"I Watched It With My Jaw On The Floor" – Seth Rogen and Billy Eichner React to the Improv Used in 'Mufasa: The Lion King'

Mufasa: The Lion King may be taking us back to the beginning, but Disney is doing it in a way that guarantees audiences get even more of the beloved characters that make The Lion King magical. In particular, you can't make a visit to the Pride Lands without Timon and Pumbaa, with Billy Eichner and Seth Rogen reprising their roles as the two best buds.

Mufasa tells the tale of the titular hero, voiced by Aaron Pierre, and his confidante and adoptive brother, Taka (Kelvin Harrison Jr.), long before Simba (Donald Glover) embarked on his own journey to becoming king. The story is told through the wise Rafiki, voiced by John Kani, to Simba and Nala's (Beyoncé) daughter, Kiara (Blue Ivy Carter), and wherever Simba is, you know Timon and Pumbaa aren't far behind.

While talking with Collider's Perri Nemiroff, Eichner and Rogen compare the "free rein" they had working with director Barry Jenkins to how much improvisation there was in adapting the original with Jon Favreau. They reveal how shocked they were that so much of their banter was used in the movie, discuss the "wink-wink" humor for the adult audiences and how Rogen continues to be inspired by The Lion King collaborations and what he's taking into Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2.

Seth Rogen and Billy Eichner Were "Beholden to Nothing" This Time Around

"I watched it with my jaw on the floor."

PERRI NEMIROFF: You've been lucky enough to work with two great directors on these characters. Can you tell me something about Barry specifically that made making Mufasa a creatively unique experience for you?

BILLY EICHNER: He was just incredibly encouraging. We improvised a lot in the 2019 version, which Jon Favreau encouraged us to do, but this time, I guess Barry really liked what we did in that version and really had us lean into riffing a lot, going off script, bantering with each other, and a shocking amount of that ended up in the movie.

ROGEN: And I think in the first one, we were kind of beholden a little bit more to some of the actual lines and things like that that you want to hit from the original film, but in this, there was none of that. We were beholden to nothing, so it was much freer in some ways because we could really go off, and we could just let our imaginations run wild.

EICHNER: We were beholden to nothing. Do you understand?

ROGEN: Nothing! [Laughs]

I like when you work that way! Is there anything in particular you remember improvising that made you stop and go, “There's no way they're ever going to keep this,” but now it's in the finished film?

EICHNER: Pretty much everything.

ROGEN: Literally everything. I watched it with my jaw on the floor.

EICHNER: Same.

Image via Disney

ROGEN: Like, “They used that? They used that?” I could not believe it.

EICHNER: I think some of the Timon and Pumbaa humor stuff is there this time, too, as a little wink-wink for the adults in the room, which I'm happy about.

ROGEN: “Hakuna Mufasa.” We improvised that. It was literally a very silly moment that became an actual song.

I enjoyed how you held tight to that and kept it going.

ROGEN: Oh, yeah! [Laughs] We brought a lot of our own insecurities as far as our lack of Lin-Manuel Miranda songs.

'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2' Is Taking a Page from 'The Lion King' Again

"We are never recording one line without all of them there together."

Image via Paramount Pictures

Seth, one of the last times we spoke was for [Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem], and I know you emphasized the importance of having those kids record together in the booth because of your experience making Lion King . I'm wondering if you could pay it forward again. Is there anything about watching those kids work together in that booth that you found yourself holding especially tight to and influencing your work here?

ROGEN: Yeah! I mean, to the spirit of this, I remember often with Ninja Turtles, we would completely throw all the dialogue out and be like, “How would you say this? We wrote the 40-year-old-man version of four teenagers having a conversation, but put it in your own words.” And we were encouraged to do that with this. And I think that's a thing that at times can make you uncomfortable where it's like, “Oh, we're just gonna make up all of it?” But now I really trust that process and see, especially with animation, you can really get great stuff if you're with the person and completely given free rein. “Beholden to nobody.” [Laughs]

EICHNER: Beholden to nothing and no one during the making of this film.

I understand why it's not feasible in some situations, but recording together in a booth seems, to me, as an outsider at least, like it could make all the difference.

ROGEN: It's such a big difference. Now, I fully took it from Jon on the first one. We're starting Ninja Turtles 2, and it's the exact same. We are never recording one line without all of them there together.

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I did want to ask the two of you about the songs. As you brought up earlier, because of how the film is structured, you do not get the opportunity to sing the new songs so, if you could steal one for yourself, which one would you choose to sing and why?

ROGEN: That’s a good question.

EICHNER: Maybe we would take one from Encanto and stick it in this movie.

Oh, we're going to other films now. I’ll take that!

EICHNER: Yeah! Why not?

ROGEN: I’d do that Bruno song.

EICHNER: Exactly. “We Don't Talk About Bruno” — We don't give Timon and Pumbaa a song either, apparently. [Laughs]

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I was thinking maybe the brother song.

EICHNER: The brother song is really good.

ROGEN: That’s a little more organic.

I quite enjoyed that.

ROGEN: It’s from this movie.

EICHNER: That's a really good song.

ROGEN: It's a good song.

Six Degrees of David Krumholtz

Image via Disney+

I did want to wrap with a personal question inspired by this film, because I just love the idea of found families in general. I love how it's used in this film, and also in this industry. Early in your careers, can you name someone who filled that gap and made you feel like you belonged in film and television, and like you could thrive in it?

ROGEN: For me, it was actually David Krumholtz because he was someone that I grew up watching, and I met him when I was 16. He was on Freaks and Geeks, and we became very good friends. He was very successful, by all means, and I remember being like, “Oh, he seems to be embracing me and thinks I'm talented and seems to like me.” And he was someone that made me think like, “He seems to think I have it, and he's seen a lot of people come and go at his young age.”

EICHNER: That’s so nice. David Krumholtz and I went to junior high school together and Jewish day camp right before he got whisked away to Hollywood. So, that's so cute. Now we’re friends again all these years later. So many people. I went to Northwestern and graduated with a huge group of friends who all wanted to be in some aspect of entertainment. We really stuck together in those first years in New York. I actually have known Lin-Manuel since those days, too. We didn't go to college together, but met in New York right after, over 20 years ago. We performed together. The Billy on the Street videos started as a segment I did in a live show that I did with literally all of my college friends who had just graduated, and that ended up, years later, obviously, doing some very nice things for me, and it was all my college friends believing in me at the beginning.

Mufasa: The Lion King opens in theaters on December 20.

Mufasa, a cub lost and alone, meets a sympathetic lion named Taka, the heir to a royal bloodline. The chance meeting sets in motion an expansive journey of a group of misfits searching for their destiny.

Director Barry Jenkins

Writers Jeff Nathanson

Sequel The Lion King (2019)

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