He’s not appeared in a cinematic musical since then, but now, 20 years later, he’s found the perfect excuse to belt out some tunes again. As Butler explained to Zavvi, he wasn’t consciously looking to return to the genre, but when the opportunity to appear in animated festival musical The Nightmare Before Christmas In Wonderland came up, he realised it was something he’d been missing.
He said: “As an actor, I’m always on the lookout for something different that will take me by surprise. In this case, a musical wasn’t what I was looking for, but I had been missing singing a little bit; I was very busy when I read the script, but it grabbed me, I was like a dog with a bone and couldn’t let it go.
“I knew from the second I read it that there was something special about it. I love Peter Baynton, the director and animator, and I thought the music was tremendous – it was something special and different with a great message, and it was an opportunity I knew I needed to take.
“I'm not good when I miss opportunities like this; when I can’t do a project and see it come out, I’ll often think that should have been me onscreen! I’m so happy I got to make this, because even if nobody saw it, I had the best time making it, just a bunch of us in a room having an absolute blast, and you can see that coming out in the story.”
Butler leads the film as St. Nick, who travels to Wonderland on Christmas Eve after receiving the Christmas list from the Queen of Hearts (Emilia Clarke). What he doesn’t realise is that this was lost in the post many years before, and in retaliation, she’s banned Christmas throughout the kingdom – making him persona non grata when he shows up with his fleet of reindeer in tow.
It’s a simple story aimed at young audiences, but filled with enough humour and catchy tunes that parents may find themselves charmed too. It’s director Baynton’s follow-up to his Oscar-winning animated short The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and The Horse – which first premiered on the BBC on Christmas Eve two years ago – but this won’t leave viewers in floods of tears like that one did, acting as a comedy first and foremost.
Butler’s characterisation of Santa is fundamental to this approach, which he describes as bringing to life the universal perception people have of the character.
He continued: “This is St Nick as how you want him to be; he takes his job very seriously, but he loves it. He’s a rock star, but he has self-awareness. He’s stupid, but in the nicest way, and he makes people crazy because he is so head strong, but it’s easy to forgive because his only motivation is making people happy.
“There’s a ditziness to him, as he doesn’t see the consequences to his actions for everybody around him, but there’s a joy he still puts in everybody’s eyes. He’s the kind of guy you want to hang out with.
“I could feel a lot of that characterisation intuitively when reading the script, and I didn’t want to overthink the performance. I was only in the booth for a few days, but I had the best time, and you can see that on the screen – you can feel the fun everybody had, from the performers and the composers right down to the animators.”
Another thing Butler opted to not overthink was the fact that this festive mash-up could be the first time a new generation of kids encounters the world of Lewis Carroll. For their parents, it’s a fresh spin on Alice In Wonderland – but for young ones, this might be their first glimpse of Alice, the Mad Hatter and the Queen of Hearts.
“The weird thing for me is that, even though it merges two stories, it stays faithful to the characters and the worlds they live in. Santa is how you expect him to be when hanging out with Alice, and the Queen of Hearts is just as wicked as ever, and it all took me back to being a child again – which I think you’ll hear in my performance, as Santa is a bit of a child!
“I didn’t treat this like a normal film, as when I read it, it struck me in a more powerful way that reminded me of the animated movies I grew up loving. It wasn’t exactly the biggest movie I was making, and it was almost at the point that it wasn’t going to work because of my schedule – by that point, I told the producers I’d pay them to be in it, as I didn’t want to let this go.
“There was something in it where I knew I just had to be a part of it. Not only do you get the magic of two stories for the price of one, but it also teaches a lesson about what life is about, especially at this time of year.”
The actor hopes this will become annual viewing for families everywhere, in large part because he himself has long been looking for a new Christmas movie he can watch every December.
“I grew up watching The Wizard Of Oz every Christmas, and in recent years, I’ve loved Bad Santa, Elf, Miracle At 34th Street and Scrooged, but recently I haven’t had one that I’d sit down to watch at this time of year. It’s another reason why I thought it’d be nice to make one; I don’t really know Christmas movies now, and I wanted to make one that would be fun for everybody to watch.
“This brings people together, it has an infectious fun to it that bonds people – the atmosphere is always great in the room after a screening. Even when I talk about it, I feel more like an audience member than an actor; I really don’t think anybody will regret diving into this at Christmas.”
The Night Before Christmas In Wonderland is released on Sky Cinema and NOW on Friday, 13th December.Shop all things Christmas.
