Disney’s moana live action campaign added a new voice return, with Jemaine Clement set to play Tamatoa again in the final trailer. The release also pushes Catherine Laga’aia’s Moana and Dwayne Johnson’s Maui back into view before the film opens exclusively in theaters on July 10, 2026.
Tamatoa Returns
Clement’s return gives the remake one of the original film’s most recognizable supporting voices. The original Moana grossed over $687 million worldwide in 2016, and the sequel Moana 2 later cleared $1.059 billion, so Disney is not treating this as a routine cast refresh.
The trailer keeps the remake tied to the animated version through specific visuals: Te Fiti, Maui’s transformations into other animals, Maui’s moving tattoos, Heihei, and Pua all appear. That narrows the distance between the two versions and signals that the studio is leaning on familiarity as much as it is on a new live-action frame.
Thomas Kail’s Remake
Thomas Kail directs the film, which arrives less than ten years after the original Moana. That timing is unusual even for a studio that has spent well over a decade remaking classic cartoons in live action, and it gives the project a shorter runway than older library titles that have been reworked after much longer gaps.
Jemaine Clement, Catherine Laga’aia, Dwayne Johnson, and the returning music team of Lin-Manuel Miranda, Opetaia Foaʻi, and Mark Mancina keep the movie close to the 2016 template. The original film’s song “How Far I’ll Go” was nominated for the Academy Award, and the remake now has to sell itself on execution, not just on recognition.
July 10, 2026 Release
The July 10, 2026 theatrical date gives Disney a clear test for how much value it can still pull from a property that already produced a billion-dollar follow-up. For viewers, the practical takeaway is simple: Tamatoa is back, Maui is back, and the studio has shown enough of the recreated world to make clear it expects the remake to trade on the same elements that carried the animated films.
