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The Lion King: The Official Movie Special July 8th, 2019 Digital Back Issue Cover

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THE CIRCLE OF LIFE When the classic The Lion King was released in 1994, it became a worldwide phenomenon, spawning into a groundbreaking stage musical, and now a whole new realization that combines techniques and vernaculars of animation, cinema, and human performance. Its characters and songs have captivated generations. Now, pioneering director Jon Favreau has reimagined The Lion King for a modern-day audience. A revolutionary blend of virtual reality and new, ultrafast rendering technologies, The Lion King builds on the legacy of the original movie by bringing the adventures of its cast of iconic characters to stunning, vivid new life. In retelling the story of Simba, Nala, Mufasa, Scar, Timon, and Pumbaa, Favreau and his collaborators have reinvented the medium, crafting a film that points the way to the future…

THE STORY OF THE LION KING

In the peaceful Pride Lands, the Circle of Life begins once more with the birth of a future lion king. On Pride Rock, Simba, the newborn lion cub of King Mufasa and Queen Sarabi, is presented by Rafiki, the king’s shaman, to the assembled animals. Meanwhile, in the shadows, Mufasa’s embittered brother, Scar, plots to usurp the king and dispose of Simba, with the aid of the hyenas Shenzi, Azizi, and Kamari. Simba and his lioness cub friend Nala have a near miss when they venture to the Elephant Graveyard (despite the protestations of Zazu, the king’s hornbill majordomo). The pair avoid an early end thanks only to the timely intervention of Mufasa. Then, engineered by Scar, tragedy strikes, sending Simba far from the Pride Lands to a new life…

THE STORY OF THE LION KING

JON FAVREAU – DIRECTOR

The Lion King – The Official Movie Special: Were your experiences from directing The Jungle Book (2016) a help in approaching The Lion King? Jon Favreau: It took me the two and a half years of The Jungle Book to scale the learning curve. I came in as somebody who understood about visual effects from films like Iron Man, but this was going to be fully embracing CGI – not just a metal suit, but organic characters and fur. At the same time, while I’m learning more about how to use the technology effectively, the technology is getting better, so you’re getting this synergistic confluence of circumstances that leads to the ability to show things on the screen in a way that you hadn’t been able to before. What that…

JON FAVREAU – DIRECTOR

BLACK BOX THEATER

“The reason that we used the black box theater technique was because I was trying to pursue an approach that made this film feel less like an animated movie and more like a live-action film. Instead of having people doing motion capture and getting that data, we were able to get the reference of the choices they were making from an acting perspective. “Because most of these characters are lions, you can’t just retarget a human performance captured from a face onto a lion and expect it to feel like a real lion. We would bring the actors into the room together and we made it a top-lit, dark little theater, like you would have for a theater rehearsal. Along the periphery on long lenses, we had video cameras that…

JON FAVREAU ON MUFASA JAMES EARL JONES

Casting starts with being nervous! Especially in the case of this movie. What do you do? A lot of the original cast are still around; what messages are you sending with each announcement? “What we wanted to do was honor the past, but also look forward and do something fresh. That’s why the first two announcements that we made – I wanted to make sure they were at the same time – were James Earl Jones coming back as Mufasa, and then Donald Glover playing Simba. “I think the audiences who were paying attention – the people out there who are tapped into social media, who had an ear to the ground on this production – overwhelmingly supported what we were doing. With a new production, you want somebody to…

JON FAVREAU ON MUFASA JAMES EARL JONES

DONALD GLOVER SIMBA

The Lion King – The Official Movie Special: How does it feel to be part of this new version of The Lion King? Donald Glover: It’s very special. I have a son who loves animals, and the lion is his favorite, so it will be cool that in two years he’ll be old enough to understand. He’s really going to love this. I actually feel a great amount of responsibility. I didn’t feel the joy of it immediately, I felt all the responsibility, because I know how much it meant to me, and now it will be out there forever. What did you think when you first heard about the project? When I first heard Jon Favreau was doing it, I was very excited, because I really liked The Jungle…

DONALD GLOVER SIMBA

JON FAVREAU ON DONALD GLOVER

“Donald Glover is an amazing singer, and also an amazing improviser, which is one of the things that really drew me towards him, because he comes from a similar comedic background to me. He came up with a lot of the people that I came up with; I was in the Chicago improv scene, which overlaps with [comedy collective] Upright Citizens Brigade and Tina Fey’s world and all that. So I knew that we were going to have a common take on how to do comedy and how to do that type of performance. He’s since come into his own, of course, as Lando Calrissian, and working on a lot of projects such as Atlanta, so I thought a guy who has talents in all those areas was going to…

JON FAVREAU ON NALA

For the older version of Nala, we have Beyoncé. When you think of somebody who you’d be excited to hear reinterpret this role, especially the musical performances, she’s in a class all by herself. When you have tweens and teens at home, it’s a struggle to remain cool because you’re irritating to your children, but having Beyoncé in my film definitely bought me a lot of credibility on campus with my kids and their friends. “I’m very excited and a big fan of her music. She’s very down to earth, friendly, and was excited to be working on this. She has kids of her own, so the fact that she was working on The Lion King was something that she could share with her family, and they’re very excited about…

JON FAVREAU ON NALA

CHIWETEL EJIOFOR SCAR

The Lion King – The Official Movie Special: What is it about this story that resonates so much with audiences? Chiwetel Ejiofor: The story is so epic. It has these great arcs, it has great heroes, great villains, and a great compass – a real sense of social consciousness and a moral idea at the heart of it. So it’s very appealing and informative, as well as entertaining. These characters take you on extraordinary, emotional, very complicated journeys, so bringing them back in a way that can actually be, in some ways, more relatable, where you can really fall down the rabbit hole with these characters, is pretty stunning. How would you describe Scar, your character? Scar is a very complicated, malevolent character, and therefore fun to play. Scar works…

CHIWETEL EJIOFOR SCAR

JON FAVREAU ON CHIWETEL EJIOFOR

“Scar is played by Chiwetel Ejiofor, who is just a wonderful actor who brings his British accent and, I think, a bit of the Shakespearean cadence to [the role]. He brings a new take on that character. Jeremy Irons did a fantastic job [in the 1994 original], the character is a very scary villain; and with Chiwetel you have someone who’s doing something different but still evocative of the old version of Scar. Because of his background as an actor, he brings the feeling of a Shakespearean villain to bear. “It’s wonderful when you have somebody as experienced and seasoned as Chiwetel. Through his voice he breathes such wonderful life into this character. He’s somebody who you could take away a lot of their other tools – like their face,…

BILLY EICHNER & SETH ROGEN TIMON & PUMBAA

The Lion King – The Official Movie Special: Seth, you’ve known Jon Favreau for close to two decades; how did he contact you about the role of Pumbaa? Seth Rogen: He just emailed and said, “Would you like to be Pumbaa?” I was like, “Absolutely.” I was a little surprised, but honestly, in the back of my head I was secretly hoping that I would get the part. I was a huge fan of the original movie. I grew up with it – I’ve seen it so many times – so it’s a little hard at first to separate yourself from it and to not organically do the thing that the other person’s done. But it became clear pretty early on that there would be ways to create a new…

BILLY EICHNER & SETH ROGEN TIMON & PUMBAA

JON FAVREAU ON THE HYENAS

With the hyenas, because of the photo-real nature of the film and the stakes feeling quite a bit higher and more real, having too much of a comedic take on the villains felt inconsistent with what we were doing. So we went for casting and performances and writing that felt a little bit more grounded in the stakes of the story, rather than the comedy that I think works very well in the ’94 movie. Whoopi Goldberg [Shenzi in the original film], who I’m a huge fan of, did an amazing job, but as we tried to picture that characterization in this film, it always felt like a note that didn’t fit. We wanted to raise the mystery and the stakes of the character of Shenzi, while offering some comic…

JON FAVREAU ON THE HYENAS

FLORENCE KASUMBA & ERIC ANDRÉ SHENZI & AZIZI

The Lion King – The Official Movie Special: Florence, were you familiar with the original 1994 animated movie? Florence Kasumba: I remember it well. I actually have the DVD at home. When the movie came out, I was so excited to see it, and of course, I’ve watched it many times since then. Even my kids know it and all the songs. It’s just a really beautiful movie. Eric, were you a fan of the 1994 original? Eric André: Oh yeah, I cried my eyes out. I was a mess. I was 11 when the 1994 version came out. It was a precious time for me. I was a very impressionable young boy. What do you think makes the story of The Lion King so special? FK: We have a…

FLORENCE KASUMBA & ERIC ANDRÉ SHENZI & AZIZI

JON FAVREAU ON SARABI ALFRE WOODARD

We have Alfre Woodard playing Sarabi, which is one of the roles where we found there was room to add more, and help balance the cast. The original film was definitely weighted more toward the male roles; and certainly in the culture of a lion’s pride, the female lions play a very important role. Also, there were, we felt, holes in the plot that we could smooth out involving Sarabi’s character, even reconstituting versions of scenes that had existed and were cut from the ’94 production, but also the original script and outtakes, as well as scenes that were included in the stage musical that weren’t in the film. “Having such a wonderful actor as Alfre Woodard – who brought gravitas to the role and the feeling of her being…

JON FAVREAU ON SARABI ALFRE WOODARD

JON FAVREAU ON YOUNG SIMBA JD MCCRARY

JD, who’s playing young Simba, is great. He is somebody that we found through the casting process, and it just so happens that in addition to being a bit of a YouTube sensation as a singer, he collaborated with Donald Glover on the last Childish Gambino album. When I told Donald that JD was going to be involved, he was very, very complimentary and excited. “Having JD play the young Simba and hearing them both sing is wonderful. I think he not only brings tremendous humanity to the role, but so much personality in the way he sings. It’s nice to get the opportunity to have actors who are both the performers and the singers. You get a certain amount of latitude when it comes to animated films to mix…

JON FAVREAU ON YOUNG SIMBA JD MCCRARY

JON FAVREAU ON YOUNG NALA SHAHADI WRIGHT JOSEPH

“Shahadi actually played young Nala in a stage production of The Lion King, and I remembered seeing her in Hairspray live on TV. There was very little discussion about who should play young Nala – it was hers right from the beginning. “It was great to have the kids around and seeing what the character was going to look like, then going into VR and exploring the environments and singing and performing. It was nice because it didn’t disturb their lives too much as young kids. They came in, did their thing, and then they went and came back later to do another session. It wasn’t the day-in, day-out grind it usually is for an actor, especially for kids, where it’s hard. They have to do schooling and stuff. You…

JON FAVREAU ON YOUNG NALA SHAHADI WRIGHT JOSEPH

JOHN OLIVER ZAZU

The Lion King – The Official Movie Special: How familiar were you with the original The Lion King? John Oliver: I was very familiar with it. I saw it when it came out, and then saw it again multiple times. Also, as a British person, we were all very excited that Elton John was doing songs for movies: “Our Elton, he’s singing songs for Hollywood. See? We’re still relevant!” That was basically the British take on it. “And look, Rowan [Atkinson] is in it as well! And Jeremy Irons! They still need us! Although usually as villains.” What was it about the original film that you connected with? It’s a really fun story. The songs were amazing; the animation was great; it felt like everything you’d want from a Disney…

JOHN OLIVER ZAZU

JAMES CHINLUND PRODUCTION DESIGNER PRODUCTION DESIGN

The Lion King – The Official Movie Special: How does it feel to be involved with such a pioneering production? James Chinlund: This opportunity has been a really exciting one. When I saw The Jungle Book, as a traditional, live-action production designer I suddenly got the sweats. I could see how quickly the technology was advancing and was worried about being left behind. So when the opportunity came to work in this new way, I was so excited about the chance. Being able to control the world to the degree you can in a movie like this is an amazing opportunity. There are big differences in the workflows but also some real similarities. We scouted in Africa, looking for locations that would inspire our sets, then came back to the…

JAMES CHINLUND PRODUCTION DESIGNER PRODUCTION DESIGN

“We start with an absolutely empty space – a digital void. Literally, we’re designing the world from the ground up. As we start to unpack these various spaces, our process in the art department is to build the world first, and then find the space within the world that would be appropriate to the set. “For example, we scouted a space known as the Cloud Forest, which is the site of ‘Hakuna Matata’ and all those classic sets, so we knew more or less that it was a mountain valley, and it needed to have a river in it and a waterfall. Reaching back to the research from our scout in Kenya, we were exploring the areas around Mount Kenya that had features relevant to the Cloud Forest. “We used…

ANDREW R. JONES ANIMATION SUPERVISOR ANIMATION

ANDREW R. JONES Selected Credits FILM The Jungle Book, 2016 World War Z, 2013 Avatar, 2009 The Lovely Bones, 2009 Superman Returns, 2006 I, Robot, 2004 Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, 2001 Godzilla, 1998 Titanic, 1997 The Lion King – The Official Movie Special: What was your initial reaction when this new iteration of The Lion King was proposed to you? Andrew R. Jones: When Jon Favreau called me and said he was going to do it, my first feeling was excitement, because as an animator, this was the Holy Grail for me. It was one of the most beautiful animated films ever, and still is. It’s one of the most powerful stories, and it had a big effect on me when I saw it. Now, to be able to…

ANDREW R. JONES ANIMATION SUPERVISOR ANIMATION

CALEB DESCHANEL DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY CINEMATOGRAPHY

The Lion King – The Official Movie Special: As a cinematographer you’re used to working in a more traditional manner. How did Jon Favreau convince you to come on board this very technologically advanced new take on The Lion King? Caleb Deschanel: I wasn’t sure about it at first. I was worried it would be like revisiting calculus class – all math and technology. I loved the story and was excited to work with Jon. But it took a while to warm up to the idea of making a film this way – in virtual reality. But the tools [Visual Effects Supervisor] Rob Legato and Magnopus developed mimicked the tools I was used to using when filming live action. I got excited about that. Early on, before we started shooting,…

CALEB DESCHANEL DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY CINEMATOGRAPHY

ROB LEGATO VISUAL EFFECTS SUPERVISOR VISUAL EFFECTS

The Lion King – The Official Movie Special: This film has been produced using revolutionary virtual reality techniques; what was the thinking behind bringing more traditional filmmakers like Director of Photography Caleb Deschanel and Production Designer James Chinlund into that VR space? Rob Legato: Instead of only getting people who have experience in these sorts of visual effects, the idea was to get somebody who has 40 years’ experience making great images on-screen naturally, and then build a tool that wasn’t daunting for them, so they could walk in, grab a camera, and say, “We’ll move the light over here; put the camera down low.” All of a sudden, it’s like they’re comfortable doing what they’ve done for 40 years, except they don’t have to rush to get in a…

ROB LEGATO VISUAL EFFECTS SUPERVISOR VISUAL EFFECTS

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