Get ready for the gender-swapped fairy tale of your dreams! Sneakerella is coming to Disney+ with tons of major Young Hollywood stars.
Starring Chosen Jacobs as El, the story is set completely in New York City’s sneaker world. An aspiring sneaker designer, El hides his talent following his mom’s death now that he’s living with his stepfather and two stepbrothers. Things change for the teen when he meets Kira King, played by Lexi Underwood, who is the daughter of fictional basketball legend Darius King, played by John Salley. The two start to bond over their love of sneakers and El gets to courage to start fulfilling his dream of becoming a sneaker designer. Of course, viewers will be graced with some Fairy Godfather magic along the way.
“What I love so much about this story is, obviously, the gender role reversal specifically with Kira. She’s not the damsel in distress waiting to be rescued by a man,” Lexi told J-14 exclusively of her character ahead of the film’s premiere. “She’s smart, she’s relatable, she’s passionate and she’s creative. I feel like that’s really dope to see. Also, just the mere fact that, you know, this is a project that’s about fate and community and passion and love — then also sneakers.”
The Cruel Summer star went on to explain that the “timely” film is also a “love story to New York.” Lexi added, “I’m really excited [about] the fact that this new wave … new generation of kids are going to be able to see this.”
Chosen, for his part, agreed with his costar and gushed over how “timely” and “timeless” the story is.
“It’s not only just a love story between my character and Lexi’s character, Kira, but also, just a love story of learning to love yourself and learning to love your community and learning to love the differences about yourself — and not just the strengths, but the weaknesses,” the IT actor explained. “I think that’s something that’s gonna be timeless.”
As the first-ever Disney+ live-action musical, Sneakerella is set to have tons of original music written by duo Doug Rockwell and Tova Litvin.
“That was just so great because the people we were working on that with we have relationships with, and we love them so much,” Doug told Broadway World in July 2021 of the film. “It was interesting because this was being done during the height of the pandemic, so it was a learning curve. The talent and the actors, they filmed in Canada, they had to quarantine, and that kind of pushed some stuff back. As far as recording, usually we’re in the studio with them, and we had to do it remotely.”
However, the COVID-19 protocols didn’t stop Lexi and Chosen from working on their chemistry. The actress explained to J-14 that the film’s dance rehearsals were “an intimate process,” so it was easy for the Sneakerella cast to become close.
“It’s your costars and a choreographer in a room for hours and hours consistently practicing, trying to get steps right. And with that, you stumble, you fall sometimes, but you also motivate each other, and you lift each other up,” Lexi recalled. “That’s really how we were able to form — all of us — just such a great bond.”
Scroll through our gallery for everything we know about Sneakerella so far.
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