Once Upon a Studio Filmmakers Reveal How They Brought Back Robin Williams’s Genie

The filmmakers behind the just-released Disney short Once Upon a Studio knew that any “family photo” that brought together dozens of characters from throughout the studio’s history would be incomplete without an appearance by Robin Williams’s beloved Genie from Aladdin. They did not want to recast the character for the short, though, which means a lot of digging around for unused lines that could be assembled into something viable. In the short, Genie pops out of a page of drawings, knocking over Olaf from Frozen, who falls apart.

“I haven’t seen a fall like that since Rome,” Genie quips, then uses his magic to put Olaf back together, saying, “That’s better.” And,  yes, those are lines from Williams — and his involvement was approved by his family and estate.

According to Variety, directors Dan Abraham and Trent Correy were aware from the start that they needed Genie. After digging throught he archives to find some lines that they could use, Producers Bradford Simonsen and Yvett Merino reached out to the Williams Estate. 

“We tried to take them on the journey with us to say, ‘We’ve got this very special short that we’re doing. Robin as the genie means so much to so many people and we would really love to involve him,’” Simonsen explained. “So Dan listened to the outtakes from the original recording and he found those little bites that we could use. We went back to the estate and said, ‘This is what we hope to do.’ Eric [Goldberg], who originally animated the genie is on the show, and he’s going to be part of it.’ And it was wonderful to see that happen.”

Williams had a famous conflict with Disney following the release of Aladdin. While he was excited to be a part of the project, he took a significant pay cut in order to get a deal where his voice would not be used to promote products. The cut was so enormous — he got $75,000, rather than the $8 million that was his asking price at the time for live-action parts — that it certainly seemed like Disney would be motivated to take the deal. 

“Then all of a sudden, they release an advertisement–one part was the movie, the second part was where they used the movie to sell stuff,” Williams told Today in 1993. “Not only did they use my voice, they took a character I did and overdubbed it to sell stuff. That was the one thing I said: ‘I don’t do that.’ That was the one thing where they crossed the line.”

As a result, Williams didn’t return for the direct-to-video sequel Aladdin: The Return of Jafar, with the part of the Genie being played by The Simpsons star Dan Castellaneta, who also appeared in the Aladdin TV series.

It wasn’t until Jeffrey Katzenberg left Disney, replaced by a new chief executive who was willing to apologize to Williams for the way Disney mishandled the situation, that the actor mended fences with the studio, appearing in the series’ third and final animated movie, Aladdin and the King of Thieves. In 2009, Williams was awarded the title of Disney Legend at the D23 Expo.