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Jeffrey Katzenberg: Miss Saigon

Larkin auditioned for the role of Jasmine in Aladdin over several months, including a four hour audition where she read the entire script. She was initially cast but later had to re-audition. Although Disney wanted actresses who could sing, Larkin declined to provide Jasmine's singing voice. Lea Salonga, who had won a Tony award, was then cast to provide Jasmine's singing voice instead while mimicking Larkin's speaking voice. This marked the first time Disney separated a princess's speaking and singing roles.

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20 views

Jeffrey Katzenberg: Miss Saigon

Larkin auditioned for the role of Jasmine in Aladdin over several months, including a four hour audition where she read the entire script. She was initially cast but later had to re-audition. Although Disney wanted actresses who could sing, Larkin declined to provide Jasmine's singing voice. Lea Salonga, who had won a Tony award, was then cast to provide Jasmine's singing voice instead while mimicking Larkin's speaking voice. This marked the first time Disney separated a princess's speaking and singing roles.

Uploaded by

HQ
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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In the form of an extensive series of callbacks, Larkin returned to the studio on several different

occasions over the next few months.[19] While the audience of studio executives and filmmakers
continued to increase, the amount of actresses competing for the role gradually decreased
accordingly as the audition process neared completion. [19] Larkin's final audition lasted a total of four
hours, during which she read through the entire script for the first time. [17] The animators were also
provided with an opportunity to animate to Larkin's voice for the first time. [17] The actress was finally
cast several months later, by which time she had nearly forgotten she had ever auditioned. [19] Six
months into recording, however,[21] Larkin was forced to re-audition for the role by Disney
executive Jeffrey Katzenberg,[22] who felt that the actress' voice lacked the authority required to voice
a princess.[21][23] However, Clements and Musker disagreed with him, and managed to trick
Katzenberg into not firing Larkin by staging a fake recording session during which they had the
actress speak lower and slower in Katzenberg's presence, only to have her return to her natural
voice thereafter.[21] Larkin recorded only one scene alongside her co-stars Williams and Scott
Weinger, the voice of Aladdin.[24][25] Apart from some rough, unfinished storyboards and drawings,
Larkin did not see much of her character until the film was finally screened at the Museum of Modern
Art.[10]
Before discovering Larkin, Disney had been insisting on auditioning exclusively performers who were
capable of singing as well as they could act.[17] However, after Williams' recruitment, the studio
relented in favor of casting "strong actors" instead. [17] When Larkin first auditioned for the role, "A
Whole New World," Jasmine's only surviving song, had not yet been written; [17] she admitted, "there's
no way I would have even auditioned ... if there had been a song from the beginning." [19] After writing
Jasmine's first song, the filmmakers asked Larkin if she would be interested in recording it and
providing the character's singing voice.[19] Larkin immediately declined,[19] joking, "I do [sing] ... but not
like a princess!"[16] Thus, Disney decided to recruit a singer who could mimic Larkin's speaking voice
instead,[16] despite the actress' fear that the studio would completely replace her with a professional
singer altogether.[19]
Jasmine's singing voice is provided by Filipina singer and actress Lea Salonga.[26] Salonga's Tony
Award-winning performance in the musical Miss Saigon helped her garner the interest of casting
director Albert Tavares,[27][28] who proceeded to leave a note for the singer on the stage door before
leaving a show he had attended. [28][29] Salonga's agent then scheduled her audition, at which she
performed "Part of Your World" from The Little Mermaid.[29] Salonga finally began recording
a demo of "A Whole New World" a few days later.[29] With the casting of Salonga, Larkin became one
of Disney's first voice actors to not provide the singing voice of the character she voices, [16] and thus
Jasmine marked the first time Disney decided to separate a Princess's speaking and singing voices.
[17]
 Describing Salonga as "an incredible singer," Larkin herself was pleasantly surprised by how
much Salonga's voice resembled her own when she first heard "A Whole New World," joking, "the
filmmakers almost had me convinced that I sang it."[25]

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