June 21 - The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Image copyright Disney

On this day, in 1996, Walt Disney Pictures widely released its 34^th animated feature The Hunchback of Notre Dame, two days after its world premiere at the New Orleans Superdome. The idea for adapting Victor Hugo’s epic novel came in 1993 to David Stainton, one of Disney’s development executives, after reading one of those Illustrated Classic comic book versions (feel free to insert your own jokes here about the reading levels of corporate clowns, but it was actually David’s job to read that kind of stuff looking for new material to mine). Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise, who had co-directed Beauty and the Beast a couple years prior, were struggling to put together an adaptation of the Greek myth Orpheus when Jeffrey Katzenberg assigned them to helm Hunchback. It didn’t take Gary and Kirk long to get excited about the project while at the same time they quickly realized that many of the books dark themes were going to have to be toned way, way down in order to get a G rating.

So Gary and Kirk went to work. Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz came on board to do the music and also to help shape the story. A whole bunch of characters were shown the door. A few new ones were introduced, specifically Quasimodo’s gargoyle friends. The ending was made a lot (and I mean a lot) happier. In the book, literally everyone but Phoebus dies, although Hugo does quip that the soldier doesn’t get off scot free because he ends up getting married (you can see why Hugo is known for drama and not comedy). And in the end, Hunchback did get its G rating but it is still one of the, if not the, darkest Disney animated films ever made (Frollo sniffing Esmerelda’s hair, anyone?).

Image copyright Disney

At its release, Hunchback received mostly positive reviews and its fair share of controversy. To date, it is the only Disney animated film to overtly take on the issue of religion, which it did with mixed signals. On the one hand, the only actual religious figure in the film, the Archdeacon played by David Ogden Stiers, is weak, doesn’t offer much spiritual guidance other than to vaguely hint at God and presents the official church as mostly ineffective at actually helping people (although he does keep Frollo from committing infanticide at the beginning, day to day nurturing seems to overwhelm him). On the other hand, God Help the Outcasts clearly denounces religious hypocrites and, in the end, it’s strongly suggested that God himself kills Frollo when the cathedral itself causes him to fall to his death. Needless to say, there are obvious reasons Disney hasn’t touched religious material since then.

Image courtesy disney.fandom.com

The Hunchback of Notre Dame earned an Oscar nomination for its score, ten Annie Award nominations and numerous other award nominations. It won a Satellite Award for best Animated Film, two Golden Reel Awards for editing and a BMI Film Music Award for Alan Menken. The movie would later be adapted into a stage musical that only played in Berlin, Germany. But that wasn’t the only stage version that came out of the deal, which leads us to the second part of today’s post.

Also on this day, also in 1996, The Hunchback of Notre Dame – A Musical Adventure debuted at the Disney-MGM Studios in Lake Buena Vista, Florida. Considered by many guests (and cast members) to be one of the best productions to ever grace a Disney theme park stage, the Hunchback show opened to coincide with the release of the film. Closely following and condensing the plot of the movie (the only songs not included were Hellfire and The Court of Miracles, for obvious and logistic reasons respectively),  it ran for six incredible years on the Backlot Stage, then abruptly ended. The show is now infamous in the annals of Disney entertainment history as a cautionary tale for anyone who thinks being cast in a successful show equates to job security.

Image courtesy laughingplace.com

The story goes that Hunchback went down for one of its periodic refurbishments, as all shows and attractions that run 365 days a year have to do. However, not only wasn’t any refurbishing work done but part way through the refurbishment period, it was announced that the show wasn’t coming back. No explanations, just it’s done. It would be pure speculation how much management knew in advance of the decision to close (somebody somewhere was very aware). It also isn’t clear as to why the decision was made, although the best guess is that the company was no longer willing to shell out for the size of the cast required with the amount of costly expertise needed to pull the production off. What is clear is that there wasn’t a burning desire to put something else in Hunchback’s place. The Backlot Stage stood empty for years after the show’s closing.

Not to be left out of the Hunchback celebration on this day, in 1996, Disneyland also debuted their own show, The Hunchback of Notre Dame – Festival of Fools. Festival of Fools was similar to A Musical Adventure in that it was a retelling of the film but it was a very different staging of the story. The Disneyland version had more of a carnival atmosphere than a stage show. Festival wasn’t nearly as successful and only ran for two years.

November 13 - Beauty and the Beast

On this day, in 1991, Walt Disney Picture's 30th animated feature, Beauty and the Beast, was released at the El Capitan Theatre. The movie had kind of had a premier a month and a half earlier at the New York Film Festival, it just wasn't finished yet. Even the roughly animated sequences were pretty impressive, though. Based on a French fairy tale by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont (try saying that five times fast), Beast is the third film of the Disney Renaissance and considered by some to be the pinnacle of modern Disney animation (I'm biased towards The Lion King for that title, but I do think Beast is a very close second).

When Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs successfully proved that audiences were willing to sit through a feature length cartoon, Walt began looking around for other stories to animate. One of the ones that looked promising was the tale of Beauty and the Beast. The Disney writers wrestled with the story throughout the Thirties and even into the Fifties before deciding it was too difficult to adapt. To complicate matters, French director Jean Cocteau released a now classic version of the story in 1946. Plans for a Disney version ended up being shelved, where they gathered dust for decades.

In the late Eighties, after the making of Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, Disney had a new animation group in England that needed a new project to work on. Beauty and the Beast was dusted off and put into production as a non-musical. When Jeffrey Katzenberg, then chairman of the studio, saw an early storyboard treatment in 1989, the kindest thing he could say was throw it all away and let's start over. With the success of The Little Mermaid, Jeffrey declared that the new Beast would be a musical and put Alan Menken and Howard Ashman on the job. He wanted the directors of Mermaid, Ron Clements and John Musker, to lead the group again but they were too worn out to accept. Believe it or not, the studio then turned to two guys who had never directed a feature film before, Kirk Wise and Gary Trousdale. What Kirk and Gary had done was direct a little attraction for Epcot called Cranium Command.

Initially, the studio considered casting Jodi Benson, who helped make The Little Mermaid such a success, as Belle. They quickly decided, however, that this Disney heroine needed to sound more like a grown woman than a teenager and looked at over 500 actresses for the role. Howard Ashman, who was also an executive producer on the film, favored an actress featured on the cast recording of Show Boat and Broadway stalwart Paige O'Hara was given the part. To add some tragedy to the proceedings, Howard learned that he was dying from AIDS and so the pre-production hub moved from London to New York to accommodate his failing health. He would never get to see a finished film as he passed away eight months before Beast's release.

Most of the animation was done at the main studio in California although some was produced at the Disney-MGM Studios in Orlando, specifically the "Be Our Guest" scene. Beast is the second movie, after The Rescuers Down Under, that was done using the Computer Animation Production System (CAPS), a digital process of scanning and inking drawings that allowed for greater depth and a more colorful finished product then the xerography technique the studio had used since the early Sixties. The music was mostly recorded with the actors singing at the same the orchestra played, instead of the usual practice of having the voice talent sing to a recording, thus giving Alan and Howard's songs a big boost of energy. And talk about voice talent. In addition to Paige, the cast includes Robby Benson, Jerry Orbach, David Ogden Stiers, Jo Anne Worley, Tony Jay, Richard White and Disney Legend Angela Lansbury.

Upon its release, Beauty and the Beast was a massive success. It was the first animated film to gross 100 million dollars in North America and grossed over 350 million worldwide. Beast was universally acclaimed by critics and still boasts a rare A+ rating from audiences today. It became the first animated film to win the Golden Globe for Best Musical or Comedy. When Oscar time rolled around, Beast garnered six nominations: three for Best Song ("Beauty and the Beast" would win), Best Original Score (also a win), Best Sound and, another first for an animated movie, Best Picture. It would also win several Grammy Awards, including one for Celine Dion and Peabo Bryson's pop version of "Beauty and the Beast." Beast was added to the National Film Registry in 2002.

Since 1991, Beauty and the Beast has spawned all manner of offspring. A hit Broadway musical opened in 1994 and ran for 13 years. Some version of that show is still running somewhere in the world. There have been several direct-to-video sequels, the most successful of which was The Enchanted Christmas. Multiple shows have appeared over the years in Disney's theme parks, the Florida ones in particular, and there might have been a live action version released at some point. All of which just goes to prove that when you have a tale as old as time, and you give it the respect it deserves, fans will love it for all of time.