During the panel, it was mentioned that Jennifer Lee often wrote after hearing Ariana DeBose speak, almost writing in her voice. At what stage in the process of working with these characters did you have the realization of, “Oh, this has to be Chris Pine,” or, “Oh, this has to be Ariana DeBose”?
Buck: Well, Ariana, we met about a year before we even cast her and it was an early, early script, but our casting director knew where we were going with the character Asha, and she just set up a Zoom meeting and we got to meet her and you could just feel that incredible energy. And I think she might’ve still been filming “West Side Story.” So then when we finally signed her on, it was just a week before she won the Oscar for “West Side Story.” So it was all very lucky in that respect. But she’s incredible. She just brings so much of herself, a lot of the characters we love when the actors are able to bring themselves to it. Chris is the same way. We had a design for Magnifico already, but Chris came in. So what’s happening is we look at the design when we hear the voices, sometimes we’ll cut together some sound bites and Chris’ other movies, and put it against just the Magnifico drawings and you can tell if something’s going to work. Of course, he has that charm. He’s actually very funny. He could sing [like] crazy.
Veerasunthorn: He’s a great actor, too. So [he’s got] all those combinations.
Buck: One thing you may not know, which we didn’t know either, we did a deep dive and we went on to YouTube and said, “Let’s hear Chris singing.” We knew he was in “Into the Woods,” so he was great in that. But then we found a duet he did with Barbra Streisand. Like, what? If you’re going to sing with Barbra Streisand, you’ve got to have some skills. Anyway, he was great. And like I said, he brought so much fun, and Jen [Lee] and Allison [Moore] also wrote to him. Once they heard Chris and they heard a few sessions, they’re like, “Okay, we know exactly what would be perfect, how to write for Chris.”
Yeah, when “Dungeons and Dragons” was coming out and they announced, “Chris Pine’s the bard,” everyone I knew was like, “Oh, that is perfect casting for him.”
Buck: He’s so good in that. I love that movie.
Wish Directors Fawn Veerasunthorn And Chris Buck Reveal Their Wishes For The New Disney Film [Exclusive Interview]
