Anastasia (1997 film)

Anastasia is a 1997 American animated musical historical fantasy film produced and directed by Don Bluth and Gary Goldman from a screenplay by Susan Gauthier, Bruce Graham, and the writing team of Bob Tzudiker and Noni White. Based on the legend of the Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia, youngest daughter of the last Russian Tsar, Nicholas II, and set in an alternate version of 1926, the film follows eighteen-year-old amnesiac orphan, Anya, who, hoping to find some trace of her past, sides with two con men who wish to pass her off as the Grand Duchess to Anastasia's paternal grandmother, Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna, amidst the rumors that the Grand Duchess had escaped the execution of the royal family. The film shares its plot with the 1956 film of the same name, which in turn was based on a play by Marcelle Maurette. Unlike those treatments, this version adds a magically empowered Grigori Rasputin as the antagonist.

Voice Cast

Japanese

English

Trivia

• The film aired on Cartoon Network for the first time on October 3, 2004.
• In real life, Olga really did say that Anastasia's drawing looked like a pig riding a donkey. This was stated by Anastasia in a letter to her father, and the image used in the movie is a reproduction of the original picture.
• The real Anastasia once wore a dress almost exactly like the one Anya wears in the last scenes of the movie. This same dress was seen in Anastasia (1956).
• The Parisian bridge, on which the confrontation between Rasputin, Dimitri, and Anastasia occurs, is the Alexander III bridge, named after the real Anastasia Romanov's grandfather, on the occasion of his state visit to France in the 1870s.
• The music box in this movie existed. It was given to Anastasia by Marie Feoderovna for her thirteenth birthday, but was silver, with a ballerina on top.
• The portrait in the ballroom of the whole family includes a spaniel. The spaniel existed. The spaniel, named Joy, belonged to Anastasia's brother, Alexei, and was found alive at the house where the family was killed. Anastasia's own dog, Jimmy, did not survive.
• Just as was suggested in this movie, the real-life Anastasia Romanov loved playing practical jokes. This made her quite notorious amongst her family and the palace staff.
• The character of Vladimir was based on Count Vladimir Frederiks, Czar Nicholas II's Chief Court Minister. He was very close to Czar Nicholas II and his children, and remained in Russia for years after the revolution, wearing his court uniform in protest.
• In real life, Gregori Efimovich (Rasputin) was a very controversial figure who, in fact, was the Romanovs' advisor and Czarina Alexandra's most trusted confidant. Rumor has it that Rasputin told the Czarina he was about to be assassinated, and that if one of her relatives killed him, all the Romanov family would die within a year. While of course these facts were too dark to be included in the movie, there is a reference: during the song "A Rumor in St. Petersburg", an old woman tells Dimitri to buy "Count Yussupov's pajamas", while offering a pair of ragged clothes. Yussupov, who actually was a Prince, really existed, was indeed related to Alexandra Romanov, and was the one who killed the real Rasputin, along with a group of noblemen.
• Liz Callaway was called at the last minute by Vocalist Stephen Flaherty and Lyricist Lynn Ahrens to substitute for a singer who couldn't make the recording session of the temp tracks for Twentieth Century Fox. Her tracks of the songs were liked so much, they led to her subsequent casting as the singing voice of Anastasia.
• The drawing the Dowager Empress Marie Feodorovna (Dame Angela Lansbury) holds when she and Anya (Meg Ryan) are reminiscing (the same one we see little Anastasia give her at the beginning of the movie) is a picture the real Anastasia had drawn for her father in 1914.
• When Anya returns to the palace in St. Petersburg, and is in the ballroom, you can see the painting of the coronation of Alexandra and Nicholas on the left hand side, being the first picture, which is a real painting.
• The real Anastasia was born at the Peterhof Palace, which was called "The Farm" by her family. It was designed in imitation of the Palace of Versailles, in France.
• Vladimir (Kelsey Grammer) tells Anya (Meg Ryan) that Anastasia means "she will rise again". The name Anastasia does, in fact, mean "resurrection".
• When Anastasia and her Grandmother are running away from the palace, they are chased by Rasputin, who then fell through the ice allowing them to escape. In real life, Rasputin was murdered, and his body was dumped into a hole in the ice of the Malaya Nevka River.
• This movie was well-received in Russia, despite the artistic liberties that this movie took with Russian history. Gemini Films, the Russian distributor of this movie, stressed the fact that the story was "not history" but rather, "a fairy tale set against the background of real Russian events" in this movie's Russian marketing campaign so that its Russian audience would not view this movie as a historical movie. As a result, many Russians praised this movie for its art and storytelling and saw it as, "not so much a piece of history, but another Western import to be consumed and enjoyed. (- The Philadelphia Inquirer)".
• When Meg Ryan was offered the role of Anya, she could not decide if she wanted to accept it or not. Upon hearing of Ryan's indecision, Fox took an audio clip of Ryan talking in Sleepless in Seattle (1993) and created a short animated sequence of Anya speaking the lines. They sent the clip to Ryan, and she was so impressed that she changed her mind, and accepted the role.
• The character of Dimitri was based on a European Prince, who vouched for Anna Anderson's identity as Anastasia. The Prince had only met Anastasia once and during her childhood, though, so he was not considered a very credible source.
• The ballet that the characters go to see is "Cinderella".
• Carrie Fisher contributed some ideas for this movie, especially the "Journey to the Past" sequence.
• This was the first movie for Twentieth Century Fox's animation division.
• When Don Bluth and Gary Goldman began researching the actual events, they discovered the history of Anastasia and the Romanov dynasty was too dark for their movie, and decided to use the basic facts of the Romanovs' demise and the Russian Revolution as a starting point and ask, "What if this girl escaped, and what would have happened to her?" opting to "tell a myth or a fairy tale". Bluth also did not take into consideration depicting Vladimir Lenin and the Bolsheviks as the villains, and instead, incorporated Grigori Rasputin, explaining "We wanted to stay out of politics." In reality, Rasputin was already dead when the Romanovs were assassinated. In addition to this, Bluth created the idea for Bartok, the albino bat, as a sidekick for Rasputin. "I just thought the villain had to have a comic sidekick, just to let everyone know that it was all right to laugh. A bat seemed a natural friend for Rasputin. Making him a white bat came later, just to make him different”.
• The musical number "Paris Holds the Key (To Your Heart)" includes cameos by various historical characters from the time including Maurice Chevalier, Sigmund Freud, Charles A. Lindbergh, Josephine Baker, Claude Monet, Isadora Duncan, Auguste Rodin, and Gertrude Stein.
• Near the beginning of this movie, Anya finds a puppy and names him Pooka. In Celtic folklore, a pooka is a shape-shifting creature that can bring fortune.
• The story and plot of this movie shares similarities with Twentieth Century Fox's prior movie, Anastasia (1956), which, in turn, was based on the 1955 play by Marcelle Maurette. Coincidentally, composer David Newman's father, Alfred Newman, wrote the musical score for Anastasia (1956).
• Dimitri was supposedly based on Leonid Ivanovich Sednev, a kitchen boy who served the Romanovs along with his uncle. When the family was executed, Leonid was amongst the few members of the entourage that were spared by the Soviets, who sent him off to live with relatives.
• Don Bluth later on admitted that he didn't like Vladimir's character design. He felt the more comically exaggerated appearance of Vladimir looked out of place against the more realistic designs of Dimitri and Anastasia.
• There is a concept art for a deleted scene and song number on Content Pro.com where Anastasia dances with some dogs at the orphanage, in which she was raised. It also explains why Pooka the dog wants to be with her, and follows her.
• Upon receiving two Academy Award nominations at the 70th Annual Academy Awards in 1998, this movie became the first Don Bluth and Gary Goldman movie and the first non-Disney and non-Pixar animated movie to be nominated for an Academy Award since An American Tail (1986). In fact, this movie received more Academy Award nominations that year, than Disney's Hercules (1997).
• Before Meg Ryan was cast, Liz Callaway was brought in to record several demos of the songs, hoping to land a job in background vocals, but were liked well enough by the songwriters, that they were ultimately used in the final movie.
• Originally produced and released by Twentieth Century Fox to compete with Disney's animation department, this movie was later purchased from them by Disney, before Disney bought the entire studio.
• Hank Azaria won the role for Bartok only ten minutes into his audition.
• Bernadette Peters was not pleased with the design for her character. According to Gary Goldman, Peters was very physically fit at the time of production, and was disappointed that Sophie was drawn so heavyset.
• Right from the beginning, directors Don Bluth and Gary Goldman wanted to film this movie in CinemaScope to give this movie the right scope, vision, and depth the story needed. This movie marked the first movie to be completely shot in CinemaScope since In Like Flint (1967). Bluth and Goldman used CinemaScope, one more time, to film their next and final movie, Titan A.E. (2000). Titan A.E. (2000) was the last movie to be filmed in CinemaScope until Frozen (2013).
• The original working title for this movie was called "The Music Box", due to its focus on the music box that Anastasia was given.
• Sir Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Pryce, and Tim Curry were considered to voice Grigori Rasputin.
• One idea for the soundtrack was Bartok singing Boney M's song "Ra Ra Rasputin", but they couldn't get the rights for it.
• This was the last animated movie from Twentieth Century Fox to feature a female protagonist until Epic (2013).
• The tiara the Dowager Empress wears during the opera/reunion scene is based on the Grand Duchess Vladimir tiara. The Grand Duchess Vladimir tiara was owned by the Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna, and was sold to the British royal family after the Russian Revolution. It is currently in possession of Queen Elizabeth II.
• During the song "Learn to Do It", the list of family relatives states that there was an Uncle Vanya. "Uncle Vanya" is a real play by Russian playwright Anton Chekhov.
• Billy Porter and JK Simmons were ensemble singers in this film.
• Gary Goldman had commented that originally, as with the rest of the cast, they were going to have Meg Ryanrecord her lines separately from the others, with Don Bluth reading the lines of the other characters to her. However, after Ryan and the directors were finding the method to be too challenging when her character was paired with Dimitri, she and John Cusack recorded the dialogue of their characters together, with Goldman noting "It made a huge difference".
• Originally, Tilly the cat, a kitten of the Dowager Empress Marie Feodorovna was going to have a larger role in the movie, and have a friendly rivalry with Anya's puppy Pooka.
• Glenn Walker Harris, Jr. voiced the younger version of John Cusack's character, Dimitri, in this movie. In Say Anything (1989), he portrayed Cusack's nephew.
• As is the case with many Twentieth Century Fox movies, the film cans for the advance screening prints and show prints had a code name. This movie was "The Train". There is a train wreck in this movie.
• Characters that were deleted from this movie were a cat and rat duo named Masha and Jean-Claude, that were going to be the original storytellers of this movie; a rat named Rodan, that was going to be a partner to Bartok; demon minions who served Rasputin; and a man named Phillippe, that was later re-worked into Dimitri.
• In reality, Grigori Rasputin was a holy man in name only, and had no official connection to the Russian Orthodox Church, though he was widely known as a mystic. He was even married and had three children, one of whom was named Dmitri.
• Don Bluth's highest-grossing film and his first financially successful film since All Dogs Go to Heaven (1989).
• Even though The Dowager Empress Marie speaks with a Russian accent in the film, she was actually Danish in real life. Her real name was Dagmar and her title was Princess Dagmar of Denmark.
• Meg Ryan was in her mid thirties when she portrayed the eighteen-year-old Anastasia.
• In May 1994, the Los Angeles Times reported that Don Bluth and Gary Goldman had signed a long-term deal to produce animated movies with Twentieth Century Fox, with the studio channelling more than $100 million in constructing the animation studio. For the location of the new animation studio, Phoenix, Arizona was selected, because the state offered the company about $1 million in job training funds and low-interest loans for the state-of-the-art digital animation equipment, with a staff of three hundred artists and technicians, including a third of which worked with Bluth and Goldman in Dublin, Ireland for Sullivan Bluth Studios. For their first project, the studio insisted they select one out of a dozen existing properties in which they owned, where Bluth and Goldman suggested adapting The King and I (1956) and My Fair Lady (1964), though Bluth and Goldman felt it would be impossible to improve on Audrey Hepburn's performance, and Alan Jay Lernerand Frederick Loewe's score. Following several story suggestions, the idea to adapt this movie originated from Fox Filmed Entertainment CEO Bill Mechanic. They would later adapt story elements from Pygmalion, with the peasant Anya being molded into a regal woman. Warner Brothers made an animated version of "The King and I" in 1999, which was a commercial flop.
• Kelsey Grammer who voices Vlad is also the well known star of sitcom Frasier. In season 7 of Frasier, episode 'A Tsar is Born', Frasier and his brother investigate the possibility of being descended from the Romanov family upon discovering a Russian family heirloom.
• DIRECTOR TRADEMARK (Don Bluth): (object): Anastasia's music box. In 1916, the Dowager Empress Marie Feodorovna gave the music box to the young Anastasia, so that she'll have something, by which to remember her, before she returns home to Paris. Only the two knew the music from the music box, as it is the "Once Upon a December" lullaby that Marie sings to Anya at bedtime. That music box, as well as Anya's memorization of its music, were to prove to Marie that Anya is her long-lost granddaughter, Anastasia.
• Before Grigori Rasputin was the antagonist, Don Bluth initially wanted to make an unknown communist soldier to be the antagonist who has his own personal vendetta against Anastasia. However, this Communist soldier later filled in Rasputin's place in the musical version named "Gleb".
• Woody Allen originally going to voice Bartok, but the studio was very reluctant upon discovering about his affair with Soon-Yi Previn, daughter of Allen's ex-partner Mia Farrow.
• An early storyboard version for the final showdown was supposedly that Dmitri was to killed Rasputin, but the producers are avoiding the stereotypical Damsel in Distress moment, resulting with Anastasia killing Rasputin instead.
• This movie marks the second animated movie for Dame Angela Lansbury and Bernadette Peters in 1997, following Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas (1997). Interestingly enough, this movie had its world premiere in New York City, New York on November 14, 1997, three days after the home video debut of Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas (1997).
• Hank Azaria, Andrea Martin, and Kelsey Grammer made Bartok the Magnificent (1999), only Azaria reprised his role as Bartok the bat. Whereas Andrea and Kelsey played two different characters.
• Peter O'Toole was the studio's first choice to voice Grigori Rasputin, but due to the popularity of the Back to the Future trilogy. Christopher Lloyd was cast instead. O'Toole was also asked to play Grigori Rasputin in Nicholas and Alexandra (1971), which was about Anastasia's parents. But he turned down the role.
• Mexican pop star Thalía sang the song "Journey to the Past", in the Spanish version of the movie.
• This movie marked the first movie by Don Bluth and Gary Goldman to be fully animated and produced in the United States, since An American Tail (1986).
• Final theatrical movie of Arthur Malet (Travelling Man/Major Domo).
• The job of composing the score was offered to Harry Gregson-Williams and John Powell but they turned it down because of their work on Antz (1998) so it was instead composed by David Newman.
• This movie marked the animated movie debut of Kelsey Grammer, following his first animated appearance in the Disney animated short film Runaway Brain (1995). Following this movie, he'd go onto voice Stinky Pete the Prospector in Toy Story 2 (1999), Dr. Krank in Teacher's Pet (2004), the Tinman in Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return (2013), and Hunter the Stork in Storks (2016).
• Included among the American Film Institute's 2004 list of 400 movies nominated for the top 100 America's Greatest Music in the Movies for the song "Journey to the Past."
• Dame Angela Lansbury's third animated movie, out of four, following Beauty and the Beast (1991) and Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas (1997). Lansbury also appeared in Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971), which also featured animated sequences.
• 20th Century Fox spent over $50 million marketing the film with promotional sponsors from Burger King, Dole Food Company, Hershey, Chesebrough-Ponds, Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, Shell Oil, and the 1997 U.S. Figure Skating Championships. Overall, the marketing costs exceeded that of Independence Day (1996), another Fox-distributed film, by more than 35 percent.
• The first movie to feature a new rendition of the 20th Century Fox fanfare, composed by David Newman, son of Alfred Newman who wrote the original composition. As of 2021, this arrangement of the iconic fanfare is still being used. David also composed this movie's music.
• In one of the trailers for this movie, the 20th Century Fox logo is seen partially covered in snow. However, at the beginning of the actual movie, the 20th Century Fox logo is normal.
• Arthur Malet's third animated film after The Secret of NIMH (1982) and The Black Cauldron (1985), the former of which is also directed by Don Bluth and Gary Goldman as well as his last before his death in 2013.
• Martin Short was considered to play Bartok.
• Christopher Lloyd and Kelsey Grammer appeared on Cheers (1982).
• First animated movie Meg Ryan and John Cusack did.
• Hank Azaria's first time voice acting in a theatrically released film. As well as reprising all his many characters from The Simpsons (1989) in The Simpsons Movie (2007), he'd go onto voice Carlos and Phil the Chickens in Hop (2011) and Sven the Puffin in Happy Feet Two (2011).
• John Cusack's sister, Joan Cusack and Kelsey Grammer worked together in another animated feature Toy Story 2 exactly two years later as Woody's two roundup gang members Jessie the cowgirl and Stinky Pete the Prospector respectively.
• DIRECTOR TRADEMARK (Don Bluth): (emigrating protagonist): Czar Nichols II and his family were forced to evacuate from the palace when it was under siege by Communist revolutionaries at the beginning of the Russian Revolution in 1917. Ten years later, the now-grown up Anastasia decides to leave Russia and accompany Dimitri and Vladimir to Paris, France in hopes of finding her long-lost family, or a new life, there.
• Since the film was made in FOX, Disney now has ownership to the rights of the film, following their acquisition of the company back in 2019. The film is now on Disney Plus.
• Dimitri was originally going to be called "Philippe".
• Anne Fletcher (27 Dresses) and Adam Shankman (A Walk to Remember) were influenced dancers in this film.
• Hank Azaria and Kelsey Grammer appeared on The Simpsons (1989) as a series regular and a recurring guest star respectively.
• The fourth theatrically released animated film to be scored by David Newman after The Brave Little Toaster (1987), DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp (1990), and Rover Dangerfield (1991).
• The character Bartok is named after the Hungarian composer Bela Bartok.
• Meg Ryan appeared in Sleepless in Seattle, in which her brother is played by David Hyde Pierce. Kelsey Grammer appeared in Frasier, which takes place in Seattle, and in which his brother is also played by David Hyde Pierce.
• Lacey Chabert performed her singing role of Anastasia while in production on Lost in Space (1998).