As to The Princess and the Frog, Jen explained how she came to do the role of Charlotte. �They don�t really have calls for these kinds of things. It�s very hard to get in. The casting director in New York had seen me in a show and she thought that the role I played as a flapper in an off Broadway show (The Wild Party), which took place in the twenties was similar to this character they were developing.  It kind of stuck in her mind, I think. When she saw the picture of who they were looking for, she thought I saw a girl who looked like this in a show. So I came in, thinking I was just auditioning as a voice over. I got in the room and they said 'Oh no, we�re going to videotape you' and so I sang and I read the scenes. I didn�t hear anything for three months. They called back and said we need you to come in again and would like you to actually look the part. I thought that�s weird. It�s a voice over. Usually when I do voice overs, you�re in a booth. They actually were going to create the character around what I looked like. So I went again, sang and read and all the directors were there. Again didn�t hear anything for months, got another call we need to see you again. I was like: Am I still up for this job? It�s been a long time. And the whole process that I auditioned for it went on a little over a year. And the last time I got a phone call on a Friday and they said could you go into a recording studio and record a couple of songs and email them to us? And I�d been singing for them for a long time at this point and I said why? They said it�s down to a few of you and the other girls have CDs and you don�t have one. So we would like to hear you sing a variety of different things. So that Friday I went in and recorded three songs and emailed them. On Monday they called and said you�re going to be the new princess (And Charlotte was a Mardi Gras princess.) At that time, that�s what they said and I was so excited. My friends all took me out and we had a Disney Princess party in a bar and they brought me a tiara and a bunch of Disney plastic jewelry. My girlfriend gave me a big frog. We had a little party and I kept all those things. A lot of my friends are big Disney fans. Everyone on Broadway wants to be a Disney voice. That�s our next dream.� 

In talking about production, Jen said �Well they videotaped me. I�ve done a lot voice overs but I�d never done a character like this. They would always videotape my whole body. At one point we were doing some footage where they did some cuts and they said no, no, make sure you get Jennifer�s whole body because I use my entire body. And I didn�t realize that not a lot of people do that until the director said you just have to see it to believe it. The man filming was laughing and I said wait, doesn�t everyone do this? He said no��At the time I was doing a musical on Broadway, I was doing Shrek. And so it was very hard for me to get time out so I did a lot of recording in New York. I think I did two sessions in Los Angeles at Disney Studios. But most of them were done in Manhattan. None of us performed together. We never met any of us�.You�re not tied down to reacting to someone. You�re just acting. Then they can decide how they want the film to go� over a year and a half we recorded and so there were things that didn�t make it in the film, such as a song that I think was called Someday My Prince Will Come, Gosh Darn It, something like that.� 

�I didn�t get to go to the premiere in New Orleans as I was doing a show, On the Town at the Paper Mill Playhouse, just outside New York at that time. My husband took me back to New Orleans to make up for the fact that I had missed the premiere. We ate beignets and we did all the touristy things again. It was great�I got there once the day after Mardi Gras and I just keep missing Mardi Gras.� Jennifer said that she had seen the exhibit of The Princess and the Frog at the New Orleans Museum of Art and that her wish is to be a real life Mardi Gras Princess of a Mardi Gras Krewe and Parade. �If I ever do get my wish, maybe I�ll have a Princess gown made for me to wear by the woman, who designed my dress that I wore to the Annies. � 

Cody at the Annies

�It�s funny, the woman who designed my dress that I wore to the Annie Awards, was on Project Runway. When I thought I was going to the premiere, I had my agent call her because she was well known on the show for making 1950�s prom dresses and I knew I wanted that style. I met with her, Kenley Collins, and went away to do a show up in Maine. She had done some drawings and attached some fabrics, sent them up and as soon as I saw that fabric, knew that�s exactly what I want. She made the dress, it�s amazing. She had measured me back in New York, I never had a fitting, came back from working in Maine, went to her apartment and it fit like a glove. It was so perfect and as soon as I walked in, I saw it and said That�s it, that�s the princess dress I want to wear. It was designed for the premiere and I didn�t get to wear it. So when I got nominated for the Annies, I thought I�ll wear it there and it�ll get photographed for her.  

Another wish she shared is to do a Saturday afternoon cartoon as Charlotte. �I would wish to do a Saturday morning cartoon for little girls, who want to be princesses and learn lessons from Charlotte, because Charlotte�s so perfect at not necessarily taking the right route but ending up in the right place. Every Saturday a little girl can learn a lesson about being polite or about being kind, that kind of thing. For marketing they could market all these princess things, that are so big right now. I should just send my idea written down to John Lasseter or Don Hahn.� 

�When I missed the premiere, I was so sad and I thought this is such an important time, this is one of those things that you don�t want to miss. So when the show closed, I decided to go to L.A. for three months and said I�m going to experience everything with the movie. I got to do the pre Oscars and I got to go to a couple of premieres, D23 and Disneyland.  

Hunter, her husband, is performing in the role of music producer Sam Phillips in the musical, Million Dollar Quartet, which recently opened at the Nederlander Theatre in New York City. Jennifer plans on doing a couple of shows there (one of them is called Boeing, Boeing) with a return to Los Angeles either in July or in definitely in October. Their goal is to spend part of the year in both cities and possibly to trade apartments with another couple, who also wishes to be bi-coastal. Their apartment in New York City is in an area now known as Clinton, though Jennifer still refers to it by its original name of Hell�s Kitchen, though the area has changed considerably from those days.