Disney’s animated comedy The Emperor’s New Groove, released in December 2000, had a long, six-year journey from script to screen. Initially entitled Kingdom of the Sun, the film was intended to be a loose reworking of Mark Twain’s classic 1881 novel The Prince and the Pauper. By the time the retitled movie was finally released, many changes had been made. In fact, one of the only things that remained for most of the development process was David Spade as the lead voice actor.
Owen Wilson was attached to play the John Goodman role in the early stages, but was dropped from the production in 1999. Carla Gugino had also been in talks to play a princess at one point before the story got an overhaul. And speaking of overhauls, the film’s original ending had to be completely rewritten at the insistence of Sting, who contributed songs to the movie’s soundtrack.
According to the musician, the film was supposed to end with Spade’s character demolishing a rainforest to build an amusement park—until he threatened to quit over it, saying that it went against what he stood for.
26 Years Ago, Disney Had to Rename Kuzco in ‘The Emperor’s New Groove’ for a Very Awkward Reason
That brings us to Spade’s character, who you might know as Emperor Kuzco. Fun fact: Kuzco went by the name of Manco when the movie was first conceived years earlier. However, producer Randy Fullmer made an interesting discovery somewhere along the way: Manco is awfully close to a vulgar Japanese slang term that basically translates to “c—t.”
While sources cite omanko as the word in question, manko appears to mean the same thing in Japanese.
But at the end of the day, if people were to have even connected the name to the word while the film was still in theaters, it probably would’ve helped its box-office returns. Though The Emperor’s New Groove was well-received, it was considered a financial disappointment. After all the changes it went through, the movie grossed just under $170 million on a $100 million budget. Surely having a character whose name means “c—t” would’ve drawn a lot more attention to it.
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