During yesterday’s Nintendo Direct presentation, the casting news broke for Illumination’s Super Mario Bros. movie. Mario will be played by Chris Pratt, Peach will be played by Anya Taylor-Joy, Luigi will be played by Charlie Day, Bowser will be played by Jack Black, Donkey Kong will be played by Seth Rogen, Toad will be played by Keegan-Michael Key, Cranky Kong will be played by Fred Armisen, Kamek will be played by Kevin Michael Richardson, and Spike will be played by Sebastian Maniscalco. Many of the stars on the cast list are no strangers to voice acting, in fact, both Pratt and Day were in The LEGO Movie together. In honor of the Super Mario casting announcement, The LEGO Movie‘s director shared a hilarious tweet.
Chirs Miller took Pratt and Day’s LEGO characters, Emmet and Benny, and gave them a Mario twist. You can check out the image below:
— Christopher Miller (@chrizmillr) September 24, 2021
“There was this coin-operated laundromat near my house, and it had Super Mario Bros., the original arcade game. I loved that game,” Pratt said in a video published to Instagram yesterday. Because he “never had a quarter, it felt like,” Pratt would steal quarters out of a wishing fountain. “The quarter I stole out of the wishing well to play Super Mario Bros. has come true that I get to be the voice of Mario, but I clearly stole someone else’s wish. So just waiting for that row of karma dominoes to come crashing down on me,” quipped Pratt, “but as it is right now, it’s-a me, Mario.”
After doing an impression of the character’s catchphrase and Italian accent, Pratt added, “That’s not the voice. You’ll have to wait to hear the voice.” He continued, “We’ve been working hard at it and I’m really excited to announce that I’m going to be the voice of that video game that I dreamed about playing as a kid. Dreams come true.”
Mario’s primary voice actor, Charles Martinet, who has voiced the iconic video game character more than 100 times since the early 1990s, will make “surprise cameos” in the movie. Each actor announced Thursday was cast “for their ability to capture the unique spirit of their character,” according to the press release. Chris Meledandri of Illumination and Shigeru Miyamoto of Nintendo are set to produce the film from directors Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic (Teen Titans Go!, Teen Titans Go! to the Movies) and screenwriter Matthew Fogel (The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part, Illumination’s upcoming Minions: The Rise of Gru).
Super Mario Bros. is scheduled to be released on December 21, 2022.