We spoke to Hoppers star Piper Curda about everything from talking animals to saving the world. Curda voices Mabel Tanaka, a tenacious animal loving college student who uses technology to ‘hop’ her consciousness into a robotic beaver with the ability to communicate with other animals. Her character befriends and gains the trust of the local animal kingdom to rally them to save her local glade from being torn down by Mayor Jerry (voiced by John Hamm).
Hoppers is directed by Daniel Chong and also features the voices of Bobby Moynihan, Kathy Najimy, Dave Franco, Aparna Nancherla, and Meryl Streep. The film will be released in theaters on March 6, 2026.
Daphne Mangin: Other than a beaver, what animal would you like to hop into?
Piper Curda: I would hop into a puffin.
DM: Do you have any pets?
PC: Oh yes I do! I have a dog. Her name’s Belly and she’s perfect. She’s not named after any TV characters. I found her in a gas station in Arizona. When I walked up to her, she would just fall onto her back like this and I was like, “Oh my god, is something wrong with it?” And she still does that now after four years of luxury. So her name’s Belly and she’s perfect in every way.
DM: So if you could ask Belly one question and she could understand and answer back, what would you ask her?
PC: Do you like me? [laughs] No she’s obsessed with me. I’d probably be like, “How can I make your life better?” Or what do you mean when you’ve gone out and your bowl is full of food and your other bowl is full of water and you’re sitting there looking at me whining? I’d have her explain that to me.
DM: I’m a dog mother too I get it.
PC: Yes! You’re like what I’m doing everything I can!
DM: If you could cast an actor to voice Belly, who are you casting?
PC: What a good question. You know, for whatever reason in my head, I’ve always pictured Belly having a Transatlantic accent. So one of the old film starts or Jimmy Stewart [laughs] Anyway something like that, a film noir star that’s definitely dead now, they would voice Belly for sure.
DM: Ooh she’s a classy lady.
PC: Yeah [laughs]
DM: I feel like for every generation there’s a movie that kind of opens their eyes to environmental issues and I feel like this movie could do that for a lot of kids. Was there a movie that did that for you as a child?
PC: Oh yeah. I mean, Wall-E. That was a big one for me. I was like, “Oh my god that’s the world we’re going to live in in ten years if we don’t do something?” Definitely that and the song “Wake Up America” by Miley Cyrus. It’s on her first double CD album, Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley Cyrus. It’s a song about the environment and I love it and that really struck me as a kid for some reason. Well it’s because I really love Miley Cyrus and I was like Miley loves the environment, I love the environment.
DM: It’s great how it makes such a great impact on you as a kid.
PC: Yeah and I love nature independently of that. I’m a big advocate for national parks and land preservation and leave no trace. I think it’s so cool that I get to be part of a movie like this that kind of champions a lot of that.
DM: If I’m not mistaken, is this your first voice acting role?
PC: It’s the first one of this scale for sure. I did a pilot and then a few episodes of a show on Disney XD over ten years ago.
DM: Can you tell me about what the audition process was like and were there any challenges you faced from it versus traditional acting?
PC: The audition process was really interesting because it’s Pixar so everything was done in a really particular way that I’ve never been privy to until now. Daniel, the director, was basically told, “Alright, make a list of 10-15 names of people that you want to see audition for Mabel.” So if Daniel didn’t know your name, then it wasn’t on the list. For whatever reason, this is still just a rumor to me, I never actually confirmed this with him, but someone told me he found me on TikTok which makes me want to die a little bit. I think he just saw my stuff and I’m just me on TikTok and liked it for whatever reason and was like, “This could be Mabel.” [He] threw me on a list. I get this nondescript email that’s like “Untitled,” “Top Secret,” “Details under wraps.” I knew nothing about the character and I hop on this Zoom with Daniel and he pitches this movie to me. It all didn’t feel real. Quite honestly, until a trailer came out, nothing about this felt like it was a real thing. I went in, we recorded the whole movie, I spent so much time up at Pixar and I was still like, “Maybe this movie will come out, but there’s also a very high chance that it gets shelved forever and it never sees the light of day and nothing ever happens.” I don’t know why I thought that was gonna go on— I do know why actually, it was because I was told I didn’t get the job first before I was told I got the job. So I think after that, I thought it could go away at any second, which probably made my work better, but yeah it was just an unreal experience kind of as a whole.
DM: And now here we are at press day.
PC: Yeah, I know right? I’m going to blink and be back in my bed and be like, “So none of that really happened.”
DM: You mentioned earlier about being an advocate for the environment. Are there any other qualities of your character that you feel mirror yours?
PC: Yeah absolutely. Her rage. Her sometimes inability to deal with all of the emotions she has and what she wants to do to make the world a better place. I think I relate to that a lot. I think a lot of people relate to that a lot and I think often times you see Pixar characters deal with hard things, but I feel like a majority of the time they’re outside forces that are making things hard for them. There is absolutely some of that in this movie like with Mayor Jerry, but so much of what Mabel has to overcome is within her. I think that that’s really cool because I know I dealt with it. So many other people and other kids that are just dealing with emotions and that’s just it. I think having someone like Mabel represent that emotional turmoil is really cool and hopeful feel like an arm around your shoulder. Like you’re not alone man, everybody’s going through it—even Mabel, even Pixar characters!
DM: Is there a scene in particular you’re excited for audiences to see without giving away too much?
PC: Oh yeah the scene I’m so excited for is one I cannot talk about. It is specifically has been told to me that I’m not allowed to mention this for good reason. People are going to know what it is when they see the movie and I’m sure you know what I’m talking about, but I’m very excited for people to see that. The first time I saw that scene, my reaction was literally like, “Ahhh!” So I just feel like there’s going to be a theater full of people with that reaction and I’m very excited for that.
DM: I know exactly what you’re talking about. Everybody in my theater was like, “Oh…. Did we just see that?” [laughs]
PC: Like are you guys allowed to do that?! And they were like [shrugs]. So here we go [laughs]
