Credit: Neil Zlozower
Wendy Dio, the widow and longtime manager of rock legend Ronnie James Dio, recently said her late husband had considered creating an animated movie in the 80s, using the voice of David Lee Roth for the main character. The main character was a demonic beast named Murray.
Here’s the excerpt from Wendy’s recent appearance on The Metal Voice with Jimmy Kay:
JK: Do you remember, and how true is this? Ronnie had a movie in his mind to make…
WD: Yeah.
JK: He wanted to make an animation movie, correct?
WD: Yeah.
JK: He wanted David Lee Roth’s voice to be the main character. Do you remember this?
WD: Yes I do! [laughs]
JK: Is this true?
WD: This is true. This is very true. I think he was working on [his 2000 album] “Magica” then to be a trilogy, which unfortunately didn’t work out. I don’t know if that…I don’t think that’s the one he wanted David Lee Roth to work on but…
JK: No, no. I think that was…I think the David Lee Roth one was in the 80s…
WD: Yeah. He wanted a cartoon. A story of Murray! [laughs]
[NOTE: Murray was the name of the monstrous mascot Ronnie created for his band Dio. It was first seen choking a priest with iron chains on the cover of 1983’s Holy Diver album and would later appear on several future Dio albums.]
JK: I think it was a Middle-Earth…
WD: Yeah!
JK: Again, I’m going right from memory here but I think…
WD: Yeah, it was Middle-Earth. Yup.
JK: How far did he get up to that, in that project. It was just maybe, just on paper? Was it something that he was just kinda…
WD: I don’t think he even got to paper. Ronnie was very much [into] doing one thing at a time, you know. He’d be asked to do something but if he was on a tour, he could only do that. If he was home, he was writing songs and he was doing that, so he didn’t multitask very well.
JK: But he wanted to David Lee Roth to sing or at least…I don’t know if it was supposed to be a musical or just a speaking movie…
WD: It was a musical. A musical.
JK: It was going to be a Middle-Earth musical and David Lee Roth he wanted as the main character! [laughs]
WD: That’s right. It was going to be the story of Murray and Murray is the name he gave of that monster drowning the priest.