Random Old Clip: Pee Wee Herman voicing Roger Rabbit

This clip is obviously old and was apparently uploaded to YouTube in 2009, so feel free to leave dickish remarks about how this isn’t news and how I’m terrible person in the comments, but I hadn’t seen it before today and I thought it was interesting, so here we are. It’s a 1983 pencil test for Who Framed Roger Rabbit, with the voice of Roger played by Paul Reubens, aka Pee Wee Herman. The movie wouldn’t come out until 1988, and the role eventually went to character actor Charles Fleischer, whom you may remember as the creepy guy who scared the sh*t out of Jake Gyllenhaal in that basement in Zodiac.

He certainly looks more like a serial killer than a cartoon rabbit. Thank God whoever did the voice casting was able to see beyond appearances, Fleischer seems like a much better fit than Paul Reubens would’ve been (his brilliance as Pee Wee notwithstanding).

In related news, my sources tell me that the voice of Jessica Rabbit was originally played by Ernest Borgnine. Who knew!

Additional (not fake) trivia: We were saved from a possible performance-capture Who Framed Roger Rabbit remake when Disney put the kibosh on more of Robert Zemeckis’s mo-cap projects. Which is too bad, I bet Andy Serkis could’ve created a Roger Rabbit imbued with heart, and soul, and ACTING! I can see it now… Shooting would rap, the room would fill with the sound of a slow clap, and Andy Serkis, clad only in a black leotard with bunny ears, would graciously wave and blow kisses to the crew as the roses piled at his feet, a single tear trickling down the cheek of the producer.

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