1994’s The Lion King is considered one of the best family movies of the ‘90s for a lot of reasons. Its epic animation brought the African savanna to life as well as being a successful Shakespeare play adaptation of Hamlet’s themes of responsibility and redemption. Even though The Lion King has lived rent-free in my mind for the past three decades, I was today years old when I found out the roars from the movie was a voice actor literally growling into a trash can!
It still amazes me how realism was put into the 2D drawings of The Lion King. If you look back at stunning Disney+ nature documentaries that feature lions, the animation in the Disney animated movie was on point. It makes sense considering a BTS fact from the Walt Disney Feature was that real lions were brought into the studio so animators could draw them.
You would think that with all of the accuracy captured for the appearance of the classic Lion King characters that they recorded the real lions’ roars, right? Think again! I, for one, learned today that the infamous roars you hear from the high-grossing movie was actually voice actor Frank Welker. Watch this X video below of him literally roaring into a trash can:
The lion roar sound effects in The Lion King were not actual lions, but voice actor Frank Welker growling into a metal trash can pic.twitter.com/j899xLzFsVJuly 11, 2024
My mind is officially blown that all it took was the impressive vocal stylings of roars in a trash can to hear what we all heard in The Lion King. You may not recognize Frank Welker by face, but his voice talent is so prolific that he’s considered the fourth highest-grossing actor.
Frank Welker is best known for voicing Fred and later Scooby in the animated Scooby-Doo franchise. Welker reprised the role in 2020 as the only returning cast member for Scoob! He’s also lent his voice to a number of iconic animated characters like Curious George, Garfield, various Transformers characters, and more. You know Welker’s got true talent if he can roar in a trashcan and sound exactly like a lion this way.
Roaring in The Lion King was a very important element that shows Simba’s coming-of-age transition. At the beginning of the movie, Simba tries to use his roar to thwart hyenas only for it to come off as cute. Then, his father Mufasa’s deafening roar was able to successfully clear the hyenas away because of the force he developed throughout his years. By the end of the movie, Simba lets out a booming roar his father would be proud of that the rest of the pride is able to respect.
Just when we thought the roars heard in The Lion King came from real lions, a video revealed it was actually the talents of voice actor Frank Welker roaring into a trash can. Even though we have all of the technology in the world to be able to create realistic sound effects now, this behind-the-scenes detail from the 1994 movie proves that even a simple practical effect tool can achieve movie magic. You can hear all of the roars from your favorite animated lions in The Lion King on your Disney+ subscription.
