“Imagine how you could sell that!” the iconic character Steve Martin was banned from playing
Movie executives are famously bad at casting, which is why it’s so important to have an Oscar for casting directors to demonstrate just how pivotal a role it is.
When executives throw names around, they are usually guided by potential dollar signs rather than by potential performances, and perhaps the worst example of this was when John Wayne was cast as Genghis Khan in The Conqueror, but there is no shortage of egregious incidents along the same lines.
No matter how you feel about his performance, there is no denying that Robin Williams commandeered Aladdin and made it his own star vehicle, while Jim Carrey did the same with How the Grinch Stole Christmas. In both cases, how you feel about the performance will have more to do with whether you went into the movie as a fan of the performer or as a fan of the character, but then, there’s something like the live-action version of The Cat in the Hat, where it’s difficult to see how even the most adoring fan of Mike Myers could stomach the whole 82-minute running time.
Steve Martin is not entirely innocent when it comes to stunt casting, either, and perhaps he went into The Pink Panther reboots truly believing that he could walk in Peter Sellers’ footsteps, but anyone who’s seen the results can attest that he could not. Luckily, a much more embarrassing incident of potential miscasting never made it to his desk.
In the 1990s, Disney was on a remake and reboot tear that modern-day viewers would recognise all too well. One of their projects was a feature film about Goofy, the anthropomorphic dog known for his friendship with Mickey Mouse and his catchphrase that is more of a sound (“a-hyuck”) than a phrase. As his name suggests, he’s usually pretty hapless and dim-witted, which makes him one of the more lovable Disney characters.
Created in 1932, Goofy was originally voiced by Pinto Colvig, though Bill Farmer became the definitive voice of the character in the ‘80s. When Disney decided to make a feature-length film about the bumbling canine, studio chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg fancied himself a bit of a genius for alighting on one of the premiere comedians of the day to take over the voice acting duties.
As A Goofy Movie director Kevin Lima remembered it in the making-of documentary Not Just a Goof, the executive gleefully suggested Martin for the role, saying, “Wouldn’t that be fabulous? Imagine how you could sell that!” Lima was very much of the opinion that it would not be fabulous, especially when he learned that Katzenberg wanted Martin to speak in his normal voice rather than attempt to stay true to the original character.
To avoid certain disaster, Lima had Farmer record some lines in his regular voice rather than his Goofy voice, and when the director played the audio for Katzenberg, the executive was horrified. He realised, mercifully, that an everyday voice for an absurdist kids’ cartoon was a terrible idea, and Farmer got to stay on as the actor behind the character.
Whether Martin was ever aware that he was up for contention as Goofy is uncertain, but, as Lima said, the whole episode was an example of “how the whim of a studio executive can change a movie in a moment if you don’t fight back against a bad idea”. If only Disney learned from its mistakes.
