Intercompany crossovers have become more and more common with movies like Ready Player One and Lego Movie, as well as comics like Batman vs. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. But the idea of major companies mixing their properties together was basically unheard of 33 years ago when Disney brought together animated characters from all over the pop culture world for Who Framed Roger Rabbit.
The now-iconic film directed by Robert Zemeckis was unlike anything that came before it and will likely stand out as the largest crossover event in film history. But the film as the world knows it almost didn't happen. A series of behind-the-scenes decisions could have led to a very different movie, one that may not have ended up being so beloved all these years later.
10 Bob Hoskins Was The Studio's Last Choice For Eddie Valiant
Eddie Valiant, the true main character of Who Framed Roger Rabbit, is a hardened detective harkening back to the noir films of the 1940s when the film takes place. He's a hard-drinking, hard-fighting gumshoe who works the streets to get the info he needs and has a real dislike for toons thanks to his brother being killed by one.
While Bob Hoskins matches the personality and style of a 1940s private eye in every way, he almost didn't get the role. Before Hoskins was cast, the role was offered to the biggest stars of the day, including Harrison Ford, Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Sylvester Stallone, and Eddie Murphy.
9 Christopher Lloyd Wasn't The First Choice For Judge Doom
When Who Framed Roger Rabbit was being made, Christopher Lloyd had just come off playing Doc Brown in the massive hit that was Back to the Future. That film and the TV show Taxi were Lloyd's best-known work, and the idea of casting him as a stern villain wasn't on anyone's minds.
Before Zemeckis turned to his Back to the Future actor, the role of Judge Doom was offered to Tim Curry, who had recently frightened moviegoers as the Lord of Darkness in Ridley Scott's Legend, and to Christopher Lee, the British actor known for playing Count Dracula in a sequence of Hammer Horror films.
8 The Book It's Based On Is Vastly Different
While Who Framed Roger Rabbit is a fun family film with hints of adult humor, the book it's based on, Who Censored Roger Rabbit, is very different. In the book, Roger Rabbit isn't a cartoon, but a divorced and talentless comic-strip character. The book has Eddie Valiant looking to discover who killed Roger, and his only clue is a word balloon the comic rabbit left behind at the scene of his murder.
Where the movie is filled with cameos by cartoon characters, the book has appearances from other comic-strip stars like Hagar the Horrible, Snoopy, Beetle Bailey, and Dick Tracy.
7 Jessica Rabbit's Underwear Debate
While Who Framed Roger Rabbit was made for families, there's some debate over just how kid-friendly the film is, especially when it comes to one scene in particular. In the scene, Eddie Valiant and Jessica Rabbit are in a car chase when Benny the Cab, the animated taxi they're in, hits a lamppost, sending the two flying. When Jessica lands, she spins around in a cartoonish fashion, and according to some, for a few frames of her spin, viewers can see up her red dress and notice that she is not wearing any underwear.
6 It Saved Animator Jobs At Disney
Before making Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Disney was in trouble. Disney hadn't had a successful animated movie since The Fox and the Hound seven years earlier. 1985's Black Cauldron was a financial disaster and 1986's The Great Mouse Detective barely made its money back.
Disney had scrapped a number of projects and was considering shutting down their animation department when it made a deal with Steven Spielberg's Amblin Entertainment to co-produce Who Framed Roger Rabbit. The film kept Disney from walking away from the films that made the studio famous and helped usher in a new age for the House of the Mouse.
5 It Marked The End Of A Disney Era
The same year that Who Framed Roger Rabbit was released, Disney also put out their first animated musical in years, Oliver and Company. The movie not only brought back the musical format for Disney animation, but it also proved to be a big hit. The major shift would happen the next year, when Disney released The Little Mermaid, a bona fide smash success, grossing over $200 million on a $40 million dollar budget.
To the heads at Disney, Who Framed Roger Rabbit was the symbol of an old version of the company, while Ariel and her friends, thanks to the songs by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman, were the future. The Little Mermaid kicked off a decade of massive animated hits for Disney, including Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and Mulan.
4 Over 100 Cartoon Stars Make Cameos
The two biggest crossover moments in Who Framed Roger Rabbit are the piano scene with Donald Duck and Daffy Duck and the skydiving scene with Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny, but there are over 100 cameos from famous cartoon characters.
Along with the Disney and Warner Brothers' Looney Tunes characters popping up, the movie also features Betty Boop and Koko the Clown from the Fleischer Studios, Droopy Dog and Spike from MGM, Woody Woodpecker, and Felix the Cat. For fans of classic animation, seeing these characters interacting is like seeing the Justice League and Avengers come together for a comic fan.
3 But Not Every Toon Idol Made The Cut
Even with over 100 cameos from different studios, not every planned cameo made it into the film. A scene that was never finished, set at Marvin Acme's funeral, was going to have appearances by a number of famous cartoon characters, including Disney's Cinderella, Alice, the White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter, the March Hare, Winnie the Pooh and Tigger, as well as Pepé Le Pew from Warner Brothers, Tom and Jerry from MGM, and Popeye, Bluto, Olive Oyl and Wimpy from Fleischer Studios.
Other characters left out due to time constraints or legal issues included Superman and Lois Lane, the Tasmanian Devil, Screwy Squirrel, and Rocky and Bullwinkle.
2 Spielberg Made It Happen
Every non-Disney cartoon character that appears in Who Framed Roger Rabbit shows up because of one man: Steve Spielberg. In the 1980s, no studio was willing to say no to Spielberg thanks in part to the massive hits he had directed in the years prior, including Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. Adding to Spielberg's power was his list of producing credits, which included Back to the Future, Gremlins, and An American Tail.
Every studio wanted to work with Spielberg, which meant they wanted to be on his good side, so when he called up Warner Brothers or MGM looking to stick their animated characters in a Disney movie, they were all more than happy to come to the table.
1 It Was The Most Expensive Movie Ever Made At The Time
Of course, the other studios weren't going to just give Disney their characters for free. Disney had budgeted Who Framed Roger Rabbit at $30 million dollars, which would have made it the most expensive animated movie ever made at the time. But they had to add on the licensing fees, along with the new equipment and techniques Robert Zemeckis needed to film the movie, plus animation supervisor Richard Williams' careful attention to detail and animation styles for each character.
Who Framed Roger Rabbit's budget thus shot up to $60 million dollars, making it not just the most expensive animated movie for its time, but one of the most expensive movies ever. It all paid off for Disney - Who Framed Roger Rabbit went on to make $320 million in theaters, not counting the merchandising bonanza of Roger Rabbit plush dolls that came with it.