealing plot details, particularly those that might help get his proposal moving in a positive direction:
The Stooge is more of G-rated animated movie with the sensibility of a Wall-E or Toy Story. There will be no question that this will be a family oriented movie…realistically there is only one place that can make this movie. There is only [one] place where Mickey Mouse and Roger Rabbit exist and that is Disney. If Disney isn’t interested, then that is it!…the good part of it is that we have structured the whole proposal so that it is Disney-centric and there are a lot of spin-offs to this proposal that would make sense to Disney. The whole movie, The Stooge is going to be set in Disney theme park lands…they take a train from land to land with their traveling vaudeville show. You are not only merchandising Roger and Mickey, but you are merchandising the Disney lands!
Sounds exciting! Although the blatant product placement as a selling point for the proposal is a little worrying. However, pitching the entire proposal via Roger Rabbit himself, is a stroke of genius.
And to give a boost of confidence for those of us crossing our fingers for the proposal to be accepted by Disney/Pixar, Gary K. Wolf mentions some of the voice actors they are interested in:
We would love to have Tom Hanks voicing Walt Disney. We would love to have Ryan Gosling as Jimmy Stewart! We would love to get Samuel L. Jackson as Louis Armstrong! The real coup would be Ben Affleckvoicing Orson Welles who is Mickey’s buddy in the movie! I am going to write them a letter to see if they are interested!
As if that wasn’t enough, check out the mock up posters for the three short films.
