Kendall Coyne Schofield discusses how her role as a voice actor in the upcoming Disney and Pixar film Inside Out 2 came to be, and how it's representation that will impact girls like The Mighty Ducks movies impacted her.
Kendall Coyne Schofield discusses how her role as a voice actor in the upcoming Disney and Pixar film Inside Out 2 came to be, and how it's representation that will impact girls like The Mighty Ducks movies impacted her.
When Kendall Coyne Schofield made her official announcement on March 7 that she was voicing a character in Disney and Pixar's Inside Out 2, her PWHL Minnesota teammates reacted in the only way that seemed right.
She walked into Minnesota's locker room just after her posts on social media, and as she stepped foot into their room, her teammates "went nuts."
"They all were screaming. They wanted to know everything I could tell them and more," Coyne Schofield said. "Now they will call me the 'Disney Star' or their 'Disney Star.'"
Sandwiched between playing through the 2022 Rivalry Series and days before the announcement of her pregnancy on March 1, 2023, Disney and Pixar reached out to Minnesota's captain about voicing a character in Inside Out 2 in February of that year.
She remembered watching the original Inside Out and thinking about her experiences growing up playing hockey, making it an immediate ‘yes’ for the PWHL star.
And luckily, the timing of everything happened to work out.
"It worked out that I was not traveling as much as I would have been because of the pregnancy," Coyne Schofield said. "However, there is no doubt that I would have made this work even if I was in the midst of the season and traveling.”
"This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I am so honored to be a part of it and that they even considered me for the role."
The turnaround from query to recording happened swiftly. Coyne Schofield recorded her lines in April of 2023, a couple of months after Inside Out 2's casting director reached out. The studio sent over her lines before she went to downtown Chicago to record — a short trip from her house in the suburbs of the 'windy city' — and got to work.
She met the Los Angeles team virtually over Zoom and put her hockey skills to use throughout the recording process.
"They were coaching me as if they were my hockey coach through the process," Coyne Schofield said. "What they needed more of me, less of me, do more of this, do less of that. Being an elite athlete, you have to be coachable, and it was no different in this setting."
When Coyne Schofield accepted the role and recorded her audio, naturally, she signed an NDA, meaning the only person who knew about her role was her husband. For over a year, she had to sit with the excitement of voice acting in a movie whose precursor she holds dearly to her heart.
When the Oak Lawn, Illinois, product finally announced her participation in Inside Out 2 weeks ago, she felt the same excitement as when Disney's casting director initially reached out to her. With her announcement came an outpouring of support from parents and people on social media sharing their stories.
"[There were] so many parents reaching [saying] my daughter's a Riley, my daughter started playing hockey because of Riley, my son loves this movie, there's a Riley on my team," Coyne Schofield said. "It was a new world for me to hear from so many people how Inside Out has already impacted them, and they can't wait for Inside Out 2 because they know how much it will have on them.”
“Knowing I have a small part in that is cool, and the response was incredible. It was like when I won a gold medal, to be honest."
Beyond how cool it is to be a voice actor in a Disney movie, Coyne Schofield wants to build a legacy by propping up women's hockey and helping grow the sport.
"This is something that will be a part of my legacy for when I'm done playing hockey, and this movie will live on forever and impact people forever," Coyne Schofield said. "As I've gotten older and have played in this game longer and longer, one thing that keeps me going is leaving this game better than when I entered it."
However, Coyne Schofield knows that regardless of which PWHL player emerged as a voice actor for Inside Out 2, it is the representation that matters.
"Whether it's my voice or another player's voice, I think the representation matters," Coyne Schofield said. "Representation is so important, and I give Pixar and Disney so much credit."
Women's representation in sports — hockey in Coyne Schofield's case — was lacking when Minnesota's captain was growing up. The Mighty Ducks was her favorite Disney movie growing up, mainly because it was relatable.
"It was so hard to find women's hockey; it was so hard to find girls and women in hockey when I was a kid," Coyne Schofield said. "I'd watch the Mighty Ducks, and there were girls on the team, and so, I saw myself in those players. Being a couple of girls on an all-boys team and [seeing] how they were treated and how the boys treated them and how the girls treated the boys and [how] they were just one team, it didn't matter, boys or girls.”
By being a headliner in the PWHL and a voice actor in Inside Out 2, Coyne Schofield is helping bring more representation to women's sports because she knows not too long ago, it wasn't as accessible to find players like her on television.
"When times were hard, or people would call me names, or people would tell me to go play sports normal girls play, I'd flip on the Disney Channel and see The Mighty Ducks and be like, nope, there they are, they play right there."
Disney and Pixar’s Inside Out 2 releases only in theaters June 14.