Aladdin Genie Rules Quote
Saurabh Cloudas
The Genie is the tritagonist of Disney's 1992 animated feature film Aladdin. He is a larger-than-life jinn residing in a magic oil lamp originating from the Cave of Wonders. For thousands of years, the Genie served as a slave to whomever held ownership of his lamp, to which he was eternally bound unless granted freedom by a master. The Genie possesses phenomenal cosmic power that allows him to grant wishes, shapeshift, and transcend space and time.
The Genie is loosely based on the Genie of the Lamp featured in the One Thousand and One Nights folk tale Aladdin. The figure in the tale, while important, was portrayed as a mere slave while the Disney interpretation was greatly expanded into an identifiable character personality, the most notable difference being the Disney genie's ultimate wish to be free.
Genie was originally a slave imprisoned within his lamp, which, itself, was sealed away in the Cave of Wonders for 10,000 years. Though he possesses "phenomenal cosmic powers", he is bound to an "itty bitty living space" and can only use his powers when the owner of the lamp (his master) makes a wish; he occasionally does things without granting a wish, but never anything that greatly affects the world around him. He is also bound by three laws; he cannot kill anyone, he cannot make people fall in love with each other, and he cannot revive the dead. It is possible, however, that he can do the third one, but as he puts it, "It's not a pretty picture. I don't like doing it!". Alternatively, it could mean that while he can revive a person's corpse, he cannot bring them back properly. Each master has three wishes, and cannot exceed this amount by wishing for more wishes. After enduring 10,000 years of imprisonment, the lamp comes into the possession of Aladdin during the course of the first film, and Genie remains in servitude until Aladdin uses his third and final wish to grant Genie his freedom at the end of the film.
As well as largely driving the plot in the first film, Genie serves as a comic relief element in each of his appearances. He is shown to have shapeshifting abilities, which allow for many and varied sight gags. His supernatural disposition permits him to break the fourth wall, as well as parody real-life people and popular culture completely outside of the boundaries of the universe in which he is contained. Robin Williams is responsible for most of these because he improvised many of the lines in the film. Genie's true name (if he has one) has never been revealed; he answers to being called "Genie" and never says he has a real name.
In terms of characterization, Eric Goldberg has always imagined Genie as being Jewish. This relates to Genie's occasional use of Yiddish phrases.[5] Songwriters Alan Menken and Howard Ashman envisioned the Genie as a big, bombastic entertainer. They looked to famous 1920s, Harlem jazz musicians, such as Cab Calloway and Fats Waller for inspiration. This is mainly evident in "Friend Like Me", in which the Genie actually imitates Calloway's dancing and vocalizations.[1]
At one point, the Peddler that opens the movie was going to reveal himself to actually be the Genie at the end of the movie. However, the filmmakers were convinced that the audience would already be leaving by the time the reveal came, and it was ultimately cut.[3] However, there is still evidence of the Genie and Peddler's connections, such as both characters having blue clothing, red sash, bushy eyebrows and beard ending in a curl, the fact both characters had only four fingers in contrast to everyone else who had five, and the fact both were voiced by Robin Williams.
John Musker and Ron Clements created Genie with Robin Williams in mind as they believed a zany, shapeshifting, chaotic character perfectly matched Williams' comedic sensibilities. Despite this, Disney studio chief Jeffrey Katzenberg did suggest names, such as John Candy, Steve Martin, and Eddie Murphy, Williams was approached and was initially hesitant. To persuade the comic, Eric Goldberg, the supervising animator for Genie, created bits of animation of the Genie and synced them with audio dialogue from Williams' stand-up routines. Williams was said to have loved Goldberg's work so much that he signed on immediately.
Williams came for voice recording sessions during breaks in the shooting of his other two films at the time: Hook and Toys. Unusually for an animated film, much of Williams' dialogue was ad-libbed: for some scenes, Williams was given topics and dialogue suggestions but allowed to improvise his lines.[5] It was estimated that Williams improvised 52 characters. Eric Goldberg then reviewed Williams' recorded dialogue and selected the best gags and lines. Goldberg and his crew then created character animation to match Williams' jokes, puns, and impersonations.
Williams supplied the character with an unconventional method of voice acting which proved to be groundbreaking, resulting in universal acclaim and Genie becoming one of the most iconic and influential characters in the history of animated films. However, Williams did not return for The Return of Jafar or the animated television series due to disputes with the Disney company. While negotiating for the part of Genie in Aladdin, Williams agreed to work for less than what the studio offered and made a non-written agreement with Disney to not overexpose his involvement in the promotion for Aladdin so as not to create competition between other Robin Williams-led films being released at the time. However, Genie was the most prominent character in Aladdin marketing, overshadowing even the main characters in materials, such as posters and trailers. This went completely against what Williams had agreed to and the actor vowed to never work with Disney again. As such, Dan Castellaneta (who also voiced Homer Simpson and Grampa Abraham Simpson on The Simpsons) was called in to voice the Genie in Aladdin spin-off projects.
Genie is full of life and bursting with positive energy. Though he is amongst the most powerful, chaotic beings in the universe, Genie is benevolent, easygoing, and friendly; so much so that he primarily uses his abilities as a means to amuse both himself and those around him. According to the filmmakers' commentary, Genie's energy is a direct result of his imprisonment; his years of isolation have left him teaming with vigor, so whenever he is given a chance at freedom, his first instinct is to go wild with his powers by cracking jokes and entertaining whatever audience he has. He is also inviting, as when he first met Aladdin, Genie immediately introduced himself as a friend to rely on and emphasized the fact that his purpose was to magically enhance Aladdin's life by any means necessary (so long as it did not interfere with the three rules of wishing).
Though he was generally devoted to whoever held temporary ownership of the lamp, Genie has always had a will and mind of his own, outside the bounds of a stereotypical genie slave. As seen during his time as Jafar's lackey, Genie's job did not require him to agree with his masters' morals. It did, however, force him to adhere to their three commands without question, no matter how vile they may have been. Nevertheless, he was still able to provide advice to masters that were willing to listen. In the first film, he served as a mentor figure to Aladdin, often giving the latter advice and encouragement when needed, as seen when he urged Aladdin to tell Jasmine the truth about not being a prince. As mentioned, Genie did not offer himself as a mere slave, but rather as a supportive friend to his masters. His friendship with Aladdin proved that he was capable of forming genuine relationships with masters, though it was not until Aladdin that Genie was treated as anything beyond a mere slave by his superiors. This tied to Genie's dream of being freed from the lamp.
Though mischievous, manic, and explosive, Genie is also compassionate, wise, and serious when he feels it's necessary. He understands human emotions to a profound degree and takes matters, such as love, trust, and being true to yourself quite seriously. His more sincere moments are indicated by his tone, which changes from wily and exuberant, to low and soft when he wants to get a serious point across. Despite this, he still tries to lighten even the darkest moments with a dose of comedy, an example of this being the climax of the original film, where Genie transformed into a cheerleading squad to root for Aladdin during his battle against Jafar.
By the time of Aladdin and the King of Thieves, Genie is now freed, but continues to show genuine love and support for Aladdin and his endeavors. He is still every bit comedic, chaotic, and lighthearted, but never holds his tongue when it comes to objections towards Aladdin's more controversial choices. He is nevertheless shown to assist Aladdin, magically, whenever asked to.
There, Aladdin confesses his trickery to Genie, but the latter quickly shrugs it off to return to his job at hand, though he does warn Aladdin against trying to trick him into giving him a free wish again. Aladdin accepts this and, out of genuine curiosity, asks Genie what the latter would wish for. Though initially surprised by such an altruistic question, Genie takes the opportunity to express his longing for freedom. He explains that he cannot escape his lamp prison unless his master wishes him out. Feeling sympathy, Aladdin promises to use his third wish to free Genie, though the latter finds this hard to believe at first. Once Aladdin reassures he's telling the truth, an optimistic Genie takes Aladdin's word for it and a promise is set. Next, Genie returns his attention to Aladdin, who confesses that he is in love with Princess Jasmine (Genie at first stamps on the idea of making Jasmine fall in love with Aladdin, reminding the latter what he said about not being able to make people fall in love with each other). However, Aladdin laments that only a prince can marry a princess, so he settles on his first wish: to become a prince. Along with new attire, Aladdin is given the alias "Prince Ali" and travels to Agrabah with the accompaniment of an elaborate parade led by a disguised Genie. Though the front is enough to impress the Sultan, Jasmine is less than amused by Ali's flashy nature, disregarding him as yet another pompous suitor who sees her as nothing but a prize to be won.
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