Between the Spider-Verse movies and KPop Demon Hunters, Sony Pictures Animation has been scoring big lately. So what happens when the studio enlists four-time NBA champion Stephen Curry as producer and voice actor to its team for its latest film? A movie called Goat, which has a lot more connections to the baller than a fun play on the “greatest of all time” acronym.
How Goat Is Inspired By Steph Curry
Ahead of Goat’s theatrical release, CinemaBlend was invited to Sony Animated Pictures in Los Angeles, California to learn more about the making of the new release which we previously heard about at last year's CinemaCon panel. During a Q&A with directors Tyree Dillihay, Adam Rosette and producer Michelle Raimo-Kouyate, they talked about how Steph Curry inspired the story of the film. As Dillihay said:
Steph has been an amazing partner. Number one, he's arguably the greatest shooter of all time… we modeled Will's shooting form after him and the way he plays, but that's just the physicalization of the story. It's more about [if] you’ve ever seen his documentary, Steph came out underestimated, unheralded, but ended up becoming literally the greatest that we've ever seen. I love what he writes on his shoes, ‘All things possible through God.’ That is real for Stephen's story, and we're glad to bring it to life.
The movie follows a young goat who’s been a huge fan of “roarball” (which is practically basketball) ever since his mom took him to his first game as a kid. In his world, only big animals play the sport, and the phrase "smalls don't ball" is commonly said. However, when he’s unexpectedly offered a chance to play for his favorite team, the Thorns, while they are in a rough patch, he has a chance to prove to everyone that any type of animal can play.
As Dillihay shared in the Q&A, the Goat filmmaking team were inspired by Steph Curry’s own professional career when crafting the storyline for the sports movie. The two big things to note is that both Curry and the movie’s protagonist write inspiring lines on their shoes, and have underdog stories.
The Unexpected Character Steph Curry Voices In Goat
Along with Curry having an influence on the storyline of Goat, he also voices one of the main characters in the movie. As Rosette added during the chat:
He is so game for everything. When we're like, ‘Hey, your character, you're going to play the tallest guy.’ He was like, ‘I'm gonna do what?’ We want to play you against character… He is so funny that we were able to just go, ‘OK, like we want you to be a comedic engine in this thing and be you’. It's kind of unfair. He's one of the greatest of all time, he's an NBA champion, he's an Olympic gold winner, and he could do it all.
Curry has proved he’s a great actor in the past for the Peacock mockumentary Mr. Throwback, and he even had the opportunity to do the Space Jam sequel. For Goat, he was asked to play one of the star players, Lenny Williamson, who is a giraffe. While he was understandably surprised about the role, apparently he really impressed the filmmakers. As Raimo-Kouyate shared:
And, he's insanely coachable. The most incredible thing about him, and why he is the goat in all things is because he's so game to work hard and he came into that voice acting session, never having done it before, and he was like, ‘Just coach me, tell me what to do,’ and he listens and he grabs it and he works really, really hard. We felt that and witnessed it firsthand.
Among the rest of the voice cast is Stranger Things Caleb McLaughlin as Will the goat, Gabrielle Union as an all-star roarball player and black panther named Jett Fillmore, Bridgerton’s Nicola Coughlan as an ostrich named Olivia Burke, and Nick Kroll as a Komodo dragon named Modo Olachenko. Goat is on the 2026 movie schedule set to come out next Friday, February 13.
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