By Jim Hill for The Blog on Huffington Post
To be asked to participate in the first reading of a brand-new Disney animated feature was like a dream come true for Josh Gad.
"You
have to understand that -- when I was growing up -- I was absolutely
obsessed with the animated films of Disney's Second Golden Age," Gad
explained during a recent phone interview. "I mean, I recall going to
see The Little Mermaid in theaters no less than 20 times. My poor mother
had to send me with various aunts and uncles and nephews & nieces
who were old enough to take me. We almost ran out of relatives.""And then when Aladdin was released to theaters in 1992, I remember watching Robin Williams tearing it up up there onscreen," Josh continued. "And I remember turning to my Mother and saying prophetically 'I'm going to do that one day.' So to then get that phone call and be asked to come take part in a reading for Anna and the Snow Queen was a complete thrill for me."
Now please note that the title which I mentioned above was Anna and the Snow Queen. Not Frozen, the new Disney animated feature that opened in theaters on November 27th, wracking up an estimated $93 million in ticket sales during its first five days in domestic release. That's because this was an earlier attempt by Walt Disney Animation Studios to turn Hans Christian Andersen's classic fairytale into a full-length animated feature.
"This was about three years ago before I went off to do Book of Mormon. This version of the movie was supposed to be done in 2D and featured songs by Alan Menken. And at the reading that I took part in, Megan Mullally read the part of Elsa the Snow Queen. And she was brilliant, by the way," Gad enthused. "But this movie, it was a completely different thing than Frozen. It had a storyline that stuck a lot closer to the original source material. And at this reading, Olaf was an entirely different character."
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