Canada.com has an extended interview with Anika Noni Rose who voices Princess Tiana in Disney’s traditionally-animated The Princess and the Frog which opens in theaters Dec. 11th.
Rose says when she saw the first official image of the character whose voice she had been recording, “I couldn’t even breathe. I just started to cry. Even to talk about it now, I’ll be crying. It was the most amazing, awesome – I don’t even know that I have real words for it.”
Here’s another excerpt from the interview:
Rose, 37, grew up watching Disney movies, and as someone who knew from an early age that she wanted to perform, she dreamt of one day participating in a Disney film herself. But as an African-American child, she was also realistic.
“I was just watching the movies and enjoying them. But I do remember wondering to myself whether there would ever be a chocolate-brown Snow White!
“But I didn’t necessarily feel deprived. When you’re a child, you don’t know; you’re living in your world.”
So working for Disney was had been this compelling dream. But, she giggles, “I didn’t dream of being a princess. I could have been a dandelion and I would have been really happy. So this is like when your dreams take off and become bigger than what you had imagined. It’s amazing.”
