Aladdin - Trivia, Questions and Fun Facts

[discussimdb]

Fan of Aladdin or just want to share your movie knowledge? This topic is dedicated to all trivia and questions related to Aladdin

[gerald]

Part of the plot revolves around Jafar seeking Aladdin as he is the only one able to enter the Cave of Wonders and retrieve a valuable item inside; Aladdin finds the lamp and narrowly avoids dying inside the cave. This resembles the plot in an earlier Disney classic, The Rescuers (1977), in which Madame Medusa uses an orphan girl small enough to fit through the opening of a dangerous pirate's cave to retrieve the Devil's Eye diamond inside. Penny and her rescuers exit the cave with the jewel after they narrowly avoid drowning. Sometime after clutching their sought-out treasures, Madame Medusa and Jafar both deliver the exact same line: "It's mine. It's all mine!"

[nina]

After proving his abilities to Aladdin by getting them out of a collapsed cave, Genie calls Aladdin "Mr. Doubting Mustafa". In the classic tellings of the Aladdin story, Mustafa was the name of Aladdin's late father.

[norma]

During script and storyboard development, the writers were already considering Robin Williams for the role of the Genie but had not approached him for the project. In order to convince Williams to do the role, Eric Goldberg animated the Genie doing several minutes of Williams's stand-up routines, including parts from his album "Reality... What A Concept," and screened it for him. Williams was so impressed that he signed almost immediately.

[wesley]

During the course of recording the voices, Robin Williams improvised so much they had almost sixteen hours of material.

[lynn]

The director reportedly based Jafar, particularly the character's Machiavellian intentions, on former First Lady Nancy Reagan.

[kenzi]

Dubbed versions would sometimes go with different voice choices for the Genie's many characters, particularly the generic ones. For example, the voice of generic a sports commentator would resemble a person known only locally to that particular country, and so on.

[kim]

Jonathan Freeman, who voiced Jafar, ended up playing the live-action version in the Broadway musical.

[kristen]

Andreas Deja based Jafar on Marc Davis's design for Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty (1959). The two villains share more than just looks: both carry a staff which they use to execute evil magic; both have bird henchman (Maleficent's is a raven, Jafar's a parrot), and both turn themselves into gigantic reptiles in their respective films' climactic battles - Maleficent as a dragon, Jafar as a snake. UltimateDisney.com featured Maleficent and Jafar in their Top Villain Countdown at #1 and #2, respectively.

[janice]

When Robin Williams died in 2014, Disney honored him that week by airing Aladdin on their three children's channels (Disney Channel, Disney XD, and Disney Junior) across three days, twice on each channel. At the end of the movie, just before the credits, they put up an image that read, "In Memory of Robin Williams, who made us laugh." using animator Eric Goldberg's tribute to him as a backdrop.

[ella]

In the Italian version, Genie's voice was dubbed by Gigi Proietti.

[bernard]

To capture the movement of Aladdin's low-cut baggy pants, animator Glen Keane looked at videos of rap star M.C. Hammer.

[cameron]

When Genie outfits Aladdin, the screen behind them has two pictures on it, one with Genie in a shirt, tie and eye-patch. This is a reference to a very famous ad campaign by David Ogilvy known as "The Man In The Hathaway Shirt".

[nicholas]

Because Robin Williams ad-libbed so many of his lines, the script was rejected for a Best Adapted Screenplay Academy Award nomination.

[miriam]

Albert Brooks, John Candy, Matt Frewer, John Goodman, Steve Martin, Eddie Murphy and Martin Short were all considered at one point to provide the voice of the Genie.

[ava]

When Howard Ashman began work on the movie, he developed the story as a fast-paced comic adventure about a young boy trying to prove his worth to his parents. But, in 1991, Ashman died, and the story problems stalled the movie. So, the plot was reworked to be about a teenager, Aladdin, seeking self-respect instead of the approval of others.

[willard]

Scott Weinger was only 17 when he voiced Aladdin as a young adult in this film.

[kyle]

HIDDEN MICKEY: When Aladdin puts Jafar back into the lamp, the spell on the other characters is broken. Start watching when the cub Rajah jumps into the Sultan's arms. When Rajah hits his arms and starts to grow back into a tiger, just before he becomes normal, his face appears as Mickey Mouse for one frame.

[jesse]

Robin Williams initially refused to take the role of the Genie since it was a Disney movie, and he did not want the studio profiting by selling toys and novelty items based on the movie. He accepted the role with certain conditions: "I'm doing it basically because I want to be part of this animation tradition. I want something for my children. One deal is, I just don't want to sell anything - as in Burger King, as in toys, as in stuff."

[ronnie]

In the scene where the Sultan is flying on the magic carpet, he knocks Iago. After Iago hits the pillar he sees little Sultans flying around instead of birds.