Donald Glover is staying busy. The rapper and comedian, fresh off his two Golden Globes and NAACP Award for the breakout hit Atlanta, was recently announced as the voice of Simba in Disney’s live-action version of the ’90s classic The Lion King. He will be joined by James Earl Jones as Mufasa, a role Jones had in the original film.
Director Jon Favreau let the cat, ahem, out of the bag on Twitter Friday night with the line “I just can’t wait to be king” under a photo of Glover with the hashtag #Simba.
He then tweeted a photo of Jones with the words, “Looking forward to working with this legend. #Mufasa.”
Favreau signed on to direct the new Lion King in September, hot off the success of his Jungle Book redux, which grossed $966 million worldwide. If the Jungle Book is any indication, expect the new Lion King to be full of live action, lurching adventure and realistic talking animals.
And for all us Star Wars geeks outchea, we imagine Glover and Jones talking shop in studio.
We all know that Jones was the voice of Darth Vader in the original Star Wars films as well as Rogue One, and Glover was just cast as young Lando Calrissian in the Han Solo standalone film yet to be named.
May the force be with them.