Animal Crackers (2017 film)

Animal Crackers

A tigers paw holding one animal cracker that has been taken out of a box full of animal cracker. The words "Animal Crackers" are in the middle and the words "A magical adventure in every box" are at the top both in orange with a blue border.

Theatrical release poster
Directed by Scott Christian Sava
Tony Bancroft
Produced by Scott Christian Sava
George Lee
Marcus Englefield
Jamie Thomason
Leiming Guan
Written by Scott Christian Sava
Dean Lorey
Starring John Krasinski
Emily Blunt
Ian McKellen
Danny DeVito
Sylvester Stallone
Wallace Shawn
Raven-Symoné
Patrick Warburton
Music by Bear McCreary[1]
Edited by Ximo Romero
Production
company
Blue Dream Studios
Beijing Wen Hua Dongrun Investment Co.
China Film Group Corporation
Odins Eye Entertainment[2]
Storyoscopic Films
Distributed by Entertainment One (United Kingdom & Canada)
Relativity Media (United States)
Release dates
  • April 12, 2017 (2017-04-12)
Country United States
Language English

Animal Crackers is an upcoming 2017 American computer animated film, co-written and co-directed by Scott Christian Sava with Dean Lorey and Tony Bancroft, respectively. The film stars the voices of John Krasinski, Emily Blunt, Raven-Symoné, Ian McKellen, Sylvester Stallone, Danny DeVito, Patrick Warburton, and Wallace Shawn.

Entertainment One will be distributing the film in the United Kingdom and Canada,[3] while Odin's Eye Entertainment will be distributing international sales of the film at the Berlin International Film Festival.[4]

Premise

Animal Crackers follows the Huntington family whose life is turned upside down when they inherit a rundown circus and a mysterious box of Animal Crackers, which magically change the person who eats them into the animal they have eaten — including monkeys, giraffes, lions, elephants, tigers, rhinos and bears.[5] They must save the circus from being taken over by their evil uncle Horatio P. Huntington (McKellen).

Cast

Production

Pre-production

In 2010, Scott Christian Sava wrote a screenplay for Animal Crackers but was unsuccessful in "shopping the story". In June 2013, Harvey Weinstein had seen a short film of the screenplay made by Sava[18] and two months later in September 2013, he and his brother, Bob, made an offer to buy the rights to Animal Crackers.[19]

Sava will co-direct the movie with Tony Bancroft and co-wrote the most recent draft with Dean Lorey.[19]

Financing the movie are executive producers Mu Yedong on behalf of Wen Hua Dongrun Investment Co., La Peikang, board chairman of China Film Co., and Sam Chi for Landmark Asia.[20]

Despicable Me character designer, Carter Goodrich, was hired in October 2014.[2]

Casting

The voice cast was completed by casting director Jamie Thomason.[5]

In the last week of October and throughout November, 2014, Sava via the Animal Crackers Facebook page, there were sneak peeks to the look of some characters along with announcing the voice cast for those characters Kevin Grevioux as Samson the Strong Man,[17] James Arnold Taylor as Buffalo Bob,[16] Tara Strong as Talia,[15] Harvey Fierstein as Esmerelda the Fortune Teller,[14] Gilbert Gottfried as Mario Zucchini,[13] and Raven-Symoné as Binkley.[12]

On November 6, 2014, Blue Dream Studios announced Sylvester Stallone, Danny DeVito, and Ian McKellen as lead voice cast.[5] On February 3, 2015, John Krasinski and Kaley Cuoco joined the cast as Owen and Zoe Huntington, respectively.[4] On March 30, 2015, Emily Blunt replaced Cuoco due to a scheduling conflict.[7]

"When I was writing Animal Crackers I had specific voices in my head. Certain characters I wrote with actors in mind. Horatio was always Sir Ian McKellen. Brock was totally Patrick Warburton. Bullet-Man could be no one else but Stallone! To find out that each and every one of these actors have agreed to come on board this film and bring these characters to life... I'm flipping out," said Sava.[5]

It was announced via Sava's Facebook page that his son, Brendan, would play 12-year-old Owen Huntington and his wife, Donna, would play the Fat Lady. On May 22, 2015, it was revealed that Wallace Shawn had been cast as Mr Woodley, Zoe's (Blunt) father.[11]

Filming

Sava and his crew have been prepping Animal Crackers since July 2014 - the entire movie has been storyboarded and a temporary scratch track also has been recorded — and indicated the animation process will begin in early December 2014, in Spain, while the voiceover acting will take place in Los Angeles from January through about March 2015.[19]

On January 27, 2015, Sava announced on Facebook via the Animal Crackers page that first day of 'studio sessions with the actors' began in Los Angeles.[4]

References

  1. ↑ "Bear McCreary to Score 'Animal Crackers'". Film Score Monthly. Retrieved July 8, 2016.
  2. 1 2 Wendy Mitchell (October 24, 2014). "Odin's Eye boards Animal Crackers". Screen Daily. Retrieved February 4, 2015.
  3. ↑ Michael Rosser (May 7, 2015). "eOne snaps up Animal Crackers for UK-Canada". Screen Daily. Retrieved May 8, 2015.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 Dominio Patten (February 3, 2015). "'Animal Crackers' Adds Kaley Cuoco & John Krasinski To Voice Cast – Berlin". Deadline.com. Retrieved February 4, 2015.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Jeff Sneider (November 6, 2014). "Sylvester Stallone, Danny DeVito, Ian McKellen Lead 'Animal Crackers' Voice Cast". TheWrap. Retrieved December 29, 2014.
  6. ↑ Scott Christian Sava (February 5, 2015). "How wonderful is @johnkrasinski? My son Brendan is playing "young Owen"...". Tumblr. Retrieved August 4, 2015.
  7. 1 2 D'Alessandro, Anthony (March 30, 2015). "Emily Blunt Takes Bite Of 'Animal Crackers'; 'Neon Demon' Cast Is Set – Film Briefs". Deadline. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
  8. ↑ Scott Christian Sava (July 30, 2015). "Zoe (Emily Blunt) and her daughter Mackenzie (Lydia Taylor)". Facebook. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
  9. ↑ Scott Christian Sava (July 30, 2015). "Horatio P. Huntington (Sir Ian McKellen)". Facebook. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
  10. ↑ Scott Christian Sava (March 24, 2015). "n/a". Facebook. Retrieved August 4, 2015.
  11. 1 2 Scott Christian Sava (May 22, 2015). "Ladies and gentlemen... Zoe's (Emily Blunt) dad, MR. WOODLEY played by the incomparable Wallace Shawn!...". Facebook. Retrieved May 23, 2015.
  12. 1 2 Scott Christian Sava (November 17, 2014). "When we set out to cast the voice of Binkley... Jamie was quick to push Raven-Symoné to the top of the list. And quite honestly... we never looked further....". Facebook. Retrieved December 29, 2014.
  13. 1 2 Scott Christian Sava (November 13, 2014). "Mario Zucchini was written as a "henchman" who's "schtick" is he only speaks Italian... except... he doesn't know Italian....". Facebook. Retrieved December 29, 2014.
  14. 1 2 Scott Christian Sava (November 12, 2014). "Esmerelda the Fortune Teller... Yes... I named our 67 Cougar after a character from the movie. Yes... it's awesome!". Facebook. Retrieved December 29, 2014.
  15. 1 2 Scott Christian Sava (November 1, 2014). "Final SNEAK PEEK of the week...Talia will be played by the Inimitable (I looked it up... it means incapable of being imitated, matchless, irreplaceable) Tara Strong!...". Facebook. Retrieved December 29, 2014.
  16. 1 2 Scott Christian Sava (October 31, 2014). "Another SNEAK PEEK today! Buffalo Bob (circa 1960's) to be played by the great James Taylor (Obi-freakin-Wan Kenobi on Clone Wars)!!!...". Facebook. Retrieved December 29, 2014.
  17. 1 2 Scott Christian Sava (October 30, 2014). "Here is a SNEAK PEEK at one of our characters!...". Facebook. Retrieved December 29, 2014.
  18. ↑ Blue Dream Studios (April 2013). "Animal Crackers "Proof of Concept" Test". Vimeo. Retrieved December 29, 2014.
  19. 1 2 3 Keith Ryan Cartwright (December 2, 2014). "Franklin father turns 'Animal Crackers' for kids into feature film". tennessean.com. Retrieved December 29, 2014.
  20. ↑ Dave McNary (November 5, 2014). "Chinese Investors Board Animated 'Animal Crackers' (EXCLUSIVE)". Variety. Retrieved December 29, 2014.

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