A new Garfield animated movie in development has cast Chris Pratt to voice the lasagna-loving feline. Garfield was created by Jim Davis as a comic strip in 1976 and has since lived on in a ton of merchandise, animated shows, two live-action movies, and three direct-to-video films. Alongside the Monday-hating cat is a cast of familiar characters: human-owner John, his dog Odie, and a host of feline friends.

Pratt is known for various film and TV appearances, from Parks & Recreation on NBC to the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise for Marvel Studios. Recently, the star was announced as the voice of another incredibly popular animated character, Mario, in the upcoming Super Mario Bros. animated movie from Nintendo and Universal. Of course, his most beloved voiceover work was in The Lego Movie and its sequel, as the totally ordinary mini-figure named Emmet. Now it seems Pratt has set his sights on another iconic animated character: Garfield.

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Per Deadline, Alcon Entertainment’s new Garfield animated movie cast Chris Pratt to voice the orange furball in a new film from writer David Reynolds and director Mark Dindal. No further details about the film’s plot or release date were announced.

Opinion on Pratt’s casting as Mario was pretty split, with many reacting poorly to the news. However, Garfield casting news might fair better with the public since the character is typically portrayed as more sarcastic and glib than the Italian plumber. The two live-action/CGI hybrid Garfield movies featured Bill Murray as the titular character’s voice. The actor delivered a subdued lackadaisical performance that embraces the famously lazy cat’s desire to do nothing more than relax.

Before this feature film announcement, Viacom acquired the rights to make a new Garfield TV show, intended to premiere on Nickelodeon. That deal also included the rights to another brainchild of Davis, U.S. Acres, a spinoff show that featured a host of other anthropomorphic farm animals which ran alongside a previous iteration of the Garfield animated series. The Nickelodeon deal was announced in August 2019, and there hasn’t been much of an update on the status of that project since, so it’s unclear if this is in addition to that or in place of it. Not that a movie and show couldn’t both exist. After all, the character has managed to stay in the cultural zeitgeist since the late 70s, so his popularity should endure both mediums. The additional voice cast for the new Pratt-led Garfield movie has not been announced, but with Pratt anchoring the film, other prominent Hollywood stars could still be attached.

Source: Deadline

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Shawn DePasquale is a news editor for Screen Rant. He is a seasoned film and TV critic, a published comic book creator, and was the Editor-In-Chief of Macaulay Culkin’s Bunny Ears. Shawn has been passionate about movies ever since watching Ghostbusters with his Dad for the first time and being permanently scarred by the demon dog in the fridge.

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