‘Shrek 5’ With Original Cast, Donkey Spinoff With Eddie Murphy and More Teased by Illumination’s Chris Meledandri (EXCLUSIVE)
Chris Meledandri prepares to launch Mario onto movie screens, the Illumination founder and CEO is simultaneously juggling several new movies and sequels in his ever-expanding animation empire. These range from follow-ups to his “Sing,” “Despicable Me” and “Secret Life of Pets” franchises, as well as original movies like this fall’s “Migration,” the story of a family of ducks who live in a pond in New England and no longer have to migrate because the winters are milder. But before all that, there’s “The Super Mario Bros. Movie,” which is expected to achieve box office domination when it opens on April 5. Beyond running Illumination, Meledandri, who sat down with Variety with Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto for this week’s cover story on the making of “The Super Mario Bros. Movie,” also serves as a creative partner to DreamWorks Animation as it looks to reboot the “Shrek” franchise. In that capacity, he’s pushed to bring back the film’s original voice cast which includes Mike Myers, Cameron Diaz and Eddie Murphy for “Shrek 5.”