With filming currently underway in London on Disney’s live-action retelling of Beauty and the Beast, eight-time Oscar winner Alan Menken, who won two Academy Awards for the 1991 animated classic, has spoken at Lincoln Center (via Stitch Kingdom) about two of the three new songs he has written for the production with Sir Tim Rice.
“It’s the songs from the movie, we did not fit in any songs [from the Broadway show],” confirmed Menken. “The song I would have fit in from the Broadway show is ‘If I Can’t Love Her,’ but the Beast’s moment in the film is a much later moment, it would not be ‘if I can’t love her,’ it’s ‘I love her but -damn it- I’m letting her go.’ That lyric wouldn’t really work with that music. So we wrote another song called ‘Forever More,’ like ‘I now know what love is.’ There’s another song called ‘Days in the Sun’ which is a lullaby as all the objects and characters living in the castle are going to sleep they’re all singing about remembering before the spell. I think it’s gonna be a wonderful movie.”
The film stars Emma Watson as Belle, Dan Stevens as Beast, Ian McKellen as Cogsworth, Luke Evans as Gaston, Josh Gad as LeFou, Kevin Kline as Maurice (Belle’s father), Emma Thompson as Mrs. Potts, Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Plumette, the feather duster, Ewan McGregor as Lumiere, and Stanley Tucci as a grand piano named Cadenza.
Bill Condon is directing Beauty and the Beast from a script by Stephen Chbosky, and the film will be produced by Mandeville Films’ David Hoberman and Todd Lieberman. Walt Disney Pictures will release the movie on March 17, 2017.
