When a live action/CG version of the classic character Paddington was announced, Colin Firth was due to voice the bear. He stuck with the project right up until last month, when just five months before release he dropped out, suggesting he didn’t think he could do the bear justice.
Now we know who will replace him, as The Daily Mail says out actor Ben Whishaw has taken over the role.
As it’s just the voice work that’s changing, the movie is still on track to make its November UK release and Christmas US release.
Here’s the synopsis: ‘From the producer of Harry Potter and Gravity, Paddington comes to the big screen for the first time in an epic new adventure.
‘Featuring an all-star cast and effects courtesy of award-winning VFX company Framestore, Paddington is THE big family film of Christmas. Voted Best Animated Character at the 2012 British Animation Awards, and adapted from Michael Bond’s beloved books, Paddington follows the comic misadventures of a polite young bear with an endearing talent for comic chaos.
‘Paddington has grown up deep in the Peruvian jungle with his Aunt Lucy who, inspired by a chance encounter with an English explorer, has raised her nephew to dream of an exciting life in London. When an earthquake destroys their home, Aunt Lucy decides to smuggle her young nephew on board a boat bound for England, in search of a better life. Arriving alone at Paddington Station, Paddington soon finds that city life is not all he had imagined – until he meets the kindly Brown family, who find him with a label tied around his neck which reads ‘Please look after this bear. Thank you.’ They offer him a temporary home whilst he searches for the explorer who impressed Aunt Lucy all those years before.
‘But when Paddington catches the eye of a sinister, seductive taxidermist, it isn’t long before his home – and very existence – is under threat.’
You can take a look at the latest trailer – which is obviously minus Whishaw’s voice – here.
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