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Disney castle at night with lights
Disney castle at night with lights
Photo by PAN XIAOZHEN from Unsplash
Pace | Culture > Entertainment

From a Zombie to a Disney Prince: Milo Manheim Cast as Flynn Rider in New Live-Action ‘Tangled’

Jaden Sabathia Student Contributor, Pace University
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Pace chapter and does not reflect the views of Her Campus.

As we’re heading into the year with a new Disney live-action movie coming out in the summer, we recently got news of another Disney princess movie being turned into a live action. There was news of a live-action Tangled in production at Disney after the success of the live-action Lilo and Stitch. There was much speculation about who would be cast as Flynn Rider and the iconic Princess Rapunzel. Recently, it was announced by Disney that our Flynn Rider would be Milo Manheim, and our Rapunzel would be Teagan Croft. 

From the title of this article, I am intrigued about Croft being cast as Rapunzel, although I’m more interested in Manheim being cast as Rider. Manheim got his first major role in the Disney Channel Original Movie Zombies. While that movie was a cultural reset to me, it’s still not better than Descendants. Aside from that, Manheim was cast as the lead in that film, which boosted his popularity. Outside of Zombies, Manheim appeared in other projects: a thriller series on Paramount called School Spirits, and he was also recently in the Off-Broadway show Little Shop of Horrors as Seymour, with Elizabeth Gillies co-starring. With this, I think that Manheim may surprise me as Rider in the live-action Tangled. Manheim does have the looks for Rider for sure; there’s no mistaking that. At the same time, I feel that since we don’t know much about his acting from other projects, it may hold him back. He may surprise me and exceed my expectations for the live-action; who knows? 


I’m not going to lie: the first time I heard that a live-action Tangled was even in production at Disney, I was a bit worried, because these live-action movies haven’t always been the greatest. While not all of them are bad, the ones we received last year seemed lazy for Disney. At the same time, I think a Tangled live-action isn’t the worst idea, because it shouldn’t be too hard to adapt a movie like Tangled to live action. Hopefully, they won’t decimate the hair, the chameleon, and the horse in this movie. While we don’t yet have an exact date for this film, we can still expect more castings. Hopefully, they’ll figure out their Mother Gothel soon. Personally, my picks would be Scarlett Johansson or Kathryn Hahn.

Jaden Sabathia

Pace '28

Jaden Sabathia is a junior contributor to Pace’s Her Campus chapter, where she enjoys creating fun, engaging content for friends and family. She loves writing about music, movies, Broadway, fashion, and all things pop culture.

Outside of Her Campus, Jaden is majoring in Arts and Entertainment Management and minoring in Communication and Media Studies at Pace. She co-hosts On That Note, a podcast for her on-campus WPUB show. Passionate about digital marketing, she has gained content creation experience with Third Reprise. Last summer, she also gained public relations experience as an intern at 1964 Agency. Currently, she is interning at 4who as a creative and marketing intern, where she will support the creation and refinement of marketing plans for artist projects and initiatives. In her future, she hopes to pursue a career in media marketing.

When she’s not focused on academics or writing, Jaden enjoys going to concerts by her many favorite artists, acting for film and TV, dancing, reading, and convincing a friend to appear in a TikTok with her.