How Disney's Haunted Mansion (2023) & The Princess And The Frog Are Connected
As is typical for projects based on well-known intellectual property, Disney's 2023 "Haunted Mansion" film is full of Easter Eggs and small details that both gesture toward its theme park ride source material and various pop cultural ephemera. Among its links to other movies is an allusion to the 2009 animated Disney release "The Princess and the Frog."
Observant viewers will notice an explicit reference to the prior Disney film in "Haunted Mansion" when, soon after its start, Gabbie (Rosario Dawson) and her son Travis (Chase W. Dillon) are first moving into the mansion she recently purchased. Transporting their personal belongings is a large U-Haul trailer on the side of which is a cartoon image. Fans of "The Princess and the Frog" will recognize the character depicted on the trailer as none other than the villainous witch doctor Dr. Facilier (voiced by Keith David from "The Thing" in the original film).
Disney devotees know that this isn't the first link between these two properties, however, but a response to a direct reference "The Princess and the Frog" makes to the Haunted Mansion ride.
Madame Leota's headstone briefly shows up in The Princess and the Frog
The first official link between "Haunted Mansion" and "The Princess and the Frog" occurs during a scene near the end of the latter film that takes place in a graveyard. At one point likenesses of faces on three gravestones spring to life, one of which is virtually identical to the headstone of psychic medium Madame Leota in the Haunted Mansion Disneyland ride. Of course, Madame Leota plays a big role in the new "Haunted Mansion" movie, portrayed by Jamie Lee Curtis in this incarnation.
A TikTok video pointing this out in 2020, well prior to the new "Haunted Mansion" movie's release, received more than 14 thousand likes, seeming to indicate that a large number of Disney fans were amazed and/or delighted by this connection. The video also notes that, whereas "The Princess and The Frog" takes place in New Orleans, the Haunted Mansion building is in the New Orleans-themed section of Disneyland called New Orleans Square, likely inspiring the decision to unite these two properties.
Given this altogether outsized response to just one video highlighting the first time "The Princess and the Frog" and "Haunted Mansion" crossed paths, it's unsurprising that Disney incorporated the likeness of Dr. Facilier into "Haunted Mansion" 14 years later.