Donald Glover to play Simba in The Lion King with James Earl Jones as Mufasa

Last Updated on July 31, 2021

After surprising audiences with his successful adaptation of Disney's THE JUNGLE BOOK, Jon Favreau quickly added another live-action Disney film to his slate when it was announced that he would give THE LION KING a similar treatment. Favreau will also be tackling a sequel to THE JUNGLE BOOK, which he will be shooting back-to-back with THE LION KING.

It's safe to say that we can expect another all-star cast lending their voices to the animal characters, and Jon Favreau took to Twitter to announce that Donald Glover (Atlanta) is set to play Simba.

Not too long after, Favreau also revealed that James Earl Jones would be voicing Mufasa, the same role he played in the 1994 animated original. Get ready to cry all over again.

Jon Favreau's THE LION KING is set to be penned by Jeff Nathanson (CATCH ME IF YOU CAN) and doesn't currently have a release date. For his part, Favreau is certainly aware of how highly regarded the original is as well as the challenges which he will have to face by remaking it.

The thing is that the animated version of The Lion King is — I don’t know how you outdo that. It works tremendously well. I think it was sort of the end of the era before the 3D animation started coming in, and I don’t think anybody wants to see an animated version because if you want to see an animated version, look at the original. It holds up, it’s still wonderful to watch. So the trick is can you make it look like you actually found real animals in a real environment? And how do you translate the story through that?