John C. Reilly obce thought animation was like "boring day at work"

The 'Step Brothers' star has had his opinion changed about the genre since voicing the titular character in the Rich Moore-directed motion picture, and while he has turned down a number of animation projects over the years, he was attracted to the Disney film because of the "pedigree of the studio".

He said: "It took me a little while to sign on. I wanted to make sure I was going to really be able to believe in the project, and be able to really put my heart into it, instead of just plugging in like a hired hand. I've been offered a lot of animation in the past and it just seemed really kind of like a boring day at work, actually.

"You go in, and a lot of times they don't even give you the whole script. 'Yeah, just read this page. Don't worry.' 'Faster, slower, OK, now a funny one.' And then you go home and all the creative part is done without you there. So I passed on a lot of stuff over the years.

"It was really just the chance to work on a Disney film. Let's face it, it's not every day that someone comes up to me saying, 'Oh, do you want to play the lead in a Disney animated film?' Just the pedigree of the studio and the director's work was enough to get me interested."

While he hasn't done many animation movies in the past, John revealed he once voiced a whole film with Jack Black which has never been released due to financial issues.

He added to Mania.com: "Jack Black and I once recorded a whole animated movie on spec. They were just trying to get the money together, and all the characters were designed and everything, and the script was written, and then it went nowhere. But it's still recorded out there somewhere."