As promised, I’m keeping an eye on this one. When Lilton Stewart III announced he was making a horror film about Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, it seemed a bit out of nowhere. After talking with him, I could cautiously say he was doing it because he genuinely had an interesting idea, not just because the character is in the public domain.
I’ve seen many, many indie horror films, some good and some bad. They usually don’t rely on a good known actor to carry the story. But Oswald Down the Rabbit Hole landed a very good one: Ernie Hudson. On the heels of Ghostbusters: Frozen Kingdom, Hudson signed on to play Oswald Jebediah Coleman, a legendary animator from the medium’s early days.
This won’t be a quick cameo, like William Hickey in two minutes of Puppet Master. Though it’s likely that the younger cast members will be endangered by a monstrous silent cartoon rabbit, it’s the character of Coleman whose id is out of control. Maybe it’s like Walter Pidgeon in Forbidden Planet.
According to Deadline, “…after over 100 years of being trapped (…in a magical prison), Oswald’s come-to-life cartoon rabbit is menacing, gruesome and out for blood.” It will also suck Coleman’s grandsons Art (Topher Hall) and Evan (Yaysha Rayzberg) into that lost realm, shrouded in what’s described as “…dark Hollywood magic.”‘
All I’m saying is this isn’t going to be a run of the mill slasher movie. It’s possible that by casting Hudson, the film will be commenting on two birds with one rabbit. First as a stand-in for how Ub Iwerks was treated in the early days of Disney, and more importantly, how invisible black artists were in the pioneer days of animation.
Deadline also reports the film has a budget around $4.5 million and will start shooting sometime this spring. We’re there, Lilton. I want to see some pics from the set!
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