Nintendo Creative Fellow Shigeru Miyamoto appeared at the September 2021 Nintendo Direct to reveal the release date and full main cast of the Super Mario movie being made with Minions animation studio Illumination — and Chris Pratt is Mario. Believe it or not, Chris Pratt as Mario is actually one of the more normal parts of the Super Mario movie cast reveal though. Charlie Day is Luigi, for example. Meanwhile, Anya Taylor-Joy is Peach, Jack Black is Bowser, Keegan-Michael Key is Toad, Seth Rogen is Donkey Kong, Kevin Michael Richardson is Kamek, Fred Armisen is Cranky Kong, and Sebastian Maniscalco is Spike. Those are some pretty eye-opening choices all around, except perhaps Taylor-Joy as Peach, and it’s surprising but not shocking to see Donkey Kong in a Mario movie.
Fortunately, even though Chris Pratt is cast as Super Mario himself in this movie, Charles Martinet will still feature in the movie in various cameo roles. Martinet is the famous actor who has portrayed the voice of Mario (and Luigi, and others) for Nintendo in the video games since the 1990s, and his voice can even be heard at Super Nintendo World at Universal Studios Japan. Longtime fans will tremendously appreciate this goodwill gesture.
The Illumination Super Mario animated movie will arrive in holiday 2022, but in North America specifically, the release date is December 21, 2022. That should be enough time to let it sink in that Chris Pratt is Mario and Charlie Day is Luigi.
