I was invited on an expenses paid trip to LA by Disney to cover the #CinderellaEvent and #FrozenFever in exchange for my posts of the trip experiences. All opinions are my own.
I fell in love with Frozen the minute I saw it. So when I heard the news that the newest Disney short would be Frozen Fever I was super excited! I was extremely lucky to be able to see the Frozen Fever short early at the Red Carpet World Premiere of Disney’s Cinderella (read about that experience here). The Frozen Fever Short was so adorable and so fun! I loved it! You can only see Frozen Fever in theaters before Disney’s Cinderella opening March 13th.
“In “Frozen Fever,” it’s Anna’s birthday and Elsa and Kristoff are determined to give her the best celebration ever, but when Elsa catches a cold, her powers may put more than just the party at risk.”-Disney
Check the trailer for the Frozen Fever Short…
I felt very excited to interview the very talented directors of Frozen and Frozen Fever Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee. I even had a super fan moment when Jennifer Lee was answering my question I actually got chills! It was a wonderful experience I will never forget! It was an interview filled with laughter and even some heartfelt moments.
It’s been over a year since Frozen came out. How are your lives now?
Chris: How are our lives now? Let’s see…
Jennifer: We thought they’d be less busy, but they’re not. So…
Chris: I still buy shirts at TJ Max. Hasn’t changed…
Jennifer: I still find myself going “I have to buy another dress?” So yeah. So nothing’s changed, really.
Chris: It’s been overwhelming, the year. We still get Youtube videos sent to us. I got one just yesterday…mash-ups. All this kind of stuff. It doesn’t end. It’s been overwhelming. It really has. We’ll get serious right away. Starting with the Reddit round table is where a woman wrote in saying that she was in a bad place and was gonna commit suicide. And saw Frozen and was inspired by Elsa and her journey, and she said “I’m still here. Thank you.”
We’re overwhelmed by that. There are autistic kids that watch Frozen that parents tell us they don’t sit still for anything, and they watch Frozen. And they relate to Olaf. Just a few weeks ago a friend of ours working at a nursing home, and a senior citizen was sort of internal and not doing much. She watched Frozen. Then she started drawing again. ‘Because she used to draw when she was younger. She was drawing the Frozencharacters. Her husband was just so grateful she was coming back to life. So you get those are the stories that we go “oh wow”. That’s how I think our life has changed in that regard. We always knew that these films had some influence and power. But this one certainly I’ve never experienced anything like this.
Jennifer: Yeah, it’s still a surprise every day.
photo credit: Jana from MerlotMommy.com
WARNING: FROZEN FEVER SHORT SPOILERS
In the Frozen Fever short, Elsa sneezing is the cutest thing ever. How did you come up with that idea? Who came up with the idea of her sneezing and little snowmen coming out?
Jennifer: One of our story artists, the head story artist on Frozen itself. We were brainstorming, it would be nice to focus on Elsa more. What’s she like now? We had this tragic character. We end the film, she’s free, but we’d love to play with her magic in a different way, and he just said what if she has a cold, and the cold wreaks havoc. And we just went crazy. It got ridiculous at some points. It was so much fun…
Chris: Some of the ideas started with like spikes would show up. And we’re, like, “no we did that before in the last one”.
Jennifer: We wanted to create something else. And a sneeze does this, and blowing your nose does that. Like, we had all of these crazy… Does she know? Does she not know? We just felt it when he suggested it. We all just went yes.
Chris: And it gave us license to have fun with Elsa.
Jennifer: Yeah, which was nice.
Are we gonna see any of those little snowmen as merchandise?
Chris: Oh yes you will. I think right before it opens. (In stores) around the 12th or 13th of March. So they not only are adorable, but there’s a, a recording box in there. So you talk to it and it repeats what you say, but in a higher pitch. So you can get a whole bunch of ‘em.
Once we knew that Elsa was gonna create a couple new dresses we had to really work on and get the designs done quickly so that we could get stuff in the store.
In Frozen Fever we saw that Kristoff finally told Ana that he loves her. Is that like a little open for a wedding maybe?
Jennifer: Hey, you know I’m trying to teach my daughter to take it slow. So I don’t know. It’s been a year and a half and he finally just said I love you. So I don’t know.
One of my favorite parts was when Elsa busts out with the A cold never bothered me anyway.
Jennifer: We just had to.
Chris: Bobby and Kristen, they did that. It was great. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I know that a lot of kids, when they sang “Let it Go”, they sang “A cold never bothered me anyway”. Kids sing it like that is the lyric. I think it might have been riffed off of that.
Jennifer: They think that’s it.
Chris: It’s like a cold in their lives is so debilitating, and so big that it’s like, that’s not gonna bother me. I’m gonna get through this! So, it’s so cute when they do it. And I think of it as a little bit of a nod to that, too.
END SPOILERS.
What’s the future of Frozen and Elsa and Ana? Is there anything else coming up, can you talk about that?
Jennifer: No, we just finished the short, like two weeks ago.
Chris: And we really didn’t have much of a break before we started on this after the whirlwind of the feature.
Jennifer: But we’re working on the Broadway musical. We’re kind of in that place of, got to stop for second and then dream again. We don’t know what we’re gonna come up with.
Chris: Because we’re also involved with things, like at the Disney parks and all that. There’s the Frozen Fun that’s at California Adventure. So we were asked to help on that. We’re very Frozen busy.
So from beginning to end, how long did it take to make the Frozen Fever Short?
Chris: pretty much June through…
Jennifer: Through two weeks ago. So 11 months.
Were there any Easter eggs or anything in the Frozen Fever short that you can talk about?
Jennifer: There is one!
Chris: I don’t think we want to say yet. It’s a Disney character.
Jennifer: You can find him or her…
Chris: Watch carefully. But there is one, find it. You know, there might be more. Sometimes the animators put in things that we don’t necessarily see, or they won’t tell us.
photo credit: Jana from MerlotMommy.com
Does the fact that Frozen Fever is attached to Cinderella mean anything personally to you?
Jennifer: I have to say it’s huge for me because my first Disney film was Cinderella. Once it came on VHS, I think I played it 50, 60 times. Working for Disney was my dream when I was a kid, so to have everything come together. I was blown away by how much it was in line with the animated film. And yet it went even deeper and it was so beautiful. So there were a lot of, like, very nostalgic tears last night (at the premiere) going on.
Chris: Seeing it last night too, it felt like sort of the perfect match with Frozen, and then Cinderella.
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I loved every second of this interview with these two incredibly talented directors. It is something I will remember for the rest of my life.
Here is our group photo with Frozen Fever directors Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee.
Here is a look into Frozen Fever with Director’s Jennifer Lee and Chris Buck…
Frozen Fever will open before Disney’s CINDERELLA in theaters March 13th!
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Check out the Cinderella Trailer…
