Shrek Inspired by Russian-French wrestler Maurice Tillet?

Claim:

The character of Shrek was based on the appearance of a Russian-French wrestler named Maurice Tillet.

Rating:

On May 28, 2024, a Facebook user claimed that the character in the film Shrek was inspired by the appearance of a 20th-century Russian-French wrestler named Maurice Tillet.

The Facebook user wrote: “The creator of the popular cartoon Shrek, William Steig, took his character from professional wrestler Maurice Tillet.”

Similar claims appeared on

However, the rumor existed online years before these articles, with Snopes finding examples from 2013, 2012, and 2011. The first iteration we found was on a now-defunct blog called Panterhouse (archived here), which simply referred to Tillet as “Maurice Shrek” in the title of an article published on March 24, 2007. The same day, a Reddit user uploaded a link to the blog post and called Tillet “the REAL Shrek.”

The blogging site Neatorama published a similar article two days later, referencing the Panterhouse and Reddit articles. Neatorama also called Tillet a “real-life Shrek.”

However, Snopes found no evidence that the character of Shrek was based on the wrestler, despite their apparent resemblance. Early online examples of the rumor suggest it originated as hearsay or speculation, which is why we’ve labeled the claim “baseless.”

Snopes contacted representatives of DreamWorks Animation — the production company behind the “Shrek” film franchise — its parent company, NBC Universal, and Amblin Partners — the parent company of DreamWorks Pictures — to find out if the animation was inspired by Tillet and will update this. article if we receive responses.

The “Shrek” film franchise was loosely based on the children’s picture book of the same name, “Shrek!” The book was written by William Steig, who died on October 3, 2003, and therefore could not be contacted to determine whether his character was based on the 20th century wrestler.

Snopes found no evidence that Steig ever described Tillet as the inspiration for his “Shrek!” character, despite numerous media outlets reporting the rumor over the years.

Sources