There are a lot of talking dog movies, right? And Walt [Becker, director], I’m going to blow some air right now. It was just a joy to work with Walt, and Walt always had the perception that Clifford needed to be real. And so, like in the book, where you had a line drawing and a red dog that you could imagine and take into your heart, the standard sitting in the theater with something that’s live is it has to feel alive at all times. The moment you start speaking in English, or in French, or in German, or in Portuguese, whatever, he’s not real anymore. He’s a character in an animated movie. And that’s not what we set out to make. And again, that’s sort of, you know, [original author] Norman Bridwell sitting on our shoulders, saying, ‘Don’t screw this up and do it the right way.’ It was trying to make it real. So no, he doesn’t speak… he doesn’t have any gross sort of silly comic reactions.
