Whishaw will voice the marmalade-loving bear….
‘Cloud Atlas’ and ‘Skyfall’ star Ben Whishaw has been tapped to replace Colin Firth as the voice of Paddington Bear in Paul King’s upcoming live-action meets CG animated feature ‘Paddington.’
Based on Michael Bond’s beloved children’s character, the film follows a young Peruvian bear with a passion for all things British who travels to London in search of a home. Finding himself lost and alone at Paddington Station, he begins to realize that city life is not all he had imagined – until he meets the kindly Brown family, who read the label around his neck (‘Please look after this bear. Thank you.’) and offer him a temporary haven. It looks as though his luck has changed until this rarest of bears catches the eye of a museum taxidermist…
Firth graciously exited the family adventure last month with the statement that the character “simply doesn’t have my voice.”
Talking to The Daily Mail’s Baz Bamigboye, producer David Heyman and King revealed that Firth sensed early on, before they did, that he wasn’t right for the role. “He was saying: ‘Are you sure I’m right?’ He was way ahead of us,” Heyman admitted. “Colin was brilliant, but his voice was, ultimately, too mature.”
‘Paddington’ remains on track for its November 28th release.