History Trivia / Madagascar

* TheWikiRule: [[https://madagascar.fandom.com/wiki/Madagascar_Wiki Madagascar Wiki]].

!!Main franchise

!!First movie
* CelebrityVoiceActor: Creator/BenStiller, Creator/ChrisRock, Creator/JadaPinkettSmith, Creator/DavidSchwimmer and Creator/SachaBaronCohen.
* DescendedCreator: The penguins are all voiced by [=DreamWorks=] employees: Skipper is voiced by animator/co-director Tom [=McGrath=], Private by editor Christopher Knights, Kowalski by animator Chris Miller and Rico by company founder Jeffrey Katzenberg.
* DVDCommentary: With directors Tom [=McGrath=] and Eric Darrell.
* DuelingMovies: One of the most notorious examples. The Disney-released ''WesternAnimation/TheWild'' had been in production for a few years already, but as was usually the case with their early films, Creator/DreamWorksAnimation caught wind of it and set out to (successfully) beat them to the punch. ''Madagascar'' became a hit and ''WesternAnimation/TheWild'', finally released a year later, was immediately written off as a ripoff by those not in the know and just as quickly fell into obscurity.
* KidsMealToy: In Australia, Red Rooster released figures of Alex, Marty, Gloria, Melman, and Skipper.
* PermanentPlaceholder: Animator Tom [=McGrath=] did what was supposed to be a temporary voice track for Skipper. Robert Stack was originally cast in the role, but after his death, Eric Darnell decided to keep Tom's voice in because he liked it.
* TheRedStapler: This film helped bring the seldom seen species from the island of Madagascar to public attention. A few years after the first film came out [[BigApplesauce The Bronx Zoo in New York City]] opened the free ''Madagascar!'' exhibit where Lemurs and Fossa can be seen.
* ThrowItIn
** Originally only an instrumental version of "I Like to Move It" was to be used at the lemurs' party; Cohen then made up his own lyrics to the Reel 2 Reel song and rest is history.
** King Julien was originally just a cameo, with just three lines, but was expanded to a full character when everyone found Cohen's ad-libs and ridiculous accent too funny to cut out.
** Tom [=McGrath=] ad-libbed the line "We killed them and ate their livers." The producers told him he could only keep it if it was clear Skipper was joking.
* WhatCouldHaveBeen:
** In 1998, [=DreamWorks=] had a film idea called "Rockumentary", which featured a [[Music/TheBeatles Beatles]]-esque penguin rock band. The idea was scrapped, but after production on ''Madagascar'' started, the directors decided to revive the penguins, but make them a commando unit instead of a rock band.
** According to the book ''The Art of Madagascar 2'', Maurice was originally going to be the leader of the lemurs. It would've been his idea to have Alex help them with the foosa, and Julien would've been a minor character questioning Maurice's plan.
*** On top of that, Julien was meant to have only two lines of dialogue but when Sacha Baron Cohen was cast, he not only improvised Julien's accent, he recorded eight minutes of dialogue. The production team liked it so much that they made Julien a more prominent character.
** Music/JenniferLopez, [[Music/NoDoubt Gwen Stefani]] and Music/{{Madonna}} were originally considered to voice Gloria.
** Melman was originally supposed to be an okapi, but this was dropped in favor of a more familiar animal, the giraffe. The Valentine's Day special ''Madly Madagascar'' would later feature an okapi that served as Marty's love interest.
** Melman was originally named Henry.
** The Melman/Gloria pairing was originally going to be in the first film. Eventually, it was decided to leave it [[RefittedForSequel until the sequel]], after the audience had gotten to know their characters.
** At one point, Gloria was to be pregnant due to being part of a breeding program (hence why her model has such a huge stomach). She was to give birth during the climax of the first film, resulting in a gag where the penguins were swept away by her water breaking, and Melman would become the baby hippo's adopted father. This was dropped because test audiences found it too mature.
** The musical score was going to be done by Harry Gregson-Williams but was replaced by Hans Zimmer.
** The scene of the penguins making it to Antarctica, only to realize that it "sucks," was originally going to be TheStinger, until the filmmakers decided that they wanted the penguins to come back into the story.
** Some scrapped versions of Gloria's design had her much larger, with one looking more like a realistic hippo and another being similar to her final design, but with [[ExaggeratedTrope an even]] ''[[ExaggeratedTrope larger]]'' [[ExaggeratedTrope rear end]]. Both were passed on due to her being so big it made working with her design impractical.

* DescendedCreator: The penguins are all voiced by Dreamworks employees: Skipper is voiced by animator/co-director Tom [=McGrath=], Private by editor Christopher Knights, Kowalski by animator Chris Miller and Rico by company founder Jeffrey Katzenberg.

* DuelingMovies: One of the most notorious examples. The Disney-released ''WesternAnimation/TheWild'' had been in production for a few years already, but as was usually the case with their early films, Creator/DreamWorks caught wind of it and set out to (successfully) beat them to the punch. ''Madagascar'' became a hit and ''WesternAnimation/TheWild'', finally released a year later, was immediately written off as a ripoff by those not in the know and just as quickly fell into obscurity.

** Melman was originally supposed to be an [[SeldomSeenSpecies okapi]], but this was dropped in favor of a more familiar animal, the giraffe. The Valentine's Day special ''Madly Madagascar'' would later feature an okapi that served as Marty's love interest.

* TheRedStapler: This film helped bring the [[SeldomSeenSpecies seldom seen species]] from the island of Madagascar to public attention. A few years after the first film came out [[BigApplesauce The Bronx Zoo in New York City]] opened the free ''Madagascar!'' exhibit where Lemurs and Fossa can be seen.

* DoingItForTheArt: One joke required a ''million'' leaves to be created for it. ''One'' joke.

* DVDCommentary: With directors Tom McGrath and Eric Darrell.

** Melman was originally supposed to be an [[SeldomSeenSpecies okapi]], but this was dropped in favor of a more familiar animal, the giraffe. Fortunately, the Valentine's Day special ''Madly Madagascar'' featured an okapi that served as Marty's love interest.
*** Also, Melman was originally named Henry.

*** Also, at one point, Gloria was to be pregnant due to being part of a breeding program (hence why her model has such a huge stomach). She was to give birth during the climax of the first film, resulting in a gag where the penguins were swept away by her water breaking, and Melman would become the baby hippo's adopted father. This was dropped because test audiences found it too mature.

* DVDCommentary: With directors Eric Darrell and Tom McGrath.