# Lilo & Stitch (2025 film)

Lilo & Stitch is an upcoming American science fiction comedy film directed by Dean Fleischer Camp and written by Chris Kekaniokalani Bright and Mike Van Waes. Produced by Walt Disney Pictures and Rideback, the film is a live-action animated remake of Disney's 2002 animated film Lilo & Stitch. It stars Maia Kealoha as Lilo Pelekai, with original Lilo & Stitch writer-director Chris Sanders reprising his voice role as Stitch. It also stars Sydney Elizebeth Agudong, Zach Galifianakis, Billy Magnussen, Hannah Waddingham, and Courtney B. Vance, with original cast members Tia Carrere, Amy Hill, and Jason Scott Lee also appearing.
Lilo & Stitch is scheduled to be released in the United States by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures on May 23, 2025.

## Premise

The film tells the story of "the bond formed between a lonely human girl named Lilo and a dog-like alien named Stitch, who is engineered to be a force of destruction. Pursuing aliens, social workers and the idea of the bond of family figure into the proceedings."

## Cast

* Chris Sanders as the voice of Stitch, a blue koala-like illegal alien genetic experiment known as Experiment 626, who is adopted by Lilo. He is described as "[u]nruly, impulsive, and freakishly strong; he's a furry, ugly-cute wrecking ball seemingly bent on destroying everything in his path." Sanders, who created the character, reprises the role he originated in the 2002 animated film.
* Maia Kealoha as Lilo Pelekai, an orphaned six-year-old Native Hawaiian girl "who loves hula, surfing, and wildlife, with a special affinity for all things 'gross'." She is very imaginative yet rebellious, which gets her into trouble often and ostracizes her from her classmates, who consider her a "weirdie". Unlike the original film, which portrayed her and Nani's parents having died relatively recently by that film's events, their parents will have been dead for "a few years" by the remake's events, with Lilo hiding her grief through "relentless, fun loving optimism".
* Sydney Elizebeth Agudong as Nani Pelekai, the 18-year-old sister of Lilo and her legal guardian. She is described as "intelligent, overachieving, athletic, Type A" and a "straight-A student" who has been feeling the increasing pressures of having to take care of Lilo while maintaining her school grades and her job, causing issues with her and Lilo's social worker, with child protective services threatening to separate the Pelekai sisters and put Lilo into foster care.
* Zach Galifianakis as Dr. Jumba Jookiba, the Kweltikwan mad scientist who created Stitch.
* Billy Magnussen as Agent Pleakley, a Plorgonarian agent of the United Galactic Federation and their "expert" on Earth. He is sent down to the planet to prevent Jumba from harming any of Earth's life forms while hunting 626. The official trailer reveals that both Jumba and Pleakley will be using hologram projections when appearing as "human" instead of wearing disguises as in the original continuity, with their actors portraying the characters in their "human" forms and voicing them in their true alien forms.
* Kaipo Dudoit as David Kawena, an 18-year-old Native Hawaiian community college student and surfer who is kind to Nani. He performs the "fire knife dance" at the hotel where he and Nani work at. Kahiau Machado was originally cast in the role, but he was recast shortly thereafter due to his prior usage of a racial slur.
* Tia Carrere as Mrs. Kekoa, a 55-year-old AANHPI social worker who is "a practical, by-the-book kind and patient woman who checks in regularly with Nani", but is nevertheless aware of Nani's struggles to keep up with her duties. Carrere was originally the voice of Nani in the animated continuity.
* Courtney B. Vance as Cobra Bubbles, a social worker in charge of Lilo's welfare.
* Hannah Waddingham as the voice of the Grand Councilwoman, the alien leader of the United Galactic Federation and its council who orders Jumba and Pleakley to capture Stitch after his escape.
* Amy Hill as Tūtū, a Native Hawaiian in her 70s who is the long-time neighbor of the Pelekais and the grandmother of David Kawena. She is described as "a warm, quick-witted woman who speaks with a local Pidgin accent." She is original to this film, as none of David's family members appeared or were referred to during the original animated continuity, nor did Lilo and Nani have close neighbors during said continuity. Hill previously voiced Mrs. Hasagawa in the original film and Lilo & Stitch: The Series.
* Jason Scott Lee as a lūʻau manager. Lee previously voiced David in the original film and Lilo & Stitch 2: Stitch Has a Glitch (2005).

## Production
### Development

On October 3, 2018, it was announced that Walt Disney Pictures was developing a live-action/computer-generated animation hybrid film remake of Disney's 2002 animated feature film Lilo & Stitch. The film was set to be adapted by Mike Van Waes, produced by Dan Lin and Jonathan Eirich, and co-produced by Ryan Halprin. On October 24, 2018, Van Waes revealed that he began to work on the remake's script. On November 13, 2020, Jon M. Chu entered talks to direct the film, while Van Waes was reported to have left the project, with the studio looking for a new screenwriter to re-write Van Waes's script, though Chu would ultimately not direct the film due to other obligations. On July 14, 2022, Deadline Hollywood reported that Dean Fleischer Camp was chosen to direct instead, while Chris Kekaniokalani Bright was in talks to rewrite the script; Bright was fully confirmed to be the writer in February 2023. The day after Deadline Hollywood's announcement of Fleischer Camp and Bright's involvement, Van Waes quote tweeted from Deadline Hollywood's tweet on their article, welcoming Fleischer Camp and Bright to the film's production, possibly indicating that he is still involved with the film; this was later confirmed by the Writers Guild of America West listing both Bright and Van Waes as the film's screenwriters.
The film was given the working title Bad Dog, a reference to the ever-misbehaving Stitch being mistaken for and adopted as a dog, while the new production company established for the film was named "Blue Koala Pictures, Inc." in reference to a typical description of the character's physical appearance.

### Casting

While it was speculated that the original film's co-writer/co-director, Chris Sanders, would reprise his role as the voice of Stitch in the remake, Sanders claimed in a September 2022 interview that Disney had not yet approached him on reprising the role, although he stated that he is always open to returning to voice his creation.
It was reported in November 2022 that a casting call has been issued for the film. The initial casting call was later tweeted on November 22 by the Coalition of Asian Pacifics in Entertainment.
In February 2023, Zach Galifianakis joined the cast in a then-unspecified role. While TheWrap reported at the time that he would voice Pleakley, The Hollywood Reporter contradicted them in April when they reported that Galifianakis was instead voicing Dr. Jumba Jookiba. In late March, Maia Kealoha was cast in the lead role as Lilo Pelekai.
In April 2023, Billy Magnussen was cast as the voice of Agent Pleakley, and Sydney Agudong was cast as Nani Pelekai. Later that month, Kahiau Machado was cast as David Kawena, while Courtney B. Vance was cast as Cobra Bubbles, who fans initially believed was cut from the film's cast of characters. Tia Carrere and Amy Hill, who both voiced roles in the original film and its original sequel material such as Lilo & Stitch: The Series, were cast in new roles, with Sanders in final negotiations to reprise his voice role as Stitch. Sanders ultimately did voice recordings for the film a total of five separate times late into production, doing voice recordings for about four hours each, admitting in a 2025 interview that his "Stitch voice" is difficult to maintain for such a long period. Sanders never went on set during filming, as he was working on his film The Wild Robot (2024) over at DreamWorks Animation at the time of production.
The castings of Agudong and Machado were met with controversy on social media shortly after their announcements, with accusations of colorism and whitewashing towards Disney and the film's casting crew, as the two actors are of lighter skin tones than their characters' original animated counterparts. Sydney Agudong—the older sister of actress Siena Agudong—is a mixed-race woman born and raised on Kaua'i (where the franchise is mainly set) to a Caucasian mother and a father who is Filipino. Agudong received comments on her Instagram account attacking her for accepting the role. After Internet users discovered that Machado previously used a racial slur on his Spotify and Instagram accounts, Disney quietly recast him with Kaipo Dudoit. Machado later posted an apology for his prior use of the slur via Instagram on April 27, 2023.
In June 2023, Jason Scott Lee, who voiced David Kawena in the original film and Lilo & Stitch 2: Stitch Has a Glitch (2005), revealed on the podcast Kyle Meredith With... that he will have a cameo in the film as the manager of the luau where Nani and David work.

### Filming

Principal photography was slated to start in Oahu, Hawaii, on March 13, 2023, and finish on June 16. However, the first day of filming was later delayed to April 17.
On April 16, 2023, a fire broke out in a trailer within the base camp of the film's set in Haleiwa, causing approximately $200,000 in damage. The trailer contained costumes that would have been used for the first three weeks of filming. The fire started before 11 PM HST and was extinguished by 1 AM the following day. There were no reported injuries, although the beginning of filming was delayed indefinitely. The Honolulu Police Department classified it as a first-degree arson and opened an investigation in response.
Filming eventually began by May 1, 2023, when a portion of the Kalanianaole Highway was closed for the film's production. Filming was suspended in July due to the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike. It eventually resumed in February 2024 and finally wrapped in early March that year.

### Visual effects and design

The visual effects are provided by Industrial Light & Magic.

### Music

On February 3, 2025, it was revealed that Dan Romer was at work on scoring the film. The film's soundtrack will also feature songs from the original film, including "Hawaiian Roller Coaster Ride" and Elvis Presley's "(You're the) Devil in Disguise."

## Marketing

A first look at the film's live-action Stitch design was revealed at the 2024 D23 convention on August 9, 2024. Screen Rant and Collider both reacted positively to the reveal. On November 8, 2024, during D23 Brazil, Disney released a still from the film showing Stitch wearing a lei and looking at an out-of-focus Lilo while standing on her bed.
On November 22, Disney published the first teaser poster for the film, featuring an extreme close-up of Stitch. On November 25, Disney released the first teaser trailer, showing Stitch on a beach destroying a sandcastle modeled after Cinderella Castle, as depicted in Disney's production logo. On November 27, the same day of the wide release of Moana 2 (which the first teaser was attached to in theaters), a new poster was shown featuring Stitch with a Kakamora from the Moana franchise in his mouth, alluding to the original film's crossover-based marketing campaign in which Stitch invaded other Disney films. On December 18, two days before the release of Mufasa: The Lion King, another crossover poster and another teaser trailer were released (the latter attached to Mufasa), both showing Stitch being held up in the air in the same vein as the presentation of baby Simba in The Lion King (1994). The trailer shows him, wearing water wings, being held up by a pair of human arms until he struggles out of them to splash in shallow seawater. The accompanying poster has him being held up by Rafiki instead, as with The Lion King "Inter-Stitch-al" trailer for the original Lilo & Stitch film. A TV spot created exclusively to air during Super Bowl LIX was released on February 9, 2025, featuring Stitch seemingly "interrupting" the kickoff by running around Caesars Superdome like a football player. The spot received 173.1 million online views in 24 hours, making it Disney's most digitally viewed spot in the company's history.
The official trailer was released on March 12, 2025, Lilo & Stitch creator Chris Sanders' 63rd birthday, showing several of the characters other than Stitch for the first time. The trailer's release caused Lilo & Stitch to be the #1 trending topic on X (Twitter), YouTube, and Douyin (the Chinese version of TikTok), reaching #1 on the former platform within an hour of release. On March 14, Disney announced that the trailer became the company's second-most viewed live-action film trailer within 24 hours with 158 million views within that time, only behind the teaser trailer for The Lion King (2019) which received 224.6 million views within such time frame.
On March 19th 2025, several posters inspired by past remakes of classic Disney films, including Snow White, Cinderella, Beauty and The Beast, and Aladdin, were released and featured Stitch messing with important objects from each one of the films.

## Release

In November 2020, Variety and The Hollywood Reporter reported that Disney had not determined whether the film would be released theatrically or through Disney+. In November 2022, it was confirmed via a casting call that the film was to be produced for a direct-to-streaming Disney+ release. In August 2024, the film was shifted to a summer 2025 theatrical release. In October, the film was given a release date of May 23, 2025. The release will also include engagements in RealD 3D, Dolby Cinema and 4DX.