In a surprise announcement during Disney’s live shareholder meeting on Monday, April 3rd, actor Dwayne Johnson confirmed that a live-action “re-imagining” of the 2016 animated hit, Moana, is in the works. Although not many details are known at the moment, Johnson did confirm that he will be reprising his role as Maui, the beloved demigod from the original Walt Disney Animation Studios film.
What Details Are Known?
In his announcement, Johnson stressed that the making of the film is “still very early in the process.” However, we do know that Johnson will also be a producer on the film, alongside Seven Bucks Productions’ producers Dany & Hiram Garcia (Jungle Cruise 2021), along with Beau Flynn & Scott Sheldon of Flynn Picture Co. (Black Adam), & Auli’i Cravalho, the original voice actor of Moana from the 2016 film. It is not known if Cravalho will appear in the new live-action film or will just be co-producing.
The screenwriter for the live-action Moana will be Jared Bush. Bush wrote the screenplay for the original 2016 film and also features work from the well-known Disney films Zootopia & Encanto. Dana Ledoux Miller will also be a co-writer with Bush on the live-action adaptation.
After Johnson’s announcement on the Disney shareholder’s meeting, Bush took to Twitter to share the news as well, writing, in part, “this story, so close to my heart, will be brought to life by an absolute dream team” that will be an “unprecedented collaboration.”
During his announcement, in a pre-recorded message from the beaches of Oahu, Hawaii with his two daughters, Johnson said, “I want to thank my partners at Disney for their strong commitment to this special endeavor, because there is no better world for us to honor the story of our people, our passion & our purpose than through the realm of music and dance, which is the core of who we are as Polynesian people.”
You can watch Johnson’s announcement of the film below.
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