by Panpardus » April 10th, 2018, 7:32 pm
I find Trevor Noah to be an insightful political comedian/commentator; his stuff on African (specifically South African) politics is hilarious and actually provides for a pretty decent intro course to contemporary South African politics, especially if you watch all of his specials in order. Admittedly, he's not necessarily the greatest at working with scripted stuff for his show, but his unscripted behind-the-scenes takes show him to be pretty witty and insightful even in discussing American culture, or at least I find informed foreign opinions on American culture very interesting.
I don't think Noah would make for a good Zazu (even though he [half-]jokingly lamented John Oliver being cast over him for the role). My whole thing has always been that the live-action remake should embrace the whole African-ness of its setting and voice casting by putting in more African-accented characters, and in the original Lion King script (back when Scar was a massive dumb brute unrelated to the Ndona Pride), Timon was written specifically to sound like a young guy with a "spritely Johannesburg township" accent. Being that Noah's a popular South African comedian who is from the biggest township in Johannesburg (Soweto is to Johannesburg what Harlem is to New York City, especially during Apartheid) and grew up during the cultural period that the accent and character was referencing, it seemed like too perfect of a fit.
[quote="Elton John"]s for Eddie Murphey playing Timon, who would have played Pumbaa? Arsenio Hall?[/quote]
Maybe the guy who played the royal butler in Coming to America. He did have a comedically over-the-top singing bit in that film, and he and Murphy were pretty funny against each other even though they didn't share much screen time.