‘Frozen 2’ Announced: Chris Buck And Jennifer Lee Developing Sequel
The same Disney shareholder’s call that brought us news of a properStar Warssequelrelease dateand thetitleof the first spin-off has also delivered on the Disney Animation front.Frozen 2was announced during the call, withChris BuckandJennifer Leereturning to develop the film, andJosh Gadconfirmed to reprise the role of Olaf.
Note that there’s no release date with this announcement, nor any real discussion of story. Basically, Disney is just saying thatFrozen 2is being developed.
This comes after months of Buck and Lee and others saying there was no sequel yet in development. (Just this weekwe heard from the co-directors saying that there was no sequel coming together just yet.)
But we knew it was only a matter of time. WithFrozenstanding as one of Disney’s greatest recent successes, a sequel was basically inevitable.
(Gad, who was on stage for the presentation, also joked that the film would be calledFrozen 2: Rogue One, in a nod to the Star Wars spin-off.) Gad latertweetedthe following along with the text “Just saying…#Frozen2”:
Fans of the original film will get a little bit of new material this week as the shortFrozen Feverwill play in front of Disney’s new live-actionCinderella. The short reunites the creators and cast of the hit film — Kristen Bell, Idina Menzel, Jonathan Groff, and Josh Gad voice Anna, Elsa, Kristoff and Olaf, while Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee return todirect. There’s also aFrozenstage show on the way.
The official press release is below:
Winter weather ahead! Frozen 2 is officially in development at Walt Disney Animation Studios with directors Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee and producer Peter Del Vecho, the Oscar®-winning filmmaking team behind Frozen. The news was announced at Disney’s Annual Meeting of Shareholders this morning by Bob Iger, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of The Walt Disney Company; John Lasseter, Chief Creative Officer of Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios; and actor Josh Gad, who provides the voice of Olaf from Frozen. “We enjoyed making Frozen Fever so much and being back in that world with those characters,” said John Lasseter. “Jennifer Lee and Chris Buck have come up with a great idea for a sequel and you will be hearing a lot more about it and we’re taking you back to Arendelle. We are so excited about that.” A release date and production details are yet to be announced.
