Wild Life

Wild Life was a CGI film directed by Howard Baker and Roger Gould  at that was being developed at The Walt Disney Company in the late 1990s, but was shelved in 2000. It was to have been a satire of 70s American pop culture and would've paid homage to popular figures at the time such as Andy Warhol, Anna Wintour & Diana Vreeland.

Plot
Red Pittsain, the owner of a prestigious nightclub is quite distressed because Kitty-Glitter, his once-beloved diva pop sensation has dwindled in popularity. Without a star attraction, everyone will go to the club owned by Magda, editor of "Magazizi",   the city's most popular fashion-magazine and Red's biggest rival. Needing something big to regain the reputation their club once had, Red and Kitty find it in Ella: an elephant from the local zoo who is able to talk. However, things do not go well for Ella at first because she doesn't think she is good enough to be a star. In fact, she starts to have second thoughts about performing.

Although, one night, while attempting to plug in a neon sign, the elephant is electrocuted and knocked unconsious. When she comes to, Ella is now under the impression that she is a famous pop singer and quickly rises to fame, much to Kitty and Red's delight. However, by the end of the film, Ella decides that the glamourous life she's been leading is not for her and returns to the zoo. Meanwhile, Red and Kitty, who have fallen in love over the course of the film become a couple.

Development
Wild Life began production in 1999, under a team of animators that included Hans Bacher, Floyd Norman Jim Hill, George Mac, Doug Walker, Craig Kellman, Buck Lewis   and  Darryl Kidder, who also served as head of story. In the words of Jim Hill, the directors were hoping to create something that would really "knock the socks off the competion." However, because they wanted to give it a mature edge and wrote some adult-oriented humor into the script, the animators often worried that Disney would not want to release the film. This constant fear was realized when after viewing the presentation reel that fall, Roy Disney, then vice-chairman of the board, stated he was appalled at the mature humor and ordered the film to be shut down.

Trivia
Alan Cumming and Kathy Bates were cast as the voices of  Red Pittsain and Magda, respectively, while Debra Messing was being consdered for the voice of Kitty Gliiter

Had it been released, "Wild Life" would've predated Chicken Little as the first fully-CGI film that Disney produced without the assistance of Pixar.