Meledandri also addressed complaints about Pratt voicing an Italian character when he is not Italian—as if Super Mario is held up as some prime example of Italian culture like Leonardo da Vinci or Sergio Leone or Eugenio Barsanti (co-inventor of the internal combustion engine!) and not just a silly stereotype created by Japanese people.
Charles Martinet isn’t even Italian and he’s been doing a pretty damn good job for the last few decades voicing Mario and Luigi and Wario and Waluigi.