When I really enjoy a movie (and I mean REALLY like it), I’ll spend days watching behind-the-scenes footage or pre-production content. It’s kind of an obscure hobby of mine, just in case I ever get the chance to pull out a “Hey! Did you know . . .” moment with my friends. Granted, some of these facts I found out through accident, but I never forgot them, and they just made me appreciate that movie all the more.
In any case, here’s some facts you may or may not have known about the work that went into your favorite Disney movies.
Cut the Mermaid’s Song – Can you imagine The Little Mermaid without the iconic “Part of Your World” song? The song that brought Disney out of the dark ages and set the standard for what all following movie songs should be? I can’t, but the directors sure thought they could. During a test screening of the song with a group of children, executive Jeffrey Katzenberg noticed the lack of interest from the young audience, with one child reportedly distracted by spilled popcorn. Katzenberg almost cut the song from the film, which was only saved by the diligence of its lyricist, Howard Ashman. A later screening brought a much older audience to tears, and the classic of all Disney classics was saved.
Death by Wolves – The wolves in Beauty and the Beast are a major plot point throughout the story, and they almost came back for one final showdown with the movie’s main villain. Originally, instead of having Gaston just fall to his death (and who could survive that height?) the plan was to have the wolves surround him and finish him off. Fortunately, directors realized that would be too dark for a kid’s movie, and instead left Gaston to fall to a very poetic ending. But they never lost the “finish the villain off with wolves” idea however, as that special honor was reserved for another Disney villain, except that time, it was a pack of hyenas.
Designed by Women, for Women – Flynn Rider/Eugene was a notoriously hard character for the animators to design properly. They obviously needed someone who was suave, cunning, but still handsome enough for a sheltered girl to fall in love with. If you’ve seen the early concept art for Tangled, then you’d see that Eugene looked much different compared to his final design. His early design is actually uncannily similar to Kristoff’s from Frozen. So how did Disney animators scrap that first idea and come up with an almost perfect man? They went to the best source of inspiration: the women. “Tangled” directors Byron Howard and Nathan Greno, in wanting to make an appealing and realistic character, hosted what essentially became known as a “hot man meeting” where women from the animation studio were invited to come in and analyze several mock-ups of the character, and determine which features would make Eugene most attractive. He really is a lady’s man after all.
A failed children’s book that captured hearts – If you pay attention to the opening credits for Lilo and Stitch, you’ll see the caption across the screen: “Based on an original idea by Chris Sanders.” And it’s true. Sanders, a Disney animator and story writer for movies such as Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, and The Lion King, created what would become the beloved Stitch character in 1985 for an unsuccessful children’s book. But as fate would have it, Sanders never gave up on the idea, and over a decade later, pitched his story for a movie to Disney executives using a full booklet of his own original drawings and storyline entitled: “Lilo and Stitch: A love story of a girl and what she thinks is a dog.” Sanders’ original story had major differences from the final film, the main one being that Stitch was a galactic criminal (not experiment), who was very much a threat to Lilo’s life before he softened up a little. In any case, Sanders got his wish and ultimately produced one of the most heart-warming Disney movies ever created.
The art of the Bubble – CGI and computers were not a huge thing yet when The Little Mermaid was produced, which meant everything had that hand-drawn Disney magic to it: the characters, the settings, even the bubbles. You can’t really sell an underwater world without bubbles that mimic and follow the characters’ every move. To get this effect, the animation directors outsourced this job to a China-based animation firm called Pacific Rim Productions. The next time you sit down to watch the movie, pay attention to all the bubbles and remember the poor, unfortunate soul who probably spent hours drawing perfect circles for your enjoyment.
Scrapped and Scratched – The Emperor’s New Groove, is in my opinion, the funniest Disney movie ever produced. What it lacks in musical numbers, it makes up for in pure comedy. What most people don’t realize is that the original storyline was vastly different than the final; in fact, it was a whole other movie that was scrapped and redone. “The Kingdom of the Sun,” as it was called, still featured the lovely Yzma as the villain, except she was a powerful sorceress obsessed with regaining her beauty. She even had her own villain song! While I think the movie is perfect the way it is, I admit I’d be curious to see the hilarious direction the original movie almost went.
What a Woman – The Rescuers is one of those overlooked Disney movies that deserves more recognition. I grew up with this masterpiece, and one of the best characters is, of course, the villain. Madame Medusa is a sleezy, hot-tempered pawn shop owner obsessed with a rare diamond she forces a little orphaned girl to retrieve for her. She’s very resemblant of Cruella De Vil from 101 Dalmatians, at least in her driving skills, or lack of them. But like all villains, she ends up defeated and alone, with even her pet crocodiles mad at her. Fate, it seems, was against her from the start; and so were the animators. Milt Kahl, Medusa’s animator, allegedly based both her design and character off of his ex-wife. Talk about a personal vendetta.
There’s several more weird and interesting facts behind the scenes of Disney’s greatest movies. Hopefully this inspires you to get out there and discover some more for yourself.