Trivia / Mulan

Disney Film

• Actor-Inspired Element: Ming-Na Wen's habit of touching her own hair became one of Mulan's Character Tics.
• Accidentally-Correct Writing: Shan-Yu is understandably furious with Mulan for destroying his army, but he doesn't seem to care that she's a woman, and is also one of the few male characters in the whole film who never outright says anything sexist towards her. Given it's never commented on, it's likely the writers didn't realize that many nomadic tribes (including the actual Huns and the Xiongnu) did have a widespread culture of warrior women. Because of this, it's not too surprising that Shan-Yu wouldn't care about Mulan's gender, instead viewing her as just another soldier on the battlefield.
• Beam Me Up, Scotty!: Mushu's line "Dishonor on you! Dishonor on your family! Dishonor on your cow!" is frequently quoted, but it's wrong.
  Mushu: Alright, that's it! Dishonor! Dishonor on your whole family! Make a note of this. Dishonor on you, dishonor on your cow—
• Breakaway Pop Hit: "Reflection", which, surprisingly, was Christina Aguilera's first single, and the start of her career. As it's so different from the musical style of the movie, fans are likely to disassociate the two. However, some international Prints instead use Vanessa Mae's less popular instrumental version.
• The Cast Show Off: The singing voice for Shang in the Chinese dub is Jackie Chan, who has a background in Chinese Opera. Likewise, appropriate that a massive star of Martial Arts films sings the Training Montage song (and even shows off some sick Kung Fu skills in the music video).
• Celebrity Voice Actor: In the French dub, there's actor José Garcia as Mushu.
• Creator Backlash: While proud of the film, the grueling hours nearly ended co-director Tony Bancroft's marriage and he swore off directing features for almost twenty years, only returning to co-direct a couple of foreign co-productions. Meanwhile, Jerry Goldsmith hated the music for a pivotal scene. This was due to Executive Meddling wanting the music to have bit of a Hans Zimmer flavour. His original version. (on the soundtrack album, his original version is called "Mulan's Decision", the version heard in the film is called "Haircut".)
• Creator In-Joke: Cri-Kee wears sunglasses at the end, as a nod to Stevie Wonder who sang "True To Your Heart" with 98 Degrees (the song that plays over the end).
• Creator's Pest: The writers grew to resent Cri-Kee the cricket, as they quickly viewed him as a pointless character. Whenever they were developing a scene, someone bringing up what the cricket should be doing was met with frustrated dismissal.
• Cut Song: Two as revealed in the DVD: "Keep 'Em Guessing", originally intended to be Mushu's introduction song, and an opening number filled with Ominous Chinese Chanting.
• Dawson Casting:
  • Ming-Na Wen was in her mid-30s while voicing the 16-year-old Mulan.
  • James Hong was nearly 70, while Chi Fu seems to be 40-ish.
• Deleted Scene:
  • A deleted scene showed Mulan's betrothal to Shang, but it was cut because the filmmakers felt it made it look like she selfishly went to war to get out of her marriage rather than to save her father.
  • Another scene showed the Huns destroying a village, and Shan Yu killing one of his own soldiers for hiding a bird in his shirt because the orders were to leave nothing alive.
  • Originally, in the scene when Mushu conforts Mulan (before discovering some of the Huns are still alive), he would say he's gonna take care of her and than "the hardest part is over", and as they hug, he would look around, worried for her. Acording to animator Tom Bancroft, it was changed because Mushu wasn't being sincere with Mulan. You can watch the scene right here.
• Development Gag:
  • Mulan's dog is named Little Brother - as a nod to one version of the legend where Mulan enlists in the army to save her younger brother.
  • Mulan says "you're...tiny" when she first meets Mushu. This references that Disney execs were unsure about having a dragon as her sidekick, afraid it would be too big and menacing. Once they were told that dragons could be any size in Chinese folklore, Mushu was created.
• Fake Nationality: While Mulan, Shang, Fa Li, and Chi Fu's voice actors are Chinese-American, Mushu's is African-American; Shan Yu's is Irish-Puerto Rican; Chien-Po, General Li, Ling, the head Ancestor, and the Emperor's are Japanese-American; the Matchmaker's is Anglo-Australian; Yao's is Jewish-American; Mulan's singing voice actor is Filipina; Shang's singing voice actor is Welsh-American, and Fa Zhou's is Korean-American. While it's justified in virtue of being voice actors and appearance doesn't matter, they're oddly mostly using American Accents.
• Irony as She Is Cast: Hyper-masculine Yao is voiced by out-loud-and-proud homosexual Harvey Fierstein.
• Kids' Meal Toy: McDonald's had two different Happy Meal tie-ins; one for the film's theatrical release in 1998, and one for the VHS release one year later. The original promotion is famous for coming with Szechuan sauce, which received a Colbert Bump after it was referenced in an episode of Rick and Morty.
• Non-Singing Voice: A few.
  • B.D. Wong does the speaking voice of Shang but the singing voice — that is, for "I'll Make a Man Out of You" — would be none other than Donny Osmond. (This in spite of Wong being a Broadway performer with a good singing voice. The Word of God on this is that Donny Osmond's singing voice sounds more like B.D. Wong's speaking voice than his own.)
  • Ming-Na Wen also does Mulan's speaking voice, while her singing is provided by Lea Salonga (who also sang for Princess Jasmine).
  • Marni Nixon sings for Grandma Fa for the character's verse in "Honor To Us All", where her speaking is provided by June Foray.
  • Matthew Wilder, the film's composer (and One-Hit Wonder singer back in the 80s) does Ling's singing voice.
  • Mushu's one sung line, despite being more spoken than sung, is done by Mark Moseley, who would go on to be Eddie Murphy's Other Darrin for all future appearances of Mushu.
• Multiple Languages, Same Voice Actor: The Chinese dub has versions in all three variants (Mandarin, Cantonese, and Taiwanese), and Jackie Chan was Shang in all of them.
• The Other Marty: Joe Pesci was originally cast as Mushu but the filmmakers ultimately decided that his voice was not right for the character.
• So My Kids Can Watch: Donny Osmond jokes that his kids didn't think he had made it in show business until he had worked on a Disney movie.
• What Could Have Been:
  • The full version of the "Reflection" sequence changes the tone of the piece from a quiet, somber, well, reflection to a triumphant action scene. Lea Salonga still performs this full version live.
  • Lea Salonga originally auditioned as Mulan's speaking voice as well. Due to her voice being not considered deep enough to allow Mulan to pass for a boy, she was turned down and Ming Na Wen got cast. However, she was retained as the singing voice.
  • Shan-Yu was originally going to have Animal Eye Spy powers via his falcon.
  • According to the audio commentary on the special edition Mulan DVD, Li Shang was considered a dorky guy despite being physically fit due to his inability to talk to Mulan. An example of this would be after she defeats Shan Yu he says "You fight good" in a nervous way.
  • Rachel Portman was originally going to score the movie, but she became pregnant and dropped out; Jerry Goldsmith eventually signed on after he in turn left another project.
  • Tia Carrere was the first choice to voice Mulan. Helen Hunt was also considered.
  • Bruce Willis was originally cast as Li Shang.
  • Stephen Schwartz was originally attached to write songs for the original Mulan before being let go because of his work on The Prince of Egypt. He was perfectly happy to do both and didn't have an exclusive contract. However, because The Prince of Egypt was a DreamWorks Animation film, the top brass at Disney weren't happy about him working on a DreamWorks Animation film and said that he had to make a choice. He chose to honor his commitment to The Prince of Egypt and says he doesn't regret it. Schwartz had written two songs for the film before being let go. Neither was used. He had also begun work on two other songs. Also, "Written in Stone" is used in Mulan Jr., a children's theater production of Mulan.
  • Tony Bancroft lobbied hard to not make the movie a musical, feeling it was inappropriate, but the higher-ups didn't want to deviate from their then-still-massively successful musical format. The finished film has both approaches: During the first half, when everyone's eager to fight the Huns, the film is a musical to show off how everyone's preparing. During the second half, when it becomes clear how brutal the Huns are (the destroyed village), that's when the singing stops as the threat of the Huns is now clear (save for a brief reprise of I'll Make a Man Out Of You).
  • Harvey Fierstein almost didn't take the role of Yao, as he didn't want to potentially steal a role for a more deserving Asian actor. He was swayed when he was told that the rest of the cast was predominantly Asian.
  • Along with some other potential animated series that would have spun off from other Disney animated movies, the linked article makes mention of a Mulan & the Treasures of Qin that was to be edited by Matt Barrios (The Proud Family).
  • According to the writers, the original plan was that Mulan joining the army was supposed to be based on her not wanting to conform to the gender role expected of her. However, they realized how predictable this would be and make Mulan seem more selfish than they wanted it to be, and so they decided that Mulan joining was to protect her father, and made her mostly okay with the idea of getting married at the start.
  • An alternate opening sequence featured a shadow puppet play being put on for the soldiers during the Huns' attack on the wall. It went far enough to have a model sheet, but was likely cut for pacing reasons (and because it features much more implied murder than the final version).
  • Bill Maher was the first choice to voice Mushu.
• Working Title: China Doll and The Legend of Mulan.

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