Behind the Scenes of New #LAVA Short to Open Before #PixarInsideOut

I was invited on an expenses paid trip to CA by Disney to cover #PixarInsideOut and #Lava in exchange for my posts of the trip experiences. All opinions are my own.

When I was in San Francisco in January I had the chance to visit Pixar Studios for an inside look at Pixar’s Inside Out as well as the new LAVA short that will open before it. It was so much fun being able to see the studios where some of my favorite movies have been created.

I got to get a picture in front of the iconic Pixar Lamp! It even lights up at night, how fun is that?!

I also ran into a few familiar Pixar friends while I was there. I couldn’t resist getting a selfie with my buddy Mike Wazowski!

They fed us a fantastic dinner, we shopped at the Pixar store and then it was time to sit down with Director James Ford Murphy and Producer Andrea Warren to talk about the LAVA short that will play before Pixar Inside Out this June. James played the Ukulele for us and sang part of the song from the short. Then he told us we would be watching Lava and gave us this warning “I will warn you that what you’re about to see is an image of an extreme Tropical Nature. You may feel inspired to take a Hawaiian Vacation and we will not be held responsible for that.” LOL! We watched Lava and I thought it was so sweet and such a unique idea for a short. It is definitely something people will come away from feeling happy.

James then told us that he was the one who came up with the idea for the short. And he shared this Pixar fun fact with us “I don’t know if you know this about Pixar but anyone can pitch ideas for Short Films. And the idea is you can’t just pitch one. You have to pitch 3 ideas.” So if you plan on pitching an idea to Pixar for a short film make sure you have 3 awesome ideas.

So what inspired James to come up with the idea for this Lava short? James said “I was a huge Elvis Presley Fan and I think Elvis had a fascination with Hawaii and I was exposed to that but it wasn’t until my wife and I got married and we went to the big island for our Honeymoon that I really fell in love with Hawaii, Volcanoes, and particularly Hawaiian Music.”

After the idea was approved by Pixar James new he needed to find the perfect Hawaiian singers for the short. “I searched and I listened to every single Singer that was available in Hawaii” said James. He eventually chose Kwana Torres Vehele from Jilo and Napula Grey from Maui to be the singers in the short. James said of the singers, “They’re wonderful and it turns out that they actually grew up together and they were in Hula School together as kids. They call themselves Hula Brothers and Sisters.”

“I think it gave them such natural, wonderful Chemistry when we were in the Studio together. They were having so much fun between takes and were talking about each change and how they wanted it to be. They were laughing and we just had a great time.” Andrea said about the chosen singers.

There are two volcanoes featured in the short and they have names that when said together have a fun meaning. James told us “Uku is the Lava Volcano and Leila is the Female Character. And then together, they’re the Island of Ukulele.”

Andrea shared with us what it is like to work at Pixar, she said “something that is just so incredibly rewarding about working here at Pixar is how collaborative everybody is.”

I know everyone is going to enjoy LAVA after seeing it. Take a look at this small part of the LAVA short to see a little bit of why I enjoyed it so much.