Kiss That Frog Summary
Hadda Condino
The Princess and the Frog is a 2009 American animated musical romantic fantasy comedy film produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and released by Walt Disney Pictures. It is inspired in part by the 2002 novel The Frog Princess by E. D. Baker, which in turn is based on the German folk tale "The Frog Prince" as collected by the Brothers Grimm. The film was directed by John Musker and Ron Clements and produced by Peter Del Vecho, from a screenplay that Clements and Musker co-wrote with Rob Edwards. The directors also co-wrote the story with the writing team of Greg Erb and Jason Oremland. The film stars the voices of Anika Noni Rose, Bruno Campos, Michael-Leon Wooley, Jim Cummings, Jennifer Cody, John Goodman, Keith David, Peter Bartlett, Jenifer Lewis, Oprah Winfrey, and Terrence Howard. Set in New Orleans during the 1920s, the film tells the story of a hardworking waitress named Tiana who dreams of opening her own restaurant. After kissing prince Naveen, who has been turned into a frog by the evil voodoo witch doctor Facilier, Tiana becomes a frog as well and the two must find a way to turn human again before it is too late.
In New Orleans during the Roaring Twenties, a young woman named Tiana dreams of opening her restaurant that she shared with her late father. She works two waitress jobs to earn the money she needs, leaving no time for a social life. Naveen, the arrogant prince of Maldonia, arrives in New Orleans. His parents have cut him from the family fortune, so he intends to marry Charlotte La Bouff, Tiana's best friend. Charlotte's father, wealthy Eli "Big Daddy" La Bouff, hosts a masquerade ball in Naveen's honor, for which Charlotte hires Tiana to make beignets, paying her enough to buy a dilapidated mill to convert into her restaurant. Naveen and his valet, Lawrence, encounter Dr. Facilier, an evil voodoo witch doctor who plans to rule New Orleans. Facilier transforms Naveen into a frog and Lawrence into a doppelganger of Naveen, using a voodoo talisman containing Naveen's blood. Facilier intends for the disguised Lawrence to marry Charlotte, then to kill her father with a voodoo doll so he can gain the La Bouff fortune.
At the ball, Tiana learns she has been outbid for the mill and accidentally spills beignets and sauce on her outfit, so Charlotte lends her a princess costume. Feeling disheartened, she begins wishing on a star when Naveen appears in frog form. Thinking Tiana is a princess, he asks her to kiss him to break the spell. Tiana reluctantly agrees but got transformed into a frog. The two are chased into a nearby bayou, where they meet a jazz-loving alligator named Louis. When they explain their predicament, he tells them of Mama Odie, another voodoo practitioner who lives in the bayou. Naveen convinces Louis to take him and Tiana to see Mama Odie so he can ask her to turn him into a human to accomplish his dream of being a professional jazz musician.
Since Louis does not know the way to Mama Odie, a Cajun firefly named Ray helps the trio. During the journey, Tiana and Naveen begin developing feelings for each other, especially after Naveen learns to be more responsible. Meanwhile, the talisman containing Naveen's blood runs out. Facilier asks his "friends on the other side" (a legion of voodoo spirits) to help retrieve Naveen, and they grant him an army of shadow demons to do his bidding. The demons discover Tiana and her group in the bayou; Mama Odie rescues the group.
Mama Odie tells Naveen the spell can only be broken with a princess's kiss. Tiana realizes that since Big Daddy has been crowned Mardi Gras king, Charlotte will be a princess until midnight. The group hitches a ride on a steamboat back to New Orleans, during which Naveen tells Ray about his love for Tiana and plans to propose marriage to her. After talking to Tiana, Naveen selflessly decides against proposing, since transforming him and Tiana into humans and financing Tiana's restaurant is contingent on him kissing and marrying Charlotte. The shadow demons capture Naveen and bring him to Facilier to replenish the talisman with Naveen's blood. After Ray tells Tiana of Naveen's love for her, Tiana heads to the Mardi Gras parade to find Naveen, only to see the disguised Lawrence marrying Charlotte.
Ray rescues the real Naveen, steals the talisman, and gives it to Tiana before Facilier mortally wounds him. Facilier offers to make Tiana's dream come true in exchange for the talisman. Realizing that she would be dishonoring her father by accepting, Tiana destroys the talisman. With Facilier's plan foiled, the voodoo spirits drag him into their world for failing to pay back his debt. After Lawrence is arrested, Tiana reveals her love to Naveen. Charlotte is moved by this and agrees to kiss Naveen so he and Tiana can be human together, but as the clock strikes midnight, Charlotte is no longer a princess, so Tiana and Naveen remain frogs. Louis brings Ray to see Tiana and Naveen for the final time before he dies and is reincarnated as a star. Tiana and Naveen are married by Mama Odie, making Tiana a princess, both are restored to human form. They later return to New Orleans to legally marry and open Tiana's restaurant.
Disney had once announced that 2004's Home on the Range would be their last traditionally animated film. After the company's acquisition of Pixar in 2006, Ed Catmull and John Lasseter, the new president and chief creative officer of Disney Animation Studios, reversed this decision and reinstated hand-drawn animation at the studio.[13][14] Many animators who had either been laid off or had left the studio when the traditional animation units were dissolved in 2003 were located and re-hired for the project.[15] Lasseter also brought back directors Ron Clements and John Musker, whose earlier works include The Great Mouse Detective (1986), The Little Mermaid (1989), Aladdin (1992), Hercules (1997), and Treasure Planet (2002).[16][17] The duo had left the company in 2005, but Lasseter requested their return to Disney to direct and write the film and had let them choose the style of animation (traditional or CGI) they wanted to use.[9]
The film's story began development by merging two projects in development at Disney and Pixar at the time, both based around "The Frog Prince" fairy tale.[9][15] One of the projects was based on E. D. Baker's The Frog Princess, in which the story's heroine (Princess Emma) kisses a prince turned frog (Prince Eadric), only to become a frog herself.[15] The other was based on Ralph Eggleston's pitch of The Frog Prince set in gangster-era Chicago.[18] Jorgen Klubien separately claimed that a story he was developing at Pixar tentatively titled The Spirit of New Orleans served as inspiration for the film.[19] The Princess and the Frog returns to the musical film format used in many of the previously successful Disney animated films, with a style Musker and Clements declared, like with Aladdin and The Little Mermaid, had inspiration from Golden Age Disney features such as Cinderella (1950).[20]
Musker and Clements thought that given so many fairy tales were set in Europe, they could do an American fairy tale.[20] They stated that they chose New Orleans as a tribute to the history of the city, for its "magical" qualities, and because it was Lasseter's favorite city.[9][21] The directors spent ten days in Louisiana before starting to write the film.[20]
The Princess and the Frog was originally announced as The Frog Princess in July 2006,[13] and early concepts and songs were presented to the public at Anchor Bay Entertainment's annual shareholders' meeting in March 2007.[22] These announcements drew criticism from African-American media outlets, due to elements of the Frog Princess story, characters, and settings considered distasteful.[23][24] African-American critics disapproved of the original name for the heroine, "Maddy", due to its similarity to the derogatory word term "mammy".[23] Also protested were Maddy's original career as a chambermaid,[24] the choice to have the Black heroine's love interest be a non-Black prince,[23] and the use of a Black male voodoo witchdoctor as the film's villain.[23] The Frog Princess title was also thought by critics to be a slur on French people.[25] Also questioned was the film's setting of New Orleans, which had been heavily damaged by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, resulting in the expulsion of a large number of mostly Black residents.[26] Critics claimed the choice of New Orleans as the setting for a Disney film with a Black heroine was an affront to the Katrina victims' plight.[23][26]
In response to these early criticisms, the film's title was changed in May 2007 from The Frog Princess to The Princess and the Frog. The name "Maddy" was changed to "Tiana",[25][27] and the character's occupation was altered from chambermaid to waitress.[23] Talk show host Oprah Winfrey was hired as a technical consultant for the film, leading to her taking a voice-acting role in the film as Tiana's mother, Eudora.[9]
On December 1, 2006, a detailed casting call was announced for the film at the Manhattan Theatre Source forum.[32] The casting call states the film as being an American fairy tale musical set in New Orleans during the 1926 Jazz Age and provides a detailed list of the film's major characters.[14]
In February 2007, it was reported that Dreamgirls actresses Jennifer Hudson and Anika Noni Rose were top contenders for the voice of Tiana and that Alicia Keys directly contacted then-Walt Disney Studios chairman Dick Cook about voicing the role.[33] It was later reported that Tyra Banks was being considered for the role.[34] By April 2007, it was confirmed that Rose would be voicing Tiana.[35] Three months later, it was reported that Keith David was cast as Doctor Facilier, the villain of the film.[36]
Toon Boom Animation's Toon Boom Harmony computer software was used as the main software package for the production of the film, as the Computer Animation Production System (CAPS) system that Disney developed with Pixar in the 1980s for use on their previous traditionally animated films had become now outdated by 2004.[41] The Harmony software was augmented with a number of plug-ins to provide CAPS-like effects such as shading on cheeks and smoke effects.[10][39] The reinstated traditional unit's first production, a 2007 Goofy cartoon short entitled How to Hook Up Your Home Theater, was partly animated without paper by using Harmony and Wacom Cintiq pressure-sensitive tablets. The character animators found some difficulty with this approach, and decided to use traditional paper and pencil drawings, which were then scanned into the computer systems, for The Princess and the Frog.[10]
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