By Courtney Potter
Note: Interviews for this article were held before the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes.
Your lively glow betrays an aura of anticipation, almost as though you sense an exhilarating development... That’s right: It’s nearly time for Disney’s Haunted Mansion to creep its way into theaters!
In the new film, inspired by the classic theme park attraction, widowed New York doctor Gabbie (Rosario Dawson) and her son Travis (Chase W. Dillon) move to New Orleans and into a whopper of a “fixer upper,” hoping to transform it into a bed and breakfast... but wind up enlisting a motley crew of so-called spiritual experts—including Father Kent (Owen Wilson), a hipster priest; Ben (LaKeith Stanfield), a down-on-his-luck scientist who specializes in paranormal activity; Harriet (Tiffany Haddish), a French Quarter psychic who may be more powerful than she realizes; and cantankerous Professor Bruce Davis (Danny DeVito) of Tulane University—to help rid it of supernatural squatters.
Directed by Justin Simien (a former Disneyland Park cast member), Haunted Mansion also stars Daniel Levy as a quirky fellow bed and breakfast owner named Vic, Jared Leto as the Hatbox Ghost, and Jamie Lee Curtis as the iconic Madame Leota.
D23: The Official Disney Fan Club was lucky enough to hear exclusively from Dawson, Stanfield, and Haddish—as well as Simien—about what it was like to join the mansion’s 999 happy haunts; their memorable shoot; and what they hope audiences take away from this ghoulishly delightful film! To read more about Haunted Mansion, make sure to drag your bodies to the latest edition of Disney twenty-three, D23’s quarterly publication.
Considering the initial prospect of taking part in Haunted Mansion, “There’s a lot that excited me about it, obviously,” says Dawson. “I think it’s an amazing attraction, one of the most beloved ones; you just have such fond memories of it. And I love Disneyland and Walt Disney World; I think [those kind of memories are] what makes those resorts so special.” Plus, the actress needed a break from the more dramatic projects she’d previously been working on. “This showed up and I thought, ‘Are you kidding? Yes!,’” she adds, chuckling. “So I just laughed for a few months! I knew I was gearing up for Ahsoka as well, and that was going to be so intensive, and I just wanted to go in a different direction. And wow, did I?! It was like a roller coaster of a different direction, and it was amazing.”
Stanfield was similarly excited to be involved in the project, especially something so different from his previous films. “Some of my favorite movies of all time are Disney movies,” he explains. “The things that Disney’s created for youth have been consistently enriching parts of their lives. So when they approached me for this opportunity, I was really surprised; I wasn’t expecting that at that point in my career... and I thought, ‘Well, this might be an opportunity for me to provide a kid with the experience I had when I was younger.’” And speaking of childhood, director Simien grew up on the Disney renaissance of the 1980s and ’90s—and then found himself working for the very company that enthralled him as a child. “To be in film school and working at Disneyland Park, I was in awe of the sheer detail that goes into that immersive kind of storytelling.”
As for Haddish, the actress admits, “Let me tell you, I’m a big Disneyland fan! But when I was a kid, I used to be scared of the Haunted Mansion!” An elementary school field trip changed all that: “I thought, ‘This time I have to be brave,’ right? So I’m in there and I’m just thinking, ‘Wow, this is actually really beautiful. This is like real art!’ And every time after that, Haunted Mansion would be the first thing I had to get on.” So when the chance to be in the new film presented itself, she continues, “Before they could even finish their sentence, I said, ‘Yes! Let me read the script! May I please contribute? Yes, yes, yes, yes!’”
Filming both on location in New Orleans and at Trilith Studios in Atlanta was particularly unforgettable—chiefly due to incredible, attraction-informed sets devised by production designer Darren Gilford (another Disney Parks-related alum; he once interned for Walt Disney Imagineering) and team. “It was so wild, because everyone was ‘ooh-ing’ and ‘aah-ing’ about it even before we got there,” admits Dawson. “The amount of detail, just the scale of it—everyone was flipping out. They couldn’t have prepared you... It was really mind-blowing, honestly. There were a lot of TikToks that were done.”
“It felt like I was a little girl again,” adds Haddish. “It’s super-sized, right? I’m just walking through it like, ‘What are these spider webs made of? What is that made of? What is this made of? Who did that? Who designed this right here?’ I’m asking them a thousand questions and I’m just like—I never wanted to leave the set! I always wanted to hang out on set because it felt like I was hanging out at the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland!” That attention to design was of utmost importance to Simien: “The set was a constant source of inspiration,” the director says. “It was really important to us, with a movie like this, to shoot as much as we could practically—to ground the audience in the film’s reality. The sheer level of painstaking detail that went into such a large practical set was simply awe-inspiring. Darren and his team completely outdid themselves, and yet paid such careful homage to the original attraction.”
But it wasn’t just the sets that made the shoot so noteworthy. “The conversations that Justin and I had were probably some of my favorites in developing this character,” Dawson says. “Reminiscing about my grandmother and what she was like—and feeling that from the images that they were showing me of how they envisioned Gabbie; adding my touch to that. My grandmother was always super put-together, and she had such an incredible style... Even though she always looked so glamorous, she was always ready to dig in. So a lot of that went into building Gabbie: her look, her behavior, and even why she would get a house like this—a massive undertaking. It was really fun to see how Gabbie relates to this house.”
As for Stanfield’s Ben, “It’s a fun journey to go on with him,” the actor explains. “Some of these perennial questions are ones that we’ve been asking ever since the beginning of mankind, and now we’re here to ask Ben on this public stage. But what comes with that is a character that’s witty, funny, charming, sometimes sad, sometimes very excited and happy—running the gamut of most human emotions. He’s a really good person to go on this journey with because then it’s just fun and imaginative.”
And Haddish was especially charmed by her work with Simien: “He never made me feel insecure or uncomfortable,” she admits. “It was always, ‘Let’s level up. Let’s try something different. Let’s try something new.’ That’s fun, when you get to play; when you have a director that challenges you. I just loved working with him. I felt like I grew a lot as a performer.”
All told, the excitement the cast feels about audiences finally seeing the finished product is palpable. “I think it’s just really smart and very clever,” says Dawson. “And it’s definitely going to have some scary bits... There’s so much attention and care put into it because this is such a beloved property. You just feel it. There’s just something about it that feels really warm and fun and creepy at the same time—in a good way! It gives you those good spooky goosebumps.” But it’s not just the spirits that make this film special: “These characters, by the end of the movie we’re a family,” explains Haddish. “We’ve had this experience together—and it’s pretty awesome that we were able to accomplish what we accomplished. I hope that people take home that yes, you may have your family, but there’ll be scenarios where things happen and it’s okay to bond and work with others.”
Director Simien echoes Haddish’s sentiment. “The movie is incredibly funny and heartfelt,” he explains. “Of course the fun and scares are there, as is the lore of the mansion. But [screenwriter] Katie Dippold’s way into the story was this set of eccentric characters who desperately need a found family—and we worked hard to bring that aspect of the screenplay to life.”
