Stefano the Sea Lion

Stefano is a circus sea lion from the movie Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted. He is a hilarious comic character and he’s always bubbling with excitement and enthusiasm and is up for anything. Stefano is a happy, fun-loving Italian sea lion who always looks on the brighter side of things. A true entertainer at heart, he’s up for any challenge to save the circus, even convincing Alex that the show must go on.

Role in the film
Stefano is first seen urging Vitaly to let the troubled Zoosters join the circus, his friendly greetings a vast counterpoint to Vitaly's knife-throwing.

Stefano opens the show in Rome, first telling the Zoosters that they will be blown away. As Stefano goes on juggling balls, he trips and falls, choking on some of them. He gives himself the Heimlich maneuver, hitting an audience member and his fellow performers with the regurgitated spheres. Soon the circus flees with the audience members in hot pursuit, seeking a refund.

When the circus tries to flee Rome, Stefano was almost left behind when he dropped his horns and tried to go back for them, only to end up watching as the angry crowd stomped on them. He could have been stomped on too until Alex quickly went back, scooped him up in his arms, and saved the sea lion, who gratefully thanks the lion with a kiss on his cheek (probably much to Alex's disgust).

That night, Stefano tells Alex (whose name he confused with "Alice," thanks to his Italian accent) to meet him outside the train and watches in both awe and horror as Alex "performs" what he thought was a very skilled "Trapeze Americano" move. When he ran down the carts to find Alex, he thought the lion had fallen off the train but, much to his joy and relief, Alex turned out to be just fine, holding himself between the carts to prevent himself from falling.

He then takes the lion to the cart that had all the circus awards and posters and tells him the backstory of how Circus Zaragoza was once the most popular circus in all the world and Vitaly's life story. But when Vitaly jumped through impossibly small hoops to wow the crowd, he got burned during one fateful attempt with olive oil and a flaming hoop as small as a pinkie ring, the result was that the circus fell into a rut for a long time. Stefano tells Alex that he believes that with the Zoosters' help, they can become number one all over again and goes along with Alex's plan to reinvent the circus.

Following along with the plan, Stefano chooses to become a cannonball with the penguins helping him, while a concerned Marty watches. But when he loses his nerve at the last second, the sea lion gets blown higher than his target and ends up stuck on a cliffside, about to fall off. Marty gets shot out in the same way to rescue him. The zebra enjoys flying so much, he agrees to do the cannonball act with Stefano, forming a fast brotherly partnership with the sea lion.

Later, when they arrive in London, Marty and Stefano fist bump each other as they fly together and performed as proudly as the other circus animals did, winning an American contract to prove how much their circus has reclaimed their fame.

However, when DuBois bursts in, she reveals the Zoosters' secret and the truth is exposed and the penguins took care of her by shooting her out of the cannon. Naturally Stefano, along with the rest of the circus animals, was crushed by this, more than the others, and split up with the Zoosters. However, when they arrive and set up the tent in New York City, Stefano sadly refuses to perform without the animals, especially Marty.

When he learns that Alex, Marty, Melman, and Gloria were ambushed and trapped at the zoo, he went along with the circus-themed rescue with the rest of the circus animals. He shot out of his cannon and stretched a tightrope between the enclosures of Melman and Gloria, allowing them to escape.

After they are saved and before the circus animals could fly away, Stefano, who was left stranded in the zoo, called out to them and begged them not to leave him behind just as Dubois, who emerged from the reptile house furiously, chased after the panicked sea lion. Vitaly tossed his throwing knives for the sea lion to use, but just before the tiger could grab him, DuBois used her rope to catch Stefano and threatened to kill him out of revenge for having her lion head taken away from her. However, Alex and Gia intervene and together, using their trapeze skills, after Marty shot a line, they rescue Stefano and Gia swings him safely over the zoo and right into the arms of Vitaly.

As they watch, Alex confronts the mad animal control officer. Everything of what Alex had lied to them about comes true. The lion gets pulled up from a pool that was filled with aquatic cobras, that escaped from the reptile house, with the help of two dogs wearing rocket skates. Alex throws the vicious and ferocious DuBois in his caged habitat where she is shot with a dart by Mort. He then grabs Gia and flies through a balloon net, causing lots of balloons to fall from the sky and land into the excited hands of children, which causes the overjoyed sea lion to cry tears of joy.

When Alex and Gia return, and after the dogs help Maurice and Mort out, Stefano asks the Zoosters if they want to run away with the circus and, adding to his joy, they agree. Marty also responds by singing "Afro-Circus."

In the end, Stefano is seen dancing to "Afro-Circus/I Like to Move It" with all of his friends while their train chugs all the way across America, continuing their American Tour as one big happy family.

Role in the series
Stefano is said to appear in the series again to put on a circus act for a special celebration. However, he needs to help Fluttershy out on her stage fright.