SUNDAY, MARCH 12, 2017

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movies
Fanfare
Nature
of the
Beast
Take a reworking of the beloved classic,
add a controversial character, and its
no surprise all eyes are on this Beauty
BY FRANK LOVECE
L
Special to Newsday
newsday.com
ets say youve got a
tale as old as time, as
true as it can be.
Now youre adapting
NEWSDAY, SUNDAY, MARCH 12, 2017
it from a beloved
animated feature to
a live-action film.
Can you make just a little
change, small to say the least?
Well, yes and no. As Bill
Condon, director of Disneys
new live-action Beauty and the
Beast (opening Friday) puts it
by phone from Los Angeles, you
have to make a lot of little
changes adding to, but not
altering what people love about
the 1991 classic and its charac-
ters: bookworm Belle (Emma
Watson), her father Maurice
(Kevin Kline), the tragic Beast
(Dan Stevens) and all the rest,
including a bevy of castle ser-
vants turned into anthropomor-
phic household objects.
I remember pitching the
scenes you always wanted to
see, things you always wanted to
know, Condon, 61, says. Like,
how did Belle and Maurice wind
up in that town? How did Mrs.
Potts and all those other charac-
ters lose their humanity and
become full objects? I thought
those were great emotional
moments that needed to be
explored. But basically, it was
about: How do you take some-
thing thats perfect in one
medium and try to translate it
into really a different one?
And indeed, this latest
retelling of the venerable
French fairy tale does explore
DISNEY / LAURIE SPARHAM
DISNEY / LAURIE SPARHAM
The live-action Disney musical
features Luke Evans as Gaston
and Josh Gad as LeFou, above.
Left, Kevin Kline plays Maurice,
the father of Belle, portrayed
by Emma Watson.
the back story of Belle and esting new inner life to a
Beast, from the death of Belles comic-relief character.
mother to the family of the There were some early
cursed prince. It also adds a scripts, but there was a lot of just
magical book thats essentially brainstorming, says the films
an 18th century Star Trek composer, Alan Menken, 67,
transporter and gives an inter- who has won eight Academy
 newsday.com/movies C7

Dan Stevens plays the latest film

incarnation of the beastly castle

Fanfare
owner who gets all snarly over a
plucked rose and sets the fairy
tales story in motion.

of two songs. In the Broadway

show, he explains, we had a
treasure trove of wonderful lost
lyrics by Howard, some of which
were a bit edgy for an animated
movie but worked on stage or, in
this case, in the movie. For
Gaston we have some quote

DISNEY
unquote new Ashman lyrics,
and the movie has quote un-
quote new lyrics for Beauty and Disneys animated version was nominated for a best picture Oscar.
the Beast. I love being able to
give either a fresh arrangement

The many faces

or lyric changes. It just helps
give the movie its own identity.

A NEW LEFOU

of a magical fable
Also given something of a
new identity was the comic
character LeFou (played by Josh
Gad in the new film), sidekick of

the villainous Gaston (Luke
Evans). In what became a small
cause clbre, Condon com-
mented to a British magazine
about LeFou having confused
feelings toward Gaston and how
the films ending includes what
the director called a nice, exclu-
sively gay moment albeit
one thats so below the surface
youd need ground radar to see
it. Yet a headline in The Holly-
wood Reporter trade paper
blared: Disneys First-Ever Gay
F
irst published in 1740 as La
Belle et la Bte by French
novelist Gabrielle-Suzanne
Barbot de Villeneuve, and then
abridged and popularized by writer
Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont
in 1756, the fairy tale we know as
Beauty and the Beast has been
adapted to the screen many times
before. Among them:
LA BELLE ET LA BTE (France,
1946) Writer-director Jean
Cocteaus black-and-white

Character.
To his credit, Condon, while
calling the attention
overblown, isnt backing away.
When he and the screenwriters
were developing the movie, that
subtext seemed like, Oh, this is
DISNEY
masterpiece is widely considered
one of the most visually beautiful
love stories ever filmed.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST
(1962) This low-budget adaptation
by director Edward L. Cahn (It!
DISCINA
Jean Cocteaus poetic version
of the tale is widely considered
a classic of French cinema.
2016 starring Kristin Kreuk and

Awards for Disney animated
movies, including the studios
1991 animated Beauty and the
Beast. But when Bill Condon
came onboard, he says, then it
began to take on shape dramatur-
gically. There was adding a lot of
dramatic texture and reality
you know, Lets feel more of
18th century France. Some of it
was also an extra French influ-
version. Yet none of them made
it into the live-action film, for
which Menken and Rice wrote
yet more new songs to comple-
ment such classics as Belle,
Be Our Guest and the title
tune.
In a film, youre not going to
have as many song moments,
necessarily, says Menken. So,
assuming that you have a
just not a big deal thats what
I felt more than anything, he
says. Is he concerned about
potential backlash? No, not at
all, he says. Its 2017, and
industry estimates predict a
blockbuster opening weekend of
$100 million to $120 million.
I hope that people come to
see the film and judge for them-
selves, says singer-actress
Audra McDonald, 46, the six-
time Tony Award-winner who
The Terror From Beyond Space)
envisioned the beast as a prince
who becomes a werewolf at night.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST
(1976) George C. Scott and his
wife, Trish Van Devere, starred in
this NBC Hallmark Hall of Fame
TV movie, which earned Emmy
nominations for costume, makeup
and lead actor Scott.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST
Jay Ryan.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST (1991)
The Disney classic was the first
animated feature to be nominated
for a best picture Academy Award.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST aka
Blood of Beasts (U.K./South
Africa, 2005) Negligible entry set
in Viking times.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST

ence in the score a little bit of
boulevard music in the new
songs.
MUSICAL CHOICES
smaller number of songs for the
movie, youre certainly going to
lean first and foremost toward
those iconic tent-poles that were
in the animated film.
plays the anthropomorphic
wardrobe, here named Garder-
obe. Its a beautiful family film
whose story is a timeless classic
and celebrates love and all that
(U.S./Israel, 1987) One of action
B-movie specialist The Cannon
Groups series of fairy-tale films,
this musical version starred Re-
becca De Mornay and the aptly
newsday.com
(Australia, 2009) Widely panned
direct-to-video version starring
Victorias Secret model Estella
Warren.

NEWSDAY, SUNDAY, MARCH 12, 2017

And those new tunes are truly
new, even though there was a hit
Broadway-musical adaptation
that ran for more than 5,400
performances from 1994 to 2007
and has its own following.
Menken, whod co-written the
animated features songs with
Howard Ashman, had collabo-
rated with Tim Rice after Ash-
mans death to add an eventual
seven songs to that Broadway
Additionally, says Condon,
songs in a film must move the
plot forward, whereas on stage
they can simply deepen charac-
ter. The nature of a live perfor-
mance is that you enjoy some-
body just pouring their heart
out, you know? he says. Thats
a little harder to do in a movie.
The composer did incorpo-
rate unused lyrics by the late
Ashman into expanded versions
makes us human, she says. The
film is representative of the
world we live in today and that
is inclusive of all creeds, colors,
genders, orientations and every-
thing.
Because if theres one thing
thats as certain as the sun
rising in the east, its that Dis-
ney knows how to make
movies that are both ever a
surprise and ever as before.
named John Savage.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST
(CBS, 1987-90) Manhattan
Assistant District Attorney Linda
Hamilton finds friendship and
love with the leonine Vincent
(Ron Perlman), part of a society
of outcasts living underground in
a cultured, utopian society. The
show inspired a similarly titled
CW series that ran from 2012 to
BEASTLY (2011) Modern-day
New York City retelling of the fairy
tale as interpreted by Alex Flinns
2007 novel Beastly.
LA BELLE ET LA BTE (France /
Germany, 2014) Starring two of
Frances most honored actors,
Vincent Cassel and La Seydoux, it
was nominated for three Csar
Awards, the French equivalent of the
Oscar. FRANK LOVECE