Disney's 'Frozen'

[beautywickedlover]

Posted: 6/11/12 at 4:16pm

Tony Award winner, Idina Menzel, will be voicing the villain in the upcoming Disney animated film, 'Frozen'. The film is loosely based on 1845's 'The Snow Queen' by Hans Christian Andersen. She will be joined by Kristen Bell who will co-star as Anna, "a young girl who ventures to find Menzel’s Snow Queen and end the perpetual winter that has fallen over their mythical kingdom."

The movie, of course, will have a musical element, with original songs by Broadway’s Robert Lopez (a two-time Tony winner for Avenue Q and The Book of Mormon) and wife Kristen Anderson-Lopez (who worked with him on Disney’s 2011 Winnie the Pooh.)

I'm very much looking forward to seeing what she will bring to this character. She's a wonderul actress and singer.

"The digitally animated feature will open in November 2013 and is being directed by Chris Buck (Tarzan, Surf’s Up) and produced by Peter Del Vecho (Winnie the Pooh, The Princess and the Frog)."

I'm disappointed that Alana Menken is no longer attached to the project, but I am looking forward to hearing the songs that Lopezes will be writting.







Disney's 'Frozen': Kristen Bell and Idina Menzel to voice animated tale Updated On: 11/3/13 at 04:16 PM

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 6/11/12 at 4:17pm

A wonderful actress who needs to give her Tony back to Tonya.

[TheatreKid3]

Posted: 6/11/12 at 4:27pm

Robert Lopez + Disney? YES!

I mean, yeah he did the music for FINDING NEMO: THE MUSICAL at Disney's Animal Kingdom Park in FL, but I'm glad to see him do a movie with them!

[jdtp12]

Posted: 6/11/12 at 4:32pm

Didn't he do some music for the recent Winnie the Pooh movie?

[JohnyBroadway]

Posted: 6/11/12 at 4:39pm

Alan Menken did do a concept album for the project, but it looks like they decided to retool. I do like some of the Lopeze's work, their score for Nemo was very cute. Alan is doing a project with Dreamworks. The two companies must not be at heads anymore?



Updated On: 6/11/12 at 04:39 PM

[finebydesign]

Posted: 6/11/12 at 5:03pm

"The two companies must not be at heads anymore?"

This doesn't concern their animated films, but Dreamworks live action films are being released by a Disney arm in a long term deal. Not sure what happened with Menken on this project but it seem Lasseter is not a huge fan of his work. It's time for some new blood anyway.

[JohnyBroadway]

Posted: 6/11/12 at 5:31pm

When dream works first launched their animation department there was deffinately competition between the two. One example being, Stephen Schwartz let go from Mulan for working on the prince of Egypt. And here we are 13 years later with Menken working on a dreamworks. I just find it funny.

Updated On: 6/11/12 at 05:31 PM

[Overkill]

Posted: 6/11/12 at 6:17pm

Ugh. I was REALLY hoping this wouldn't be CGI... Oh well, I love the Lopez's songs. Finding Nemo is actually an underrated score, IMO, and the songs they wrote for Winnie the Pooh were great!

[RainbowJude]

Posted: 6/11/12 at 10:52pm

Overkill wrote: I was REALLY hoping this wouldn't be CGI...

Ain't that the truth? Disney should leave the CGI stuff to Pixar and stick to traditional animation. Alas, they basically killed the market for traditional animation by serving it poorly with films like TREASURE PLANET and HOME ON THE RANGE, along with other studios whose best films were mostly on the same level as those two films, and have ended up pretty much blaming the death of the market for traditional animation on the medium itself.

Oh well, I'll just have to wait and see what somes next from Studio Ghibli.

[sephyr]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 1:37am

Idina!! I can't wait to see what songs they come up with. So glad it's not another jukebox musical. It sounds like it has potential to be great!

[JohnyBroadway]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 1:41am

When had Disney animation ever produced a Jukebox musical?

[sephyr]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 2:20am

I wasn't referencing Disney in particular but recent animated movies like Ice Age.

[BroadwayBenny]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 2:26am

This sounds more like the plot of Narnia than the Andersen fairy tale, but since it has a different name I won't complain if it's just an "inspired by" fairy tale.

Idina...ehh, I suppose if Disney could make Mandy Moore work in Tangled, they will be able to get some decent stuff out of Idina too. I LOVE that Kristen Bell is voicing the main character though.

[finebydesign]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 10:27am

"When had Disney animation ever produced a Jukebox musical?"

Gnomeo and Juliet was started at Disney and was intended to be just that. Also Lilo and Stitch sort of used Elvis music (pretty damn amazingly.

Someone mentioned Studio Ghibli, would love to see something like Kiki's Delivery service or Nausicaa come to Broadway or even Grave of the Fireflies. Wish Disney would mine that area.

[JohnyBroadway]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 10:47am

Forgot about Lilo and Stitch, I wouldn't count that as a musical, but an animated film with a good soundtrack, I did also like the original material that was also written.

[Fosse76]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 11:03am

"The film is loosely based on 1845's 'The Snow Queen' by Hans Christian Andersen."

In other words: "we are using the name but changing everything else."

"Finding Nemo is actually an underrated score"
I find it dreadful, with only one good song (for Crush).

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 11:27am

The demos when this was meant to be a Tokyo DisneySea show are *amazing*. I hope they don't drop how dark it was meant to be (which they probably will...)

[finebydesign]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 5:14pm

What demos? I've only heard one song "Love Can't be Denied" which sounds like something from Love Never Dies.

Just Keep Swimming is cute.

[Overkill]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 6:02pm

I always thought "Big Blue World" was a wonderful opening - especially for something like Finding Nemo. It fit so well, they even had Ellen and the original voices record a version of it for the Nemo ride at EPCOT. "Go With The Flow" is definitely the best song, though.

I don't necessarily think Disney shouldn't produce ANY CGI films without Pixar... the new WRECK-IT RALPH, looks spectacular, and TANGLED was definitely a triumph. I just prefer their fairy tale musicals to stay in the 2D world... And if anyone could bring traditional animation back, I assume it would be Disney. The Princess and The Frog and Winnie the Pooh both didn't perform at the box office the way Disney wanted them to... but they put them up against Twilight AND the last Harry Potter movie... not a smart move, if you ask me.

And I HATE the title. The same way I hated when they changed RAPUNZEL to TANGLED. Instead of THE SNOW QUEEN, they're calling it FROZEN?? Might as well have called The Little Mermaid, BEACHED. Or The Princess and the Frog, BAYOUED.

[beautywickedlover]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 6:08pm

Nathan Greno and Byron Howard, the directors of 'Tangled', said that they gave 'Tangled' its title instead of 'Rapunzel' because te film was about two characters and just Rapunzel. They said that it would never have made sense for 'Toy Story' to be called "Buzz Lightyear".


How did Rapunzel become 'Tangled'? Directors Nathan Greno and Byron Howard set the record straight

[Overkill]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 6:48pm

John Smith was just as big of a role as Flynn Rider, and that was still called POCAHONTAS. Not to be snippy, it just doesn't make entire sense to me. Another big reason they changed the title to Tangled, was to market the film towards the boys. Apparently, they thought one of the biggest problems they had with Princess and the Frog, was that boys didn't want to see a princess movie... If you remember the first few trailers for Tangled, they really focused on Flynn and the action and comedy of the movie, and it didn't do the film justice one bit. Clearly a marketing ploy.

[beautywickedlover]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 8:02pm

'The Princess and the Frog' did recoup at the box office though. It grossed $267 million against a budget of $105 million. It also made over $71 milion in home video sales. It would've done better at the box office had 'Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel' not been released in December 2009. That film was originally supposed to be released in March 2010, but then 20th Century Fox moved it to Christmas weekend 2009 to cover losses just in case 'Avatar' bombed at the box office.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/09/business/media/09avatar.html?_r=1

'The Princess and the Frog' then had to move its release date from Christmas weekend 2009 to December 11. The film was a modest hit, but 'Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel' really did take most of its family audiences away along with the Jim Carey version of 'A Christmas Carol'. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1950995,00.html

'Tangled' really had no tough competition of family-friendly since it opened late November 2010. 'The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader' and 'Yogi Bear' did just okay at the box office. The second 'Narnia' film lots much its audience from the first film and the third failed to gain new audiences. As for 'Yogi Bear', I think people were getting tired of talking animal films. ('Marmaduke' and 'Cats & Dogs', both awful films, were released that year. And even the third 'Alvin and the Chipmunks' film did not do as well as its predecessors last year.) 'Gulliver's Travels' also underperformed at the North American box office.

Back to this film I am interested to see who they will cast to voice the lead male.

Updated On: 12/13/12 at 08:02 PM

[Jonwo]

Posted: 6/12/12 at 9:13pm

Musicals seem to be slowly coming back into animated films even outside of Disney, Fox/Blue Sky did Rio and Universal/Illumination did The Lorax, even Dreamworks is working on a Bollywood musical with A R Rahman and Stephen Schwartz.

I don't mind that Frozen will be a CGI film, I imagine it'll look similar to Tangled although I hope Disney release a traditional animated film in 2014, Lion King and Beauty and the Beast rereleases have proven you can do a 3D traditional animated film.

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 6/13/12 at 12:10am

FineByDesign, I meant the Menbken/Slater demo when it was meant ot be a theme park show before they decided it was too dark.

I LOVE Ghibli--perhaps my fave group of filmsin the world but, really? Nausicaa or Grave of the Fireflies (the saddest movie ever made) as live musicals? Umm why?

Disney will have less control on future Ghibli releases in English anyway--they will still release the DVDs, but starting with Poppy Hill, out next year here, G4Kids is handling the dubs and theatre releases. (If only they'd finally release the brilliant Only Yesterday here...)

[Overkill]

Posted: 6/13/12 at 1:18am

beauty - I know, but that still wasn't good enough for Disney. They were expecting Princess and the Frog to be the return of traditional hand drawn animation - Expecting huge things, like a PIXAR box office performance... Disney is never happy with their box office performances. Even if they do recoup.

They were supposed to start production of a traditional hand drawn movie, THE ELF KING, that was to be a musical based in Mississippi, again with a black leading character - After Princess and the Frog, it was scrapped. It's apparently still on the table, but only in a "we'll see" aspect...

Eric - Do you know where we can find this demo?? Sounds awesome, and I'm a junkie for the theme parks. lol