RAISING THE BAR
Tatum breaks out singing skills for animated ‘Smallfoot’
LOS ANGELES — In Friday's animated “Smallfoot,” yetis, aka the Abominable Snowmen, live happily in remote snowcovered mountain peaks. For Channing Tatum, who voices Migo, the curious, questioning yeti who is the heart of “Smallfoot,” this was an unexpected adventure.
That's because the film opens with Migo's stirring pep rally of a song, “It's a Perfect Day!”
When Tatum, 38, signed on years ago, “Migo singing wasn't in there,” he said. “I was literally not told that that was going to be a part of it.”
Tatum discovered “the different sort of journey” that is making an original animated movie. “Because of the nature of the process of how to make it, you have infinite possibilities.
“You don't have infinite money — but you have infinite possibilities. To watch how the process unfolds, it's really wild.”
But singing, including a duet with Zendaya (“The Greatest Showman”), was a surprise.
“Karey (Kirkpatrick, director, cowriter and songwriter) in his very crafty ways, kept leading me down the path of getting a little more commitment from me.”
Just as soon as Tatum finished his very first recording session, “Karey was, `We're thinking of a big kind of musical number in the beginning and all you'd need to do is — but you could even talk sing. Like just the first line of it. All you have to say is, `What a perfect day!' And then all of the village will kick in. You don't have to do anything else.'” Tatum shook his head and smiled. “As it kept progressing through the years, more songs would be added. He'd let me listen on his phone.
“Only it never really made sense to me because it wasn't somebody saying one sentence — and then the song started. It was one voice singing the entire thing!
“It's not like I'm a vocalist,” he added. “I literally know nothing about singing. I just started singing the song and weirdly enough it was in my range.”
And he pulled it off.