 John Cleese (qv), Eric Idle (qv), Michael Palin (qv),  Terry Jones (I) (qv), Terry Gilliam (qv) and  Patrick Stewart (I) (qv) were all considered for the role of Zazu.  The role was finally given to Rowan Atkinson (qv) after the  animators watched some episodes of _"Mr. Bean" (1990)_ (qv). They  even modeled Zazus appearance after Atkinson.