Like his original character in Hugo's novel, Frollo adopts Quasimodo as his son and lusts after the Romani girl Esmeralda to the point of obsession and resolves that she will belong to him or he will execute her.

A Roma woman in the group attempts to flee with her deformed baby, but Frollo kills her outside Notre Dame Cathedral, when she sought sanctuary to escape from him.

He names the child "Quasimodo" (meaning "half-formed"), and teaches him that the world outside the cathedral is a sinful place full of people who would hate and shun him for his deformity, even lying that his mother had tried to drown him and that Frollo saved him from this fate.

Twenty years later, in the Palace of Justice, Frollo appoints a new Captain of the Guard, Phoebus, stating his intent to eradicate the city's Romani population by discovering their sanctuary, the "Court of Miracles".

In the fireplace chamber of the Palace of Justice, Frollo lusts after Esmeralda and, through song, begs the Virgin Mary to save him from her "spell"; he then resolves that she will be his, or she will die, asking God to have mercy on both of them.

When Frollo learns that Esmeralda has escaped Notre Dame, he instigates a citywide manhunt for her, capturing and bribing Romani and burning countless houses in his way.

Phoebus releases the captured Roma, rallying the citizens of Paris against Frollo and his men, and Quasimodo pours molten lead around the cathedral to protect it.

Frollo was voiced by Tony Jay, whom directors Kirk Wise and Gary Trousdale chose for the role based on his brief appearance as Monsieur D'Arque in their previous film, Beauty and the Beast (1991), and animated by Kathy Zielinski.