insects and arrested by the police. James introduces his friends to the New Yorkers and allows the children to eat up the peach. The peach pit is made into a cottage in Central Park, where James lives happily with the bugs, who form his new family and also find success and fame in the city. Mr. Centipede runs for New York mayor and is now James’ father, Miss Spider opens a club and is now his mother, Mr. Earthworm becomes a mascot for a skin-care company and is now either James' uncle or cousin, Mrs. Ladybug becomes an obstetrician and is James' aunt, Mr. Grasshopper becomes a concert violinist and is now James' grandfather, and Mrs. Glowworm becomes the light in the torch of the Statue of Liberty and is now his grandmother. James celebrates his ninth birthday with his new family and friends. A post-credits scene shows a kid playing an arcade game called Spike the Aunts, which involves the rhinoceros and hitting the aunts in the buttocks. Cast Paul Terry as James Henry Trotter Miriam Margolyes as Aunt Sponge Joanna Lumley as Aunt Spiker Pete Postlethwaite as Narrator/the Magic Man Steven Culp as James' Father Susan Turner-Cray as James' Mother Mike Starr as Beat Cop Voices Simon Callow as Mr. Grasshopper Richard Dreyfuss as Mr. Centipede Jeff Bennett as Mr. Centipede (singing voice) Jane Leeves as Mrs. Ladybug Susan Sarandon as Miss Spider David Thewlis as Mr. Earthworm Miriam Margolyes as Mrs. Glowworm Production At Walt Disney Animation Studios in the early 1980s, Joe Ranft tried to convince the staff to produce a film based on Roald Dahl's James and the Giant Peach (1961), a book that enamored him with its "liberating" material ever since he first read it in third grade. However, Disney refused for reasons of a potentially expensive and difficult animation process and the source material's weird subject matter. Among the animators exposed to the book by Ranft was Henry Selick; while he enjoyed the book and thought about adapting it to screen for several years, he understood the obstacles doing so, such as the source material's dreamy nature, episodic structure, and the reputation of other Dahl books being so agitational some parts of the world banned them. Felicity Dahl, Roald's widow and executor of his estate, began offering film rights to the book in the summer in 1992; among those interested included Steven Spielberg