The Toy Story films already feature a large pool of talent in the voice actor category, with just new additions to Toy Story 4 including Keegan-Michael Key, Jordan Peele, Keanu Reeves, and Christina Hendricks. The notable additions don’t stop there, though, as it was recently announced that four comedy legends will be voicing new characters in the fourth film – get your first look at them here.
USA Today shared a still from the film1 that features a look at the characters of the four comedy greats, Mel Brooks, Carol Burnett, Carl Reiner, and Betty White:
- Melephant Brooks (Mel Brooks)
- Chairol Burnett (Carol Burnett)
- Carl Reineroceros (Carl Reiner)
- Bitey White (Betty White)
The USA Today article provides a bit of backstory for these four characters. They are apparently “four baby toys that are no longer in (Bonnie’s) spotlight.” Cooley expands on this idea, stating, “Sometimes toys fall in and out of favor.” That sounds bittersweet but it looks like Cooley sought to find the humor as well with the comedy chops these four legends bring to the screen. Brooks and Reiner recorded their lines together in Reiner’s living room, according to Cooley, who indicated “that the two comedians riffed off each other to perfect their characters.” It sounds like they had a blast – I hope that is captured in the film.
From the names of the characters, you can probably guess who is who. Yes, the four characters’ names are way up there on the punny scale. The last time that I can recall Pixar doing this with well-known personalities is when the Cars films “car-i-fied” celebrities and gave them car-related puns as names. The difference, here, though, is that rather than populate the Toy Story universe with a plethora of punny characters, it seems that the film will restrict it to just these four. Given the greatness of these four, I honestly don’t have a problem with the names. Actually, I am excited to hear these four greats interact with one another!
Toy Story 4 hits theaters on June 21st.
- Unfortunately, USA Today posted a tiny version of the image, which is why it appears blown out up above. When we are able to get a hi-res version, I will post it here. ↩
