![]() This is a very interesting thing because it started with Beauty, then Aladdin and now Mermaid. It was so great to work with Javier Bardem on that song and people will hear it as a DVD outtake, I guess. It didn’t remain in the film only because dramaturgically we didn’t really need it. We wrote a fourth song called “Impossible Child” for King Triton. They think it must be Ariel but of course it’s Ursela in the form of Vanessa. It's this harebrained trying to figure out what's going on because they hear rumors that the prince has decided to marry. Then, there was a number called “Scuttlebutt” for Scuttle and Sebastian. One was the Prince Eric song, called “Wild Unchartered Waters.” Then, there was the song for Ariel when she has her legs (doesn't have a voice), and she's singing her thoughts about all the firsts she is noticing for the first time. We discussed with Rob Marshall what he wanted. What was the first song that you did and why? Even though it's a composer, me, and the lyricist, Lin-when we were in the room, all those influences came to band. He's got this, as you know, stylistic brilliance that brings in hip hop and rap, and all old musical forms that help. He understands a lot of things really well. So this was a case where I heard I'm going to be working with Lin, I guess. Sometimes I actually find out something of mine is happening in a press release. He just went to Lin and asked him to work on the movie. Sean Bailey, head of film production at the studio, heard or read one of those interviews. What happened was Lin gave a lot of interviews about just that. So I’m wondering how the collaboration for this movie actually happened? Turning to The Little Mermaid, the story about Lin-Manuel Miranda is fascinating because he worshipped you as a kid. I am going to stop there.Ĭan you believe Aladdin is celebrating nine years on Broadway? We are recording with the artists who are doing it: Rachel Zegler, Javier Bardem, and Nicole Kidman. So there's been a lot of work in trying to make it more of a traditional musical and people pushing me to be more ambitious in a certain way. Some of the team have never written musicals before. For me, it's a great return to work again in animation. Chris Montan, who was the head of music and animation at Disney from The Little Mermaid, to Tangled and Frozen is the musical supervisor. I'm collaborating with Glenn Slater on the songs. But it's a theme that affects all of us in a contemporary way. ![]() ![]() I am not going to talk about the central theme because it's all hidden in a fairy tale which involves a spell. Number one because it is an ever-evolving project. I thought, Was he the same Lin-Manuel Miranda? And now we’re collaborating! I’ve been amazed watching what he’s become in the world.” Then one day that little boy was a writer who had a new show called In the Heights. “He was asking questions about it, wanted me to sign posters, and was just fanatical about it. “My niece went to Hunter School and I would hear about this little boy named Lin-Manuel Miranda who loved The Little Mermaid,” he recalls to Vanity Fair. But first is the live-action version of The Little Mermaid, starring Halle Bailey as Ariel and premiering in theaters on May 26, a project that led him to work on some new songs with Lin-Manuel Miranda. The fully animated feature Spellbound is expected at the end of the year, and he tells Vanity Fair that there’s another musical project in the works. Disenchanted, the sequel to Enchanted for which he cowrote the music along with Stephen Schwartz ( Wicked), debuted on Disney+ last fall. Today, at 73 years old, Menken shows no signs of slowing down. Hercules, which Disney released in 1997 and Menken worked on with lyricist David Zippel, just wrapped up a regional run in New Jersey, and will move on to premiere in Germany, while Aladdin (which also featured lyrics by Tim Rice, who helped finish Aladdin’s songs following Ashman’s death) is currently celebrating its ninth anniversary on Broadway at the New Amsterdam Theatre. With lyricist Howard Ashman (Menken’s collaborator until Ashman’s death in 1991), Menken was a driving force behind Little Shop of Horrors, which premiered off-off Broadway in 1982, and more than 40 years later is still playing at New York’s Westside Theatre. His canon has paved the way for modern-day animated musicals like Frozen and Encanto, and influenced a generation of songwriters working in film, musical theater, and beyond. As the composer behind The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin, Alan Menken has created some of Disney’s most recognizable scores and songs.
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