Tim Burton is one of those directors who like to keep working with regular collaborators and he’s raiding his Rolodex (or should that be flipping his phone contacts list these days?) for some familiar names for the voice cast of his stop-motion Frankenweenie film. The first batch up? Winona Ryder, Martin Landau, Martin Short and Catherine O’Hara.
The one thing that unites them all (besides good pedigrees) is that they’ve all appeared in Burton’s work in the past. Ryder, of course, was Lydia Deetz in Beetlejuice and then fell for Johnny Depp’s Edward Scissorhands. She’ll be voicing Elsa.
Martin Landau, meanwhile, snagged an Oscar playing Bela Lugosi in Ed Wood, and has signed on as the voice of Mr Rzykruski. Martin Short cropped up in Mars Attacks, as press secretary Jerry Ross. He’s taking on five characters in Frankenweenie: Bob, Nassor, Toshiaki, Victor’s Dad and Mr Bergermeister.
O’Hara is also pulling multiple vocal duty on the film, as Edgar, Weird Girl, Victor’s Mum, and the gym teacher. Her Burton experience goes back to voicing both Sally and Shock in** The Nightmare Before Christmas**, which the director produced.
Frankenweenie tells the story of Victor, a young man who dabbles in home movies, usually starring his best friend in the world, Sparky the dog. But when the poor pooch is hit and killed by a car, Victor decides that instead of giving him a proper burial and hitting the local shelter to find a new dog, he’ll bring him back to life through the application of some shonky science. Naturally, mayhem follows and Victor soon has to convince everyone that the bolt-necked canine is still a loyal friend.
We’re interested to see what writer John August has done to flesh the 1984 short out to full-length film status, but we’ll have to wait until March 9 2012 to find out. If you want to get a taste, though, the short is available in its entirety on YouTube…