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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 serves as a sophomore contributor to the Her Campus chapter at Pace. She loves crafting content for her friends and family, and she enjoys writing various topics including music, movies, broadway, fashion and pop culture.

Beyond Her Campus, Jaden is majoring in Arts and Entertainment Management at Pace. She is currently marketing director for P.A.C.E. Board, and is a WPUB podcast co-host for her show On That Note on campus. She is passionate about digital marketing and has gained experience through content creating with Third Reprise. She is interested in pursuing a career in media marketing.

Outside of academics and writing, Jaden enjoys jamming out at a concert to one of her many favorite artists, acting for film and TV, dancing, reading, or forcing one of her friends to be in a TikTok with her.