When it comes to Spike Jonze’s live-action adaptation of “Where The Wild Things Are,” we’ve been a bit of obsessive stickler nerds about finding out every little detail, especially the voice casting (we did a whole informed, but semi-speculative piece on what actor voiced what monster last year). And we and anyone else who’s been following closely has been thrown off a few times.
When Warner Bros. first posted their 2009 online schedule in December, most of us were shocked to hear that Mark Ruffalo was part of the film. Casting had out there for years, but somehow his participation had eluded most of the online press (it turns out he plays Catherine Keener’s — Max’s mother — boyfriend in the film, which is a small part in the beginning).
But even in November we were surprised even more when it was casually mentioned in a long AICN feature with Spike Jonze that Chris Cooper (“Adaptation”) had all off a sudden voiced one of the creatures; and his name had certainly never been mentioned before this.
Voice actors have been replaced on the film already. Lauren Ambrose was brought on to voice a character after Michelle Williams voice apparently didn’t match the original vision of how the monster should sound.
So this new USA Today article is curious because it says Chris Cooper voices “Douglas the big chicken.” But when Cinematical talked to ‘Wild Things’ voice actor Tom Noonan (who appeared in the Spike Jonze-produced, “Synecdoche, New York”) at Cannes in 2008, he said he was “the big chicken.” USA Today also mentions all the actors voicing the Wild Things monsters in the photo article and Noonan’s name is nowhere to be found (they do however confirm that Paul Dano does voice Alex The Goat).
So like Michelle Williams, did Noonan’s voice not work out either? Sounds like it. Sometimes these things obviously work out as planned. Either way, from what we can remember from reading the script, Douglas does not have a huge part. We’re sure just like Williams being replaced, there’s no hard feelings (obviously) and Cooper taking over the part was nothing personal, but it is interesting to note.