Here me out: while Aladdin’s incoming negative reviews can’t be laid at the feet of Will Smith. I think his casting had most of us surprised and not necessarily excited. And while I’ve heard he isn’t awful in this movie I think the shoes Robin Williams and for that matter James Monroe Iglehart (the guy who fantastically played the Genie on Broadway) left deserved more than “not awful”.

I think when casting the Genie the production should have gotten more creative. Everyone heard the rumors of The Rock circling the project and now we have good ol’ mainstream Will Smith. Robin Williams was certainly far from what was expected for Genie the first time around though. That being said, I think the creative team should have made a bold choice and decided to cast a woman. And what woman would be better than Whoopi?

She has a large personality like Robin and Will, as well as a unique comedic style that won’t rely on impersonating Robin. I think one downside might be she’s a little old but I think the wise cracking-older Genie would have really worked. After all, wasn’t he trapped in that lamp for 1,000 years? Or was it 10,000 years?

Finally, if you aren’t sold yet, Whoopi was a close friend of Robins and performed with him many many times. It would have been a great way to subtlety and respectfully pay homage to the man that made this story iconic.

Casting Whoopi would have been the perfect combination of forward thinking and different as well as classic and comfortable. Everybody loves Whoopi. Whoopi loved Robin. We loved Robin. Robin loved comedy. Whoopi is good at comedy.