This might be the most star-studded Pinocchio film in Hollywood history.
Guillermo del Toro has been ready to make a Pinocchio film since 2008. According to Deadline, his long-awaited passion project will finally be coming to our screens in an exciting form. Del Toro’s Pinocchio will arrive on Netflix as a stop-motion animated musical. The titular character will be based on an original design by Gris Grimley (whose work you can see above)—but when del Toro’s iteration drops, we’re going to have to shield our eyes from the massive amount of star power.
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A tweet from Netflix confirmed that two notable actors have secured lead roles: David Bradley of Game of Thrones fame will play Gepetto, Ewan McGregor is set to play “Cricket” (and given his history as Obi-Wan Kenobi, he should have no problem playing a wise mentor role). Pinocchio himself will be played by relative unknown Gregory Mann.
The AV Club has been speculating about the roles that other cast members might play be in the film—Tilda Swinton is rumored to be playing a version of the blue fairy, and Ron Perlman might be a villain named Mangiafuoco. To round out the rumor mill, Christoph Waltz will supposedly be playing both the fox and cat characters. And since having a few Oscar-winners wasn’t enough, Netflix also announced that the rest of the cast list would be filled with a mix of notable and upcoming actors: Finn Wolfhard, John Tuttoro, Tim Blake Nelson, Burn Gorman, and Cate Blanchett. Although it’s unknown where they’ll fit into the story, the possibilities are only limited to del Toro’s imagination.
Between the star-studded cast and del Toro’s passion for the material, Netflix’s Pinocchio looks like it’s in exceptionally good shape. Now, all we have to do is ask the blue fairy if she can bring us the movie in 2021.
