As to those saying that the Golden age era of movie musicals used dubbing, I'm of course well aware of that, it did happen, but it's not like it ran rampant. Most of them did their own singing with some exceptions.
Now that is double edged sword...sort of. Back then, we didn't have info at our fingertips within 10 seconds. People didn't know that Deborah Kerr and Audrey Hepburn were being dubbed by Marni Nixon, queen of Hollywood vintage musicals. You had ttosearch far and wide to find out if someone was being dubbed and search even further for WHO that voice was. The voice doing the dubbing was always kept under wraps as much as possible. This is a day and age where this is not possible nor practical thanks to the tech age of finding info you need in seconds flat.
To dub singing voices in live action movie musicals would absolutely not be tolerated or accepted today, it'd be stupid to try, but for the love of the Muses...cast someone who can sing then! Not that La La Land was impressive at all, but there's no way that movie would have survived without those two. No they're not singers but it would have flopped otherwise. Though I still wish they cast actual singers and dancers.
But this the Disney B and the B for crying out loud...to say it needed star power, at all...is inane. It would have made a ton of money no matter who was cast, but Disney knows they can make a "billion" rather than a decent "million" by casting Emma and add some Downtown peeps, Olaf, the other Emma, and actual MT stars to surround Emma with. Why make only a million when a billion can be made? This is what pisses me off. It's nothing but a money grab at best by casting Emma. Yes, I know the argument of why this movie is existing at all also stands, but this is one I don't mind at all, I'm still enthused to see it, but dammit...why couldn't they just cast someone who could do this role it's proper justice and cast bigger names around her? Hairspray did this, and it turned out just fine and that was when the world of musicals hadn't come back into popularity again yet, so why do studios still feel the need to pull casting like this when musicals have come back into popularity, and more than they've ever been? Now that musicals are the 'cool thing' again, I don't see why stunt casting is still felt to be necessary. If Hairspray could cast correctly when musicals weren't at its peak, then so can others.
Ill repeat, I love Emma dearly, and she's a decent actress in her own way, but she.is.not.a.singer.
of course this leaves out separating speaking and singing voices for animated musicals, which is more acceptable to do in that medium but I thank Lasseter quite a lot lately for being absolutely insistent on finding voices who can do both unless they truly can't find what they need in a voice actor. Only separate singing voice from speaking in this modern era that I can think of is Chris Jackson in Moana. Everyone did their own singing in Sing...so I really don't think there's an excuse for not casting someone who can do both anymore.
Updated On: 1/9/17 at 09:27 AM
