Washington [US], December 12 : As an animated musical romantic fantasy comedy film 'The Princess and the Frog' celebrated its 15th anniversary, actress Anika Noni Rose recalled working in the movie and shared her experience of lending her voice for the film's starring role as Princess Tiana.
"I just couldn't believe it. I always wanted to be a Disney voice, always," she said. "I didn't have to be a person. That didn't matter to me. I would have happily been a mushroom. I would have been a tree. I would have been a rock. I would have been whatever," she added as per The Hollywood Reporter.
"I was walking through the halls of the history of my childhood, and at that same time, I felt in my bones this was for me. I felt it."
She shared that it is mind-blowing" to see the impact of Tiana had on young girls after so many years.
'The Princess and the Frog' is inspired in part by the 2002 novel The Frog Princess by ED Baker. The film was directed by John Musker and Ron Clements and produced by Peter Del Vecho.
She has also "seen children of all different ethnicities, all different backgrounds" wearing her character's signature green gown at events.
"When I'm thinking of Black or brown-skinned adults, we spent so much time growing up trying to fit into another standard of beauty. And now, at this point, those children, these new children, are comfortable within themselves in different ways," she said. "They don't think anything of putting on their Tiana dress. You can't tell them they're not Tiana. It's not about the fact they're not brown. They still feel like they're Tiana."
"Brown babies feel like they are regal, and their friends, who may not be brown, look at them and absolutely see that. [They say,] 'Yes, you are regal, and you are a princess,'" she added.
The Princess and the Frog was released on December 11, 2009. Bruno Campos, Jennifer Cody, Keith David, Randy Newman, John Goodman and Oprah Winfrey also voice-starred in Disney's fairytale set in Jazz Age-era New Orleans and centred on young Princess Tiana and a frog prince who wants to return to human form, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
"It's those little waves that make changes when these kids want to be in the school play, and they want to be the princess," said Rose. "Who's going to tell them they can't be the princess at this point? Nobody, because we see it. It's there," as per The Hollywood Reporter.