Good news, Disney fans: There’s a brand-new princess in town, and she’s the first one ever of Indian descent! Her name is Ananya, and that’s all that is known, because Disney says we aren’t even close to ready for her and that she will remain safely in Disney headquarters until we are.
Fans have waited a long time for an Indian leading lady, and they are going to have to wait even longer, because Ananya’s movie, which has already been drawn, animated, and finished, will not be released until Disney decides that we deserve an Indian princess.
“When we unveiled Princess Tiana, the first African-American princess, in 2009, we thought the world was ready,” said Disney PR vice president George Wexler. “But we were very wrong. That’s why we’re withholding Princess Ananya. We will not make the same mistake again.”
“It’s really too bad, because when Ananya sings the incredible ‘My Own Woman’ at the film’s climax, it’s an amazing moment that transcends racial background,” added Wexler. “Unfortunately, it will probably be decades before anyone is ready for that.”
Ananya’s movie, currently titled Once Upon A Triumph, follows her travels across India to reunite a precocious lost child with her parents. How she does this, the adventures she goes on, and the cast of characters she meets along the way will be mysteries until Disney makes the call that we are worthy of it.
And it’s not just Ananya that Disney has created and is all set to debut once the world is decent enough to have her.
Disney revealed that it has Vietnamese, Ethiopian, Chinese/Iranian, and Eskimo princesses ready to go. All are fully fleshed-out, dynamic characters with their own feature-length films, complete with original scoring and toy lines. And they aren’t leaving headquarters until Disney thinks America has made the social progress to accept them.
Not only that, but insiders revealed that Disney’s forward-thinking corporate culture goes back to founder Walt Disney, who first doodled Laleh, a transgender princess, in 1928. But Disney realized Laleh could never be given to such a divisive world, so he created a whistling riverboat captain mouse, something he knew audiences could handle. Diverse princesses have been made and kept from the public ever since.
So, how long will we have to wait before Princess Ananya gets released by Disney? It’s tough to say, but Wexler is not optimistic that it will be anytime soon.
“Princess Ananya would be an incredible role model for millions of Indian girls,” Wexler said. “But until our audience is ready for her, just be prepared for tons of white princesses.”
