The Secret Weapon Behind Dwayne Johnson's Moana Transformation

1. The making of a Disney princess involves directors pitching three unrelated ideas to story chief John Lasseter before homing in on one worth pursuing. And the genesis for Moana (directed by John Musker and Ron Clements, the team behind The Little Mermaid, Aladdin and Hercules) came from Musker’s interest in the world of the South Pacific.

Digging into Polynesian mythology, they discovered hordes of legends discussing a shape-shifting character named Maui. While different islands have different versions of the tale, Maui is often credited with giving humans the knowledge of fire, slowing down the sun and using his famed hook to bring the islands up from the bottom of the ocean.

2. In the original version of the script, Dwyane Johnson’s Maui was the lead "we even had a pet name for him, like Mighty Maui," Clements revealed to Entertainment Weekly.

The script also employed a female supporting character. "It was based on a myth where a girl's lover had been kidnapped, and she enlisted Maui to help her rescue her lost lover," said Clements. "That was the bare bones of it, certainly not much more to it than that. And John loved the arena of it, but he said, 'You've got to dig deeper.'" 

3. Another idea left on the cutting room floor involved Moana—the teenage daughter of a village chief—as a fish-out-of-water type in an old world.

"There was a time-travel aspect," the directors told EW of the story that saw a contemporary kid rediscovering their ancestors. "Had an iPhone, all this modern stuff, and then discovered this ancient culture. We did not do that story."

4. An initial research trip to the Pacific Islands changed the production team’s course. “We really spent time with people, sitting in villages with the elders, children, and academics, and going out sailing as well,” producer Osnat Shurer shared with Canada’s Tribute magazine in 2017. “We came back with such a deep appreciation for the culture, for the history, for the beauty of the people, and for the rhythms and the harmonies. So right then, we made the decision together that we really wanted to celebrate the culture; to bring forward its beauty, its subtlety, its wonder, its history."

She felt particularly affected by one elder in Mo’oera “who said to us, 'For years we have been swallowed by your culture. For once, can you be swallowed by ours?'" she revealed. "We took this very seriously."

Among the lessons that shaped the eventual story: "That nature, the ocean in particular, is alive and sentient, and that the ocean connects us all," explained Shurer. "That you need to know your mountain, that you need to know everything that came before you in order to know where you are standing. That through a relationship with nature, you can find your way. Those are deep and incredible things to learn, and there are so many cultures with beautiful messages yet to be celebrated by us all. It makes me very excited."

5. The story that made it to screen addressed a real-life historical event called the Long Pause in which people in the western Pacific Islands took an estimated 1,000-year-long break before continuing to explore eastern Polynesia.

Though the reasoning behind that hiatus has long been debated, filmmakers chose to attribute it to Maui stealing the heart of Te Fiti. As a result, explores began failing to return from their trips, causing others to worry about exploring beyond the reef.

6. To stay true to the spirit of the area, filmmakers put together the Oceanic Story Trust. Made up of anthropologists, educators, linguists, master tattooists, choreographers, haka practitioners, master navigators, and other experts they met during research trips to the Pacific Islands, their role was to advise on all aspect of the region's culture.

7. One switch that was made on their behest involved Maui’s luscious locks. Though he was originally drawn without hair—like Johnson—"The advisers said, 'Maui isn’t bald. He has this long, rich hair that’s part of his mana (spiritual energy),'" Clements told USA Today. “And we all said, ‘Okay, Maui will have hair.'"

8. The change did have some people in the finance department, uh, tearing out their hair. "There’s a certain expense to doing hair like this," noted Clements. "The people in charge of the budget had a slight panic attack because suddenly we had twice as much hair as we had before. In animation, two of the hardest things to do are hair and water. So we had our challenges here."

9. But while Maui may not have had Johnson’s clean shave, the actor did share that the character was “partly inspired by my late grandfather, High Chief Peter Maivia of Samoa.”

10. The initial conceit of Maui’s beloved song "You’re Welcome" involved Moana actually belting out the lyrics, trying to remind the demigod of his accomplishments.

"When she first met him, she idolized him, and when she came upon this down-and-out guy, this mope, she had to get him going and so she sang a song to him reminding him, 'Don't you know you did all these great things?'" Musker explained to EW.

Making the swap—with Maui straight-up bragging about his greatness—not only changed the story, said Musker, but it gave lyricist Lin-Manuel Miranda “way more to write.”

11. Yes, actress Auli'i Cravalho bears a striking resemblance to her onscreen alter ego, but it's pure coincidence. The character of Moana was drawn before she was cast. Some things are just meant to be. 

12. In fact, then-14-year-old Hawaii native Cravalho was the very last actress to audition after casting directors saw hundreds of hopefuls throughout the Pacific Islands.

In a callback, she was asked to react as if she received the part. “They were like, ‘Well, actually, maybe you could play it more like we’re telling you that we were offering you the role,’” said casting director Rachel Sutton. Acknowledged Cravalho, “That was sneaky.” But it did make for a very wholesome look at the making of Moana.

13. As for Hawaii-born Nicole Scherzinger, she was cast as Moana's mom Sina after knocking down some doors. As she recounted in a 2016 interview, "I was like, 'Oh my gosh, get me in the room! I want to be a part of it in any way.'"

14. Pua and HeiHei—included because of the number of pigs and roosters spotted on South Pacific research trips—were voiced by actual animals. While Pua’s sounds all came straight from a real pig, Heihei's voice is a combo of Alan Tudyk voicing rooster noises and real recorded rooster sounds.

15. Heihei may have stolen the show, but originally the oblivious rooster was meant to have more of a companion.

Pua, Moana’s piglet pal, was supposed to join the adventure, but was ultimately left on the beach for their own safety. "I still have mixed feelings about that," Musker told EW. "The pig was supposed to go with her, but we sort of a little bit got talked out of it. They liked Moana being more isolated, stuck with this idiot rooster, and not having the comfort of having the pig with her. There were cute scenes that we don't have."

16. With directors Musker and Clements having inserted animated versions of themselves in previous films (random townspeople in Aladdin, muscle-men in Hercules), they intended to do the same with Moana.

"The original joke was that this cranky rooster was based on John and the pig was based on me," Clements told EW. "But then the rooster…well, he was not stupid originally."

17. In fact, “he started out as kind of a jerk,” writer Jared Bush shared during a 2016 Comic-Con panel. “Heihei had a lot of attitude. Over the course of many different screenings, [we learned] the character wasn't resonating. We started to change just one little thing about Heihei."

And when they did an animation test featuring a more dimwitted version of the rooster, it got the laughs. Said Bush, “Pua is the cutest Disney character, Heihei is the dumbest character.”

20. And those that stuck around after the film’s credits were treated to another Easter egg: A look at Tamatoa, the musical-yet-villainous crab Maui and Moana defeated to retrieve his hook, struggling to get off his back after their battle.

“If my name was Sebastian,” he said, “and I had a cool Jamaican accent, you would totally help me!”