Disney’s “Wish” Dives Deep Into the Disney Vault to Honor a Century of Storytelling

It takes years to create an animated feature, so if you’re trying to connect one to a milestone event, a lot of forethought is required. That’s why Walt Disney Animation Studios Chief Creative Officer Jennifer Lee began brainstorming a way to pay tribute to the 100th anniversary of the studio back in the Spring of 2018. Five years later, Wish is about to be gifted to the world, a film that celebrates the legacy that began with Walt Disney and has endured through a century of storytelling. Disney Animation recently took over Disney’s El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood to host members of the press for an early look at the film, which promises to mix together some timeless ingredients while casting a spell that’s still fresh and new.

The Kingdom of Rosas was founded by King Magnifico (voiced by Chris Pine), a sorcerer with the power to grant wishes, which draws hopeful grantees to the island. They willingly give their wishes to King Magnifico, forgetting what they were in the hopes that he will make their wish come true someday. Asha (voiced by Ariana DeBose) is a Rosas resident on the verge of turning 18, at which time she will be expected to give up her own wish. Her grandfather, Sabino (voiced by Victor Garber), is about to turn 100, and his wish has yet to be granted, so when Asha gets the opportunity to become the sorcerer’s apprentice, she hopes King Magnifico will grant Sabino’s wish. When he doesn’t, Asha begins to question everything and sets off in search of a way to make her grandpa’s wish come true and avoid losing her own in the process. And thus, the adventure begins.

“Walt had to fight through incredible obstacles,” Jennifer Lee recalled about the parallels between Walt Disney’s own rags-to-riches story and Asha’s quest to give the people of Rosas a better life. “[He was] a human with all the same flaws as every human, who persevered to bring something forward. And Asha's wish to bring joy, happiness, and connection to people, that was very inspiring.” In Asha’s greatest moment of need, she meets Star, a magical being from the heavens who has the ability to help Asha make her own wish come true. “Star can't make this wish happen for you. You have to do it. But Star represents the thing that was critical to Walt. You need hope. You need possibility. Doesn't hurt to have some wonder. Don't forget some joy. All the things that we grab onto that keep us going.” It’s often been said that Walt Disney put a lot of himself in Mickey Mouse. Connecting those dots, audiences may notice that the heart-shaped face of Star bears a resemblance to the mouse who started it all.

“Pinocchio just meant everything to me when I was a kid,” revealed director Chris Buck, who pays homage to the film that birthed “When You Wish Upon a Star” in Wish with a shot moving through Rosas that mirrors how the multiplane camera welcomed audiences to Geopetto’s workshop in 1940. The visual language of Wish takes its queues from the great artists of Disney’s past, including Gustaf Tenggren, who had a huge influence on the look of Pinocchio. Having previously directed Tarzan, which pioneered the deep canvas process that blended CG elements with the painter’s hand, Wish feels like a natural progression for his career. “[Walt] had a team of people that would help him, a team of incredible artists,” reflected Chris, echoing one of Walt Disney’s most famous quotes: “You can dream, create, design and build the most wonderful place in the world…but it takes people to make the dream a reality.”

“What I love was it brings our CG artists and 2D artists together,” co-director Fawn Veerasunthorn added about the look of Wish. “Animators will call and ask for advice about how to put the lines on the face of a character to accentuate the emotion, and they studied that. The effects crew went to the Animation Research Library… They studied how the effects, the graphic shapes of it, was translated into our CG process. And the artists have expressed that this is a wonderful thing, that it brought them together, that there's no longer a boundary between 2D and CG.”

Computer animation offers a lot more room for trial and error than hand-drawn does, so the days of live-action reference footage (filming a live-action version of scenes as an animation aid) are long gone. But just like in Walt’s time, voice actors still inspire elements of their character, as was the case with Ariana DeBose and the mannerisms of Asha. “Ariana also came into the studio to talk to the animators,” revealed producer Juan Pablo Reyes Lancaster Jones. “She sat with them and I was there in the audience. It was really cool to see her interaction. She is just so unique and she's unafraid of being herself. And the animators really reacted to that.”

Wish reunites writer Jennifer Lee with her Frozen co-director Chris Buck and producer Peter Del Vecho, which connects this film to a modern Disney classic. Another Disney Animation hallmark employed is the use of music to drive the story forward or emphasize a protagonist's (or villain’s) emotions. Songwriters have long helped shape the stories, with The Sherman Brothers and Howard Ashman proving that be more than just tunesmiths on their assigned films. And the same is true of Julia Michaels, the youngest songwriter ever hired to write for a Disney animated film. There are the staples, such as an “I Want Song” (“This Wish”) and a villain anthem (“This Is The Thanks I Get”), and also a forest animal happy song (“You’re a Star”), but also something new. “There's a song that I have always dreamed of having, a moment where the protagonist and villain are aligned in their philosophies, because it's before life really challenges you to make choices,” shared Jennifer Lee. “[Julia] and Ben [Rice] tapped into something so incredible about that and something so universal. It was fun because that was this delicious experience of getting to dream about something. And when you talk about story, as a storyteller, you talk about that moment. Can there be that moment? And rarely can you find it. She didn't just find it, she blew us away. Part of it was just getting to be in the process deeply with her, and think about what we all carried, what we all know, but what could we do that we've never done before, too.”

To sum it up, Wish contains something old, something new, something borrowed, and “Make it blue.” That Sleeping Beauty reference isn’t just a nod to Disney’s signature color for all things magical, or the fact that Eyvind Earle’s design work is part of the pastiche that makes up this film’s artistic direction. It’s a segue to an homage that’s a little harder to spot. The aspect ratio of that film – CinemaScope 2.55:1 – the widest ever used by Disney Animation to date… until Wish. It’s a format exclusively reserved for the crème de la creme ala Disney, one that hasn’t been used since Sleeping Beauty.

If you’re a Disney fan and you don’t already have goosebumps about this movie, I’ll leave you with something that’s guaranteed to tug at your heartstrings. Walt Disney was so fond of his childhood days in Marceline, MO, that his hometown’s Main Street inspired the entryway to Disneyland. It was on that farm that he began to practice his art skills (literally on the side of a barn). As a boy, Walt would daydream underneath a specific tree on the property. During a visit to Marceline in 1959, Walt and his brother Roy got to tour their old home and a photo was taken of Walt pointing to the spot where he spent countless hours dreaming impossible dreams. “One of the things that I really like that is also a direct inspiration from Walt is that in this Wish sequence, we have the Wishing Tree that is inspired by his Dreaming Tree in Marceline, Missouri,” revealed Juan Pablo Reyes Lancaster Jones. In the film, Asha’s dearly departed father used to take her to his Wishing Tree to look up at the stars and dream. And so, in her hour of need, that’s exactly where she goes. That’s where she meets Star, a character so rich in Disney magic that you’ll instantly feel a deep connection to the five-point being.

Can’t wait to see Wish? Your dream will come true on November 22nd when Walt Disney Animation Studios’ 62nd animated feature shines at a theater near you.