Happy Shrew year to all!!!Happy Gru year to you!
When you Wish Upon a Frog (Book II of the Jim Henson at Disney saga)
- Thread starter Geekhis Khan
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You know it's a fun timeline when you've got Biggie, Pac and Dubya all working for Jim Henson.
Biggie Cheese working for the Big Cheese. The jokes just write themselves.
I don't know if this is mentioned in any of the posts, but what other replaced the void that Wrestling once filled in ITTL?
Yes that was a Lost reference. Also references to other strange shows from the time. One is I'm With Busey. I'll let you all figure out the rest.
Another Ms. Khan idea. Very interesting idea, Den, but I have other plans. Alt-Firefly will be the official "last butterfly" of the TL before all goes Fiction Zone.
Assuming anyone writes the guest post.
First up would be more likely to be like In the Heights. I've made no set decisions.
Basically yes, with somewhat different shows.
Random luck it was this post, really.
Yes, reading too much into it, LOL.
Happy Gru year to you!
Terrible, just terrible.
I love it.
No thanks for the heads up!
There were two more guest posts that kind of dried up. Short answer, Luca Libre,
If it's something new entirely then I'm okay with it but please give it a couple of more seasons so the story and characters can actually go somewhere instead of leaving little tidbits and some development before abruptly ending out of nowhere.
True. Pretty sure @TheMolluskLingers was the one who initiated the idea, so I will leave it up to them for that guest post.
Huh, I thought it was a Survivor reference, being a series that wouldn't end and everyone talked about thus influencing that entire era of television. Lost also works I suppose, I somehow managed to dodge that particular pop-culture juggernaut.
I’m glad that I wasn’t the only one that thought that it was a survivor reference.
Be Our Guest Post
The Making of 1998’s Beauty and the Beast
From the Animation Classicalist Net-log by Derrick Andrews, June 5th, 2019
Guest post by @Nerdman3000, with help by @Igeo654
In terms of power and respect, few can deny that Walt Disney’s great animation studio is perhaps the most well known and most respected. For almost a century they have effectively ruled as King of the animation world, with few true rivals ever successfully rising to stand in their way. Yet few does not mean zero, and one man in particular notably sought to rise and challenge the Mouse’s crown and rule over the animation world: Don Bluth.
While he would not always to succeed, it’s undeniable that Bluth would go on to become one of the most prolific and noteworthy animators in the history of the industry, often compared in terms of influence to a young Walt Disney and Jim Henson. One film in particular that would cement this comparison is the film which is viewed by many to be Bluth’s best and the one which manages to stand toe to toe with some of Disney’s greatest animated classics.
I am of course talking about Don Bluth’s 1998 classic and arguably one of the greatest animated films of all time, Beauty and the Beast.
Don Bluth's Beauty and the Beast, which is a VERY different adaptation of the original tale, at least when compared to the OTL Disney film. (source: Pinterest)
Backstory and Production:
To get into the story of how this film was made, we first have to get into the history behind the film itself, which goes all the way back to the early days of Don Bluth’s career following his departure from Disney animation. Having left the Disney company during what is considered the companies Dark Age of the ‘70s, right in between the end of what some have called the Walt Disney era of the company (which ended with Walt’s death) and the Jim Henson era, Don Bluth would go on to try to form his own animation studio. It didn’t exactly go well, as Bluth’s first two films as an independent were the TV animated film released in 1979 called Banjo the Woodpile Cat and 1982’s The Secret of NIMH, which underperformed.
Though NIHM was critically well received and showed off Bluth’s massive talent, Bluth had made the unfortunate decision to release the film against the juggernaut that was ET: The Extra Terrestrial, which meant that the film was only modestly profitable and, combined with the 1982 animator strike, meant that Bluth’s original planned follow-up, East of the Sun and West of the Moon, had to be cancelled. Soon enough, Bluth’s own luck worsened when his studio company found itself facing bankruptcy. Finding himself left adrift, in 1983 Bluth’s animation company would try to reform as the Bluth Group, with one of their first projects being the video game Dragon’s Lair. Yet Bluth seemed determined to get back to making full feature length animated films and so he began working on various ideas and projects for a number of potential animated films, with some ideas and potential projects being tossed around or early developed including an animated film about a baby blue whale and a pitch for film called about a young satyr who has to save the moon. Reportedly Bluth even tossed around the idea of a Dracula animated film as a joke[1].
The project that got the furthest in production, however, was a pitch for a potential animated film based on the Beauty and the Beast tale[2]. The story was one Walt Disney had wanted to adapt for decades before his eventual death and one that Disney Animation had unsuccessfully tried on and off to adapt for decades. Bluth meanwhile, who was a big fan of the 1946 film live action adaptation, also had found himself quite interested in making an animated adaptation of the tale, one he hoped would be based slightly off of the previously mentioned 1946 adaptation. More than that however, Bluth wanted BatB to be the first animated film he produced and released whenever his dream of forming a fully relaunched independent animated studio eventually materialized[3].
The 1946 Beauty and the Beast film, which would heavily inspire Bluth's own adaptation. (source: AllPosters.com)
Yet as fate would have it, a 1985 call from Steven Spielberg led to Bluth getting involved with Richard Williams on The Thief and the Cobbler and then later Michael Eisner’s Hollywood Animation Studio, leaving Bluth’s undeveloped Beauty and the Beast project to be essentially stuck in limbo for a decade. It would not be until Bluth’s departure from Hollywood Animation, due to his rivalry with animation studio head Jeffrey Katzenberg, that Bluth would finally manage to form a new relaunched independent animation studio.
However, despite his initial prior hopes, the first film of the relaunched animation studio would not be Beauty and the Beast. Though Bluth had been able to convince many animators to leave Hollywood Animation with him, it had not been as many as he had originally hoped, in part due to Katzenberg successfully managing to stroke fears about Bluth’s chances of success at going independent again among a number of animators who were considering jumping ship with Bluth[4], certainly not enough to properly do Bluth’s vision of Beauty and the Beast justice. Hence Bluth’s new studio would instead partner up with Pathé to create Valerian & Laureline for their first film.
In 1991 Pathé had decided to form a animation division for their studio with French film producer and animator Didier Brunner, with their first film being the 1993 film Asterix and Obelix vs. Caesar, followed by Asterix and Obelix Meet Cleopatra in 1994[5]. Though the first film, Asterix and Obelix vs. Caesar, had been a modest financial success, the film’s sequel had drastically underperformed, and what’s more, neither had been critically well received, in part due to many of their hired animators being so inexperienced. This left Pathé Animation with two critically panned films, only one of which had any financial success. Rather than can the studio entirely, however, Pathé instead decided to try and partner up with a more experienced animation team for their third animated film, which would be adapting the Valerian & Laureline comics. This led them to approach Bluth, who as I mentioned before needed more animators to get things at his new animation studio going, and therefore found Pathé’s offer to be mutually beneficial as it meant that he could flush up the number of animators he had available and hopefully follow up on it with an adaptation of Beauty and the Beast.
Valerian and Laureline, the protagonists of the 1995 Don Bluth film of the same name. (source: Pinterest)
Now unfortunately for Bluth, while 1995’s Valerian & Laureline was a critical and home video success and even managed to go on to becoming a cult classic, it underperformed at the box office, leading to Pathé to close their short-lived animation studio after releasing only three films. Bluth nonetheless moved forward with his studio, now joined by Brunner and his animators, determined to finally move ahead with producing Beauty and the Beast. Still, Bluth needed a distributor, and as luck would have it, less than two months following the release of Valerian & Laureline, Bluth would be approached by Michael Eisner, who following his departure from ABC/Hollywood Studios, had moved over to Columbia Pictures.
After a bit of back and forth, the two men agreed to a three-picture deal (with room for more), with the first film Bluth’s studio would work on for Columbia being the long languishing Beauty and the Beast, which would go into production almost immediately after for a initially intended 1997 release. Certain difficulties during production, among them Don Bluth’s 1996 hospitalization following a car crash[6], as well as Bluth’s noted intense over obsession with perfectionism on the film due to the film essentially being his magnum opus, would ultimately lead to the film being delayed for over a year, releasing instead in late 1998.
Casting and Music:
To star as Belle, the film’s titular Beauty, Eisner and Bluth would go through a number of possible names, with names such as Meg Ryan, Carrie Fisher, and Jodie Benson being tossed around. Ultimately however, they would find themselves turning to none other than former Sunset Strip member Daphne Roane[7], in what would be one of her earliest voice acting roles. Roane’s voice would provide a sense of charm and charisma to Belle to go along with her talented singing voice. For their Beast, Bluth would select English actor Alan Rickman, whose memorable deep languid voice brought a sense of quiet sadness to the character of Prince Ardent, a man who has been cursed and transformed into the Beast. Even better for Bluth, this sense of tragic grief excellently translated over into Rickman’s singing[8].
Daphne Roane and Alan Rickman circa 1998. (source for Daphne Roane image: Image Created by @Nerdman3000 using Artbreeder and Photoshop) (source for Alan Rickman Image: Pinterest)
To star as the film’s two central villains, Bluth would cast Vanessa Redgrave as Queen Livia (an original creation of Bluth’s and one who is not from the 1946 film), while for the handsome but greedy moneylender Avenant (who is a merging of three characters from the 1946 film: the similarly named Avenant who courts Belle, the moneylender, and Belle’s brother Ludovic), Bluth would cast Christopher Lloyd. Both were meant by Bluth to act as a sort of dark mirror to both Belle and the Beast, with their fates ultimately being the reverse of the Beast and Belle.
Rounding out the cast would be David Ogden Stiers as Belle’s father Marcel (who fun fact is named after Marcel André, the French actor who played Belle’s father in the 1946 film), Leonard Nimoy as Prince Ardent/The Beast’s father King Henri, and Meg Ryan as Belle’s older sister Adelaide (who unlike the 1946 film, is Belle’s only sibling). Ryan, it should be noted, actually originally auditioned for the role of Belle and almost got the part, but later scheduling issues which arose with another film before she could sign on to play Belle meant she found herself suddenly having much reduced availability at the last minute. Bluth, reportedly still liking Ryan and feeling a bit bad over the situation, was able to get her for the much smaller role of Adelaide, which Ryan had enough availability to do.
Naturally an element of the film which was equally as important as it’s voice acting was its music, and for that Bluth and Eisner would turn to Stephen Flaherty, Stephan Schwartz and Lynn Ahrens, who together would write the films various songs. Key songs they would write would be the song which would share the same name as the film and would play during the Beast and Belle’s final dance before he gifts her the magic mirror[9], “Reflections in Me”, which Belle sings early in the film after having to again reject another proposal by Avenant, “A Journey to Find Him”, which plays as Belle journeys to find and rescue her father, Queen Livia’s villain song “Dark Roses”, and my personal favorite, “A Beast Forever More”, which is the Beast’s lamentation that he sings following Belle leaving the castle[10]. The first and final of said songs would be nominated for Best Original Song in the following years Oscars, though both unsurprisingly lost to Heart of Ice’s “Where Roses Bloom”.
Accompanying the songs would be the film’s musical score, which would be written by David Newman. Newman’s memorable score would slightly invoke elements of the 1946 film, while still keeping an almost whimsical element to it.
The Story:
The film’s story, which as noted drew heavy inspiration from both the 1946 film and the classic grim nature found in many original Grimm Brothers stories, follows Belle (Roane), a kind and humble but no less young and beautiful woman who lives in a small village in 16th Century France with her father Marcel (Stiers) and less beautiful and slightly vain older sister Adelaide (Ryan). Belle often finds herself persuaded by the town’s rich and handsome moneylender Avenant (Lloyd), who seeks Belle’s hand in marriage (to the jealousy of Belle’s sister), yet to his annoyance she constantly rejects him, as she desires to instead focus on caring for her father.
One day however, Marcel comes home, claiming to have come into great wealth which he must go to a nearby city to pick up. Promising to return with gifts for his daughters, his eldest daughter ask for Marcel to gift her beautiful jewels and dresses, while Belle asks only for a red rose as a gift. However, unknown to Marcel, this newfound wealth was in fact a scam by Avenant. Worse, Avenant had previously managed to convince Marcel to sign a contract with him, which Marcel hopes to pay off with his new wealth. Since there is in fact no new wealth and the contract allows Avenant to sue if Marcel doesn’t pay him back before a certain point, it soon becomes clear that Avenant wants to put Marvel in a great debt that he will not be able to pay in time, which Avenant will only forgive if Marcel agrees to let Belle marry him.
One of Bluth's early sketchs of Belle and the Beast. (source: Wikia.com)
Upon arriving in the city, and discovering he was scammed, a distraught Marcel finds that he is too poor to pay for lodging. Forced to return home through the forest at night, Marcel soon gets lost and finds himself at the gates of a mysterious and foreboding castle. Seeing a beautiful rose garden in the castle grounds, and remembering his promise to his youngest daughter, Marcel plucks a rose from the garden only to be attacked by a shadowy figure, which leads his horse to run away in fright.
Said horse returns to Belle’s home, leading to Belle, upon realizing her father must be in trouble, to race off to find him. Finding the same mysterious and magical castle her father did, Belle finds her father imprisoned by the Beast (Rickman), who agrees to let a pleading Belle trade places with her father. A saddened Belle, now a prisoner of the Beast, soon learns that the Beast is in fact a prince, one who has been cursed along with his servants. Only his mother Queen Livia (Redgrave), whom the Beast seems to be a puppet of, seems to have managed to avoid the curse which befell the castle and its inhabitants.
The now imprisoned Belle is then informed by the Beast she will have free reign over the castle, but that every night she must eat dinner with him and that every day after dinner, the Beast will ask her to marry him, ironically echoing Avenant’s own persistent asking of Belle to marry him. Like with Avenant, Belle ends up rejecting the Beast every day, yet unlike with the arrogant Avenant, Belle finds herself growing increasingly fond of the Beast and grows close to him. Over a year or two passes and the two grow ever closer, yet all the while Belle becomes more and more wary of the Beast’s ever-mysterious mother, Queen Livia, who is unnaturally youthful and beautiful, yet also seems to have a unusual amount of control and influence over her son.
As we soon learn, Belle has good reason to be wary of her, as Queen Livia (who is heavily based on classic Disney villains such as the Evil Queen from Disney’s Snow White and Maleficent from Disney’s Sleeping Beauty and is probably one of if, not the single most twisted and evil villain in animation and film history) is unsurprising in fact the one responsible for the curse which infects her son and the castle’s servants[11]. Livia, as we grimly discover, cursed her son with a parasitic spell that she administers via regular doses of rose-based potion, that keeps her alive and in power forever and turns him into a progressively animalistic inhuman beast. If the Beast then rejects his humanity and gives in to full despair, the spell’s effects will become permanent and he will become a Beast for all time[12]. If the Beast however were to try and embrace his humanity by becoming compassionate, selfless, and noble, would she instead begin to lose her beauty and immortality and begin to slowly wither away and die. Furthermore, if someone were to learn to love the Beast unconditionally despite his hateful traits, and if he were to love them back, the spell would be permanently broken and he would become human again[13].
Bluth's early sketches for the Beast from 1982. (source: Wikia.com)
Livia’s goal therefore in seeking to allow to the Beast to keep Belle imprisoned is that she hopes that Belle’s horror and misery of having to spend her days with the Beast will finally cause him to reject humanity and become a mindless wild animal, thereby making the spell and curse permanent. Yet to her horror, she is instead beginning to grow old and ugly, leading her to begin to realize that Belle and the Beast are instead growing far too close and fond of one another, and that the spell is now close to breaking. Desiring now to break them apart, she curses Marcel to grow sick and deathly ill, and then gives the Beast a magic mirror and magical Pegasus named Magnificent, which she instructs the Beast to gift Belle. He does so after the two have dinner and dance in the Castle ballroom, and upon learning that her father is ill, a horrified Belle pleads for the Beast to let her visit her father. He does so, but warns Belle she must eventually return to him. If she does not do so, then he will at last fall into disrepair and reject humanity, permanently becoming a Beast for all time.
Returning home after having lived with the Beast for two years, Belle goes to her father and begins to care for him, slowly helping him recover his health. While there, she learns that her father has been left to live mostly in poverty and debt by Avenant, while everyone else now believes Belle to be dead (as no one had believed Marcel’s claims that Belle had been imprisoned by a Beast), and that Avenant has married Belle’s sister Adelaide. When both Avenant and Adelaide visit Marcel, they are shocked to learn Belle is alive and that she truly did live with a Beast in a castle. Unsurprisingly, Avenant becomes filled with greed at the thought of the riches which lie in the Beasts Castle and quickly plans to take it for himself. Adelaide meanwhile reluctantly agrees to help him, as she is afraid that despite her pregnancy that her husband will leave her to once again try to pursue her sister Belle, whom he still clearly lusts after.
On Avenant's orders, Adelaide steals Belle’s mirror and gives it to Avenant, who has Belle imprisoned in her home and then uses the mirror to convince and rally a number of the villagers, terrifying them at the thought of the Beast and getting them to move to storm the castle with him to kill the Beast. Queen Livia meanwhile, now closer than ever to achieving her final goal, tries to convince her son that the villagers attack is proof that Belle has rejected him and that clinging to what is left of his humanity is hopeless. Though he does not yet give in despair, it is obvious he is close and becoming more animalistic as he fights with Avenant to defend the castle to Livia’s delight. When Avenant manages to wound the Beast, it seems that the Beast will at last give in, but before he can do so Belle arrives on Magnificent (having been aided and freed from house imprisonment by Adelaide, who discovers and is moved by her sister’s love for the Beast), much to the horror of Livia.
Realizing Belle has returned to him brings the Beast back from the abyss, and that she in turn has grown to love him and fear losing him, Belle at last tells him she will marry him. An enraged Avenant takes advantage of the Beasts distraction to stab the Beast in the back, seemingly killing him to Belle’s horror. Shockingly, the Beast’s own curse is seemingly broken as he arises once more as the human Prince Ardent, while the castles knights and servants regain their humanity. Furthermore, Magnificent himself also returns to a human form, revealing himself to be none other than Prince Ardent’s elderly father, King Henri (voiced by Leonard Nimoy). An enraged Queen Livia, now dying and fearing for her life, tries a last-ditch effort to restore the curse, using weaker spellwork instead of a potion, but finds that Belle, Ardent, Henri, and the castle servants are now protected from such a spell. Ironically enough, the spell instead turns Avenant into a Beast and the villagers who rallied with him into wolves. Unfortunately for the now-cursed Avenant, he instantly gives into despair and rejects his humanity upon looking into a mirror and realizing he is now a monstrous beast, thus effectively makes his own curse permanent[14].
Belle, from sketch to the final result. Originally intending Belle to be blonde, similar the Belle from the 1946 film, as well as Cinderella from Disney's Cinderella and Princess Aurora in Disney's Sleeping Beauty, Belle would in the final 1998 film end up being a redhead, with her appearance based primarily upon that of her voice actress, Daphne Roane, based on images of Roane when she was younger. Ironically, this means that this timeline’s Belle will somewhat also resemble Anastasia/Anya from Bluth’s Anastasia film in our timeline. (Image Edit by @Nerdman3000)
The transformed Avenant and villagers are quickly driven from the castle by Prince Ardent and the restored knights while Queen Livia herself begins to wither away and grow increasingly old, as her spell is revealed to not have saved her life. Afterwards, Belle and Ardent embrace, with both agreeing to marry, and King Henri officiating their marriage in a great marriage ceremony, under the joyful watch of Marcel, Adelaide, and Adelaide’s newborn daughter Félicie[15]. In the end, Belle and Ardent live happily ever after.
Release:
As the film neared its 1998 release, it would find itself facing two hurdles Bluth hadn’t foreseen when he went ahead with making the film. First, the film would ironically find itself unintentionally being the third such telling of what was essentially the same type of story in the past two years. In 1996, Disney and Universal/Hollywood Animation both put their own loose adaptation and spin on the tale, with Disney’s Medusa telling what was essentially a gender-bent semi-variation of the Beauty and the Beast story that starred the Greek monster of the same name. Hollywood/Universal’s Heart and Soul meanwhile was based on the myth of Eros and Psyche, which was itself the story which originally inspired the original telling of Beauty and the Beast. While ultimately excusable, since neither would be exactly the same to Bluth’s own straight adaptation of the story, it was nonetheless something which reportedly caused Bluth no end of misery, to the point that he reportedly openly cursed out loud after watching both films.
The second, and truth be told much bigger concern to Bluth, was that due to the various delays the film had suffered, it would be dualling with two different animated films in Fall/Winter of 1998: Disney’s upcoming Heart of Ice and Universal Animation’s East of the Sun and West of the Moon. While there would be almost three weeks between the planned release of Snow Queen and BATB, Katzenberg had decided to release East of the Sun and West of the Moon the week after Beauty and the Beast, a fact which both infuriated and deeply worried Bluth, even if Eisner initially seemed not to mind or see the issue when Bluth first brought it up (undoubtedly because he partially did found himself eager at the thought of going toe to toe with Katzenberg’s new film). It was easy to see that Katzenberg and Universal had chosen to specifically adapt East of the Sun and West of the Moon to bother Bluth, and unfortunately for him, it was very much working. EofSaWotM had been a film Bluth had planned to work on in the 1980s before the failure of The Secret of NIHM resulted in it being cancelled, and years later Bluth had then tried to resurrect while working at Hollywood Animation before his departure.
More than that, Beauty and the Beast, East of the Sun and West of the Moon, and Heart of Ice were all animated musical princess films and Bluth feared that releasing all three together would just risk cannibalizing the success of all three films. Considering this was the film Bluth intended to be his magnum opus, it’s therefore unsurprising that, as the film neared release, Don Bluth was reportedly a turning into a giant ball of nerves, seemingly waiting for the shoe to drop and wondering if his animated magnum opus would instead turn out to instead be a colossal failure. In fact, Bluth's nerves got so bad that in September 1998, as the animation studio neared completion, Bluth collapsed and had to be rushed to the hospital due to essentially experiencing a complete nervous breakdown and him being forced on mandatory rest. With Bluth hospitalized, Didier Brunner moved with determination to take over much of the load of his friend while he rested while the studio moved with fierce determination to finish the film. The most unexpected result of Bluth's hospitalization however would come from none other than Michael Eisner himself.
French Producer and Animator Didier Brunner, who would join Bluth's studio following the completion of Valerian & Laureline. Becoming a close friend and partner of Bluth, he would eventually help Beauty and the Beast get to the finish line and completion, following Bluth's September 1998 hospitalization. (source: Cineuropa.com)
Eisner, in what is perhaps one of the most noteworthy and heartfelt moments of his career and one which proved that even Michael Eisner has a heart, chose to unexpectedly push forward the release of Beauty and the Beast by over three weeks to late October, where it had much less competition (at least in its main children and family demographic). Despite it seeming to suggest that Eisner had blinked in the potential upcoming face off with Katzenberg’s film (Katzenberg himself certainly reportedly believed it), in truth the reason for the release date change was that Eisner had found himself developing a very close friendship with Bluth over the past three years. It was reportedly in light of that friendship that Eisner was noted as growing to worry a bit about Bluth’s mental health in the weeks before the man's nervous breakdown. Thus, fearing what would happen to Bluth if the film failed, as the man in question seemed to almost unravel in nerves and stress in the final months before the film’s release, Eisner decided he needed to step in a do something to help his friend, even if that meant essentially losing face to Katzenberg.
Though officially Eisner claims that the move was “a shrewd business decision” to “be the first out of the gate” and take advantage of “reduced competition.”
It’s fair to say that to those that knew him, that Eisner’s decision to choose to focus on the mental health of his friend instead of his ego and rivalry with Katzenberg would ultimately came as a great surprise and brought disbelief, with Eisner’s own sister Margot Freedman reportedly even thinking the whole thing had to be a lie upon being told. Ultimately however, while the move undoubtedly put extra pressure and strain on Didier Brunner and the film’s animators (who reportedly only managed to completely finish the film and put it in the can a mere two weeks before the film’s release), it would turn out in hindsight to be a rather a good decision for the film itself.
Beauty and the Beast would, to great relief, open to become a huge critical and financial success (and later on a huge home video hit as well), going on to make $378 million dollars worldwide at the box office and becoming one of the highest rated animated films of all time. Yet despite those huge numbers, the film would find itself having to accept the position of second place, at least in terms of box office, due to the release of the massive critical and financial juggernaut that was Disney’s Heart of Ice, which of course went on to become the number one movie of the entire year of 1998 at the box office. In hindsight, it’s clear that had the film not been pushed forward, that Heart of Ice likely would have significantly hurt Beauty and the Beast’s overall box office performance[16], just like it ultimately did to East of the Sun and West of the Moon with said film itself getting completely annihilated by the Disney film in question following its release during EotSaWotM’s third weekend.
Michael Eisner, who famously proved he had a heart when he made the surprising heartful decision push forward the release of Beauty and the Beast in order to help Don Bluth’s mental health. In hindsight, it is notable that said action helped prevent the film from getting crushed by the unprecedented and massive juggernaut success of Disney's Heart of Ice. (source: Success Magazine)
For Don Bluth however, the fact that Beauty and the Beast ultimately got second place to Disney’s Heart of Ice or won Best Animated picture arguably didn’t matter to him. To him, the knowledge that two decades of work had paid off and that Beauty and the Beast was a critical and financial success was what truly brought him no small amount of joy. The film, which was the happy culmination of an almost two-decade-long journey, was truly and undeniably Bluth’s animated magnum opus and would serve as Don Bluth’s greatest legacy to the animation world, one that could defiantly stand toe to toe with the greatest of Disney’s own animation classics[17].
For that alone, Don Bluth couldn’t be any happier.
[1] The former pitch was known as The Baby Blue Whale and the later pitch was known as Satyrday. The latter was ironically an actual undeveloped film Bluth would work on in in our timeline, as a potential follow up to Titan A.E. The massive failure of that film at the box office however put an end to that, resulted in it being cancelled.
[2] In our timeline, Bluth began working on his pitch for BatB in 1984 and worked on it on and off for two years until 1986, when Disney announced their plans for doing their own animated BatB film. This led to Bluth pulling the plug on his version of BatB, since he was not convinced that he could complete it in time before Disney released their version. In this timeline, though, while Disney probably considers doing an adaptation of the BatB tale, as you know they ultimately do not adapt it (not fully anyways), so Bluth never cancels it and instead puts it on the backburner.
[3] In our timeline in 1989 Bluth’s dream of reviving his animation studio as an independent studio would be realized as he was able to form Sullivan Bluth Animation Studios (later known as Don Bluth Entertainment). However, because they had the very bad luck of essentially formed it right smack dab as the Disney Renaissance started and began to release its best films (the new studio’s first film, for example, All Dogs Go To Heaven, released against and got crushed by the massive success that was The Little Mermaid), meant that by 1995 the studio was closing its doors and Bluth was moving to work at Fox Animation Studios.
[4] Katzenberg’s later antagonism with the animators at Hollywood Animation following his 1995 ousting of Michael Eisner would lead to many of those very same animators who had been on the fence to finally follow Bluth.
[5] In our timeline’s 1987, Brunner formed the Trans-Europe Film production company, which he then left in 1994 to form the French animation studio, Les Armateurs. In this timeline, various butterflies result in him leaving Trans-Europe Film three years early and partnering with Pathé to form a animation studio, named Pathé Studio d'Animations. The first Astrix animated film is essentially an earlier version of the 1999 live action film of the same name, but animated and released in 1993.
[6] Didn’t happen in our timeline, but due to random butterflies in June 1996, a drunk driver ends up crashing his car into Bluth’s. While Bluth would survive, he would receive injuries that leave him hospitalized for over a month and help to delay the film.
[7] A original character who you may be familiar with if you’ve read my Beyond Halyx guest post, found here. Roane would, alongside fellow band member Miyuki Koyama (also original character), manage to have a number of live action acting and voice acting roles in this timeline, though Koyama more so than Roane, with Koyama going on to have a very successful acting career in Japan. For those wondering, Roane is a lyric soprano, and is a four-five octave singer, so basically similar to someone like Ariana Grande in terms of vocal range.
[8] Yes Alan Rickman can sing. Just watch Sweety Todd if you don’t believe me. He’s honestly not bad either.
[9] Though it shares the same name as our timeline’s Ashman and Menken song, plays during an almost identical moment of the film, and even features the words “Beauty and the Beast”, the song is otherwise nothing like the Disney version, at least in terms of lyrics. If there are any songs from our timeline that it even slightly resembles, I’d say it’s probably closer to something like “Can You Feel The Love Tonight” from The Lion King, “If I Never Knew You” from Pocahontas, or “At the Beginning” from Anastasia.
[10] In terms of potential comparisons from our timeline, “Reflections in Me” is the film’s I Want song and can be compared to “Reflection” from our timeline’s Mulan. “A Journey to Find Him” is partially the film’s equivalent of both “Journey to the Past” and “Once Upon a December” from our timeline’s Anastasia. “Dark Rose” is comparable to our timeline’s songs “Hellfire” from The Hunchback of Notre Dame and “Into the Dark of the Night” from Anastasia. Finally, “A Beast Forever More” is comparable to “Heaven’s Light” from our timeline’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame film and “Evermore” from the Live Action Disney Beauty and the Beast film.
[11] Unlike the Disney film from our timeline, the cursed servants are not major characters, with most screentime in the castle instead given over to Belle, the Beast, and Queen Livia.
[12] One gruesome and noteworthy detail Bluth wanted to include, as a way of invoking the grim twisted nature of the classic Brothers Grimm stories, was by adding an extra dark twist to Livia’s plans for after her son permanently becomes a mindless Beast where she will have her son killed, with his head stuffed and mounted on a wall, alongside Belle’s own stuffed and mounted head. While twisted and certainly fitting the classic Grimms Brother mood, unsurprisingly this never materialized in the final film. The closest nod to it in the final film is that Livia has two empty head trophies in her room, with no actual heads attached and mounted to them.
[13] To add further context, the huge rose garden seen earlier in the film is one Livia keeps in order to keep making the potions to keep her son beastly and herself beautiful. Obvious, but there's more to it than that. Basically, there are two potions here. One made of Rose hips and Petals for Livia, to maintain youth and surface beauty and cover her true nature. The other half is made from the thorns and roots of the flower, bringing the true nature of the drinker to the skin and the mind, smoothing all goodness, hence why Livia manipulated her son the act like a beast so that he would become one to the point where only an act of unconditional love could undo the effects. Both potions work in tandem, with one being unable to work without the other with the link being unbreakable after many doses, save for the unconditional love thing. Should a user who has consumed one potion for long enough a time ever then consume the other, their true nature will be revealed while they rapidly age and die. It’s meant to be a metaphor for how toxic people never get that way on their own and are usually raised to be as such, often for the benefit or, at least, narcissistic peace of mind of the manipulator.
[14] Basically, the main reason the spell work Livia casts doesn’t work here is because outright spell work fueled by darkness and hate is weaker and easier to break than potion-based spells, which is established earlier in the movie. Since the curse, which was derived from a potion-based spell, is considered broken, no simple dark spell work can break it or recast it. As a result, it the weak spell latched onto the closest people it could find, Avenant and the villagers. However, since unlike the stronger-willed Prince Ardent, who always viewed himself as human despite looking like a beast, Avenant instantly gave into despair upon seeing his reflection and viewed himself as being no longer human and so he instantly fulfilled the conditions necessary to make the more easily breakable spell permanent and he thus will forever more be a mindless beast.
[15] Félicie, it should be noted, is the same name as Belle’s other sister in the 1946 film, who was dropped in Bluth’s own film. Having Adelaide’s daughter share that name is mainly another last-minute nod toward the 1946 film by Bluth.
[16] This is almost certainly true. While the film certainly would have still been a critical success, it would never have done nearly as well as it ultimately did if it had released under its original November 1998 release date. The release of EotSaWotM a week after, followed by the monster that was Heart of Ice would have result in the film at most making $180 million, and possibly not even that high. Ironically however, the film which would have been hurt the most had Eisner not moved BatB up those three weeks would have been EotSaWotM, which would probably have actually flopped hard if BatB had not moved, as it would have completely struggled to go up against both BatB and HoI.
[17] In a bit of irony, but just like Bluth’s own Anastasia in our timeline and Heart and Soul in this timeline, Bluth’s Beauty and the Beast has a reputation of constantly getting mistaken for being a Disney movie by casual movie goers who don’t know any better, something which undoubtedly pisses off Bluth in this timeline. Personally, I find it funny to imagine that any successful animated non-Disney Princess film which is released in this timeline’s ‘90s is rewarded for that success by forevermore being constantly mistaken as having in fact been made by Disney. Some would probably think it’s a compliment, but I just think it’s hilarious.
From the Animation Classicalist Net-log by Derrick Andrews, June 5th, 2019
Guest post by @Nerdman3000, with help by @Igeo654
In terms of power and respect, few can deny that Walt Disney’s great animation studio is perhaps the most well known and most respected. For almost a century they have effectively ruled as King of the animation world, with few true rivals ever successfully rising to stand in their way. Yet few does not mean zero, and one man in particular notably sought to rise and challenge the Mouse’s crown and rule over the animation world: Don Bluth.
While he would not always to succeed, it’s undeniable that Bluth would go on to become one of the most prolific and noteworthy animators in the history of the industry, often compared in terms of influence to a young Walt Disney and Jim Henson. One film in particular that would cement this comparison is the film which is viewed by many to be Bluth’s best and the one which manages to stand toe to toe with some of Disney’s greatest animated classics.
I am of course talking about Don Bluth’s 1998 classic and arguably one of the greatest animated films of all time, Beauty and the Beast.
Don Bluth's Beauty and the Beast, which is a VERY different adaptation of the original tale, at least when compared to the OTL Disney film. (source: Pinterest)
Backstory and Production:
To get into the story of how this film was made, we first have to get into the history behind the film itself, which goes all the way back to the early days of Don Bluth’s career following his departure from Disney animation. Having left the Disney company during what is considered the companies Dark Age of the ‘70s, right in between the end of what some have called the Walt Disney era of the company (which ended with Walt’s death) and the Jim Henson era, Don Bluth would go on to try to form his own animation studio. It didn’t exactly go well, as Bluth’s first two films as an independent were the TV animated film released in 1979 called Banjo the Woodpile Cat and 1982’s The Secret of NIMH, which underperformed.
Though NIHM was critically well received and showed off Bluth’s massive talent, Bluth had made the unfortunate decision to release the film against the juggernaut that was ET: The Extra Terrestrial, which meant that the film was only modestly profitable and, combined with the 1982 animator strike, meant that Bluth’s original planned follow-up, East of the Sun and West of the Moon, had to be cancelled. Soon enough, Bluth’s own luck worsened when his studio company found itself facing bankruptcy. Finding himself left adrift, in 1983 Bluth’s animation company would try to reform as the Bluth Group, with one of their first projects being the video game Dragon’s Lair. Yet Bluth seemed determined to get back to making full feature length animated films and so he began working on various ideas and projects for a number of potential animated films, with some ideas and potential projects being tossed around or early developed including an animated film about a baby blue whale and a pitch for film called about a young satyr who has to save the moon. Reportedly Bluth even tossed around the idea of a Dracula animated film as a joke[1].
The project that got the furthest in production, however, was a pitch for a potential animated film based on the Beauty and the Beast tale[2]. The story was one Walt Disney had wanted to adapt for decades before his eventual death and one that Disney Animation had unsuccessfully tried on and off to adapt for decades. Bluth meanwhile, who was a big fan of the 1946 film live action adaptation, also had found himself quite interested in making an animated adaptation of the tale, one he hoped would be based slightly off of the previously mentioned 1946 adaptation. More than that however, Bluth wanted BatB to be the first animated film he produced and released whenever his dream of forming a fully relaunched independent animated studio eventually materialized[3].
The 1946 Beauty and the Beast film, which would heavily inspire Bluth's own adaptation. (source: AllPosters.com)
Yet as fate would have it, a 1985 call from Steven Spielberg led to Bluth getting involved with Richard Williams on The Thief and the Cobbler and then later Michael Eisner’s Hollywood Animation Studio, leaving Bluth’s undeveloped Beauty and the Beast project to be essentially stuck in limbo for a decade. It would not be until Bluth’s departure from Hollywood Animation, due to his rivalry with animation studio head Jeffrey Katzenberg, that Bluth would finally manage to form a new relaunched independent animation studio.
However, despite his initial prior hopes, the first film of the relaunched animation studio would not be Beauty and the Beast. Though Bluth had been able to convince many animators to leave Hollywood Animation with him, it had not been as many as he had originally hoped, in part due to Katzenberg successfully managing to stroke fears about Bluth’s chances of success at going independent again among a number of animators who were considering jumping ship with Bluth[4], certainly not enough to properly do Bluth’s vision of Beauty and the Beast justice. Hence Bluth’s new studio would instead partner up with Pathé to create Valerian & Laureline for their first film.
In 1991 Pathé had decided to form a animation division for their studio with French film producer and animator Didier Brunner, with their first film being the 1993 film Asterix and Obelix vs. Caesar, followed by Asterix and Obelix Meet Cleopatra in 1994[5]. Though the first film, Asterix and Obelix vs. Caesar, had been a modest financial success, the film’s sequel had drastically underperformed, and what’s more, neither had been critically well received, in part due to many of their hired animators being so inexperienced. This left Pathé Animation with two critically panned films, only one of which had any financial success. Rather than can the studio entirely, however, Pathé instead decided to try and partner up with a more experienced animation team for their third animated film, which would be adapting the Valerian & Laureline comics. This led them to approach Bluth, who as I mentioned before needed more animators to get things at his new animation studio going, and therefore found Pathé’s offer to be mutually beneficial as it meant that he could flush up the number of animators he had available and hopefully follow up on it with an adaptation of Beauty and the Beast.
Valerian and Laureline, the protagonists of the 1995 Don Bluth film of the same name. (source: Pinterest)
Now unfortunately for Bluth, while 1995’s Valerian & Laureline was a critical and home video success and even managed to go on to becoming a cult classic, it underperformed at the box office, leading to Pathé to close their short-lived animation studio after releasing only three films. Bluth nonetheless moved forward with his studio, now joined by Brunner and his animators, determined to finally move ahead with producing Beauty and the Beast. Still, Bluth needed a distributor, and as luck would have it, less than two months following the release of Valerian & Laureline, Bluth would be approached by Michael Eisner, who following his departure from ABC/Hollywood Studios, had moved over to Columbia Pictures.
After a bit of back and forth, the two men agreed to a three-picture deal (with room for more), with the first film Bluth’s studio would work on for Columbia being the long languishing Beauty and the Beast, which would go into production almost immediately after for a initially intended 1997 release. Certain difficulties during production, among them Don Bluth’s 1996 hospitalization following a car crash[6], as well as Bluth’s noted intense over obsession with perfectionism on the film due to the film essentially being his magnum opus, would ultimately lead to the film being delayed for over a year, releasing instead in late 1998.
Casting and Music:
To star as Belle, the film’s titular Beauty, Eisner and Bluth would go through a number of possible names, with names such as Meg Ryan, Carrie Fisher, and Jodie Benson being tossed around. Ultimately however, they would find themselves turning to none other than former Sunset Strip member Daphne Roane[7], in what would be one of her earliest voice acting roles. Roane’s voice would provide a sense of charm and charisma to Belle to go along with her talented singing voice. For their Beast, Bluth would select English actor Alan Rickman, whose memorable deep languid voice brought a sense of quiet sadness to the character of Prince Ardent, a man who has been cursed and transformed into the Beast. Even better for Bluth, this sense of tragic grief excellently translated over into Rickman’s singing[8].
Daphne Roane and Alan Rickman circa 1998. (source for Daphne Roane image: Image Created by @Nerdman3000 using Artbreeder and Photoshop) (source for Alan Rickman Image: Pinterest)
To star as the film’s two central villains, Bluth would cast Vanessa Redgrave as Queen Livia (an original creation of Bluth’s and one who is not from the 1946 film), while for the handsome but greedy moneylender Avenant (who is a merging of three characters from the 1946 film: the similarly named Avenant who courts Belle, the moneylender, and Belle’s brother Ludovic), Bluth would cast Christopher Lloyd. Both were meant by Bluth to act as a sort of dark mirror to both Belle and the Beast, with their fates ultimately being the reverse of the Beast and Belle.
Rounding out the cast would be David Ogden Stiers as Belle’s father Marcel (who fun fact is named after Marcel André, the French actor who played Belle’s father in the 1946 film), Leonard Nimoy as Prince Ardent/The Beast’s father King Henri, and Meg Ryan as Belle’s older sister Adelaide (who unlike the 1946 film, is Belle’s only sibling). Ryan, it should be noted, actually originally auditioned for the role of Belle and almost got the part, but later scheduling issues which arose with another film before she could sign on to play Belle meant she found herself suddenly having much reduced availability at the last minute. Bluth, reportedly still liking Ryan and feeling a bit bad over the situation, was able to get her for the much smaller role of Adelaide, which Ryan had enough availability to do.
Naturally an element of the film which was equally as important as it’s voice acting was its music, and for that Bluth and Eisner would turn to Stephen Flaherty, Stephan Schwartz and Lynn Ahrens, who together would write the films various songs. Key songs they would write would be the song which would share the same name as the film and would play during the Beast and Belle’s final dance before he gifts her the magic mirror[9], “Reflections in Me”, which Belle sings early in the film after having to again reject another proposal by Avenant, “A Journey to Find Him”, which plays as Belle journeys to find and rescue her father, Queen Livia’s villain song “Dark Roses”, and my personal favorite, “A Beast Forever More”, which is the Beast’s lamentation that he sings following Belle leaving the castle[10]. The first and final of said songs would be nominated for Best Original Song in the following years Oscars, though both unsurprisingly lost to Heart of Ice’s “Where Roses Bloom”.
Accompanying the songs would be the film’s musical score, which would be written by David Newman. Newman’s memorable score would slightly invoke elements of the 1946 film, while still keeping an almost whimsical element to it.
The Story:
The film’s story, which as noted drew heavy inspiration from both the 1946 film and the classic grim nature found in many original Grimm Brothers stories, follows Belle (Roane), a kind and humble but no less young and beautiful woman who lives in a small village in 16th Century France with her father Marcel (Stiers) and less beautiful and slightly vain older sister Adelaide (Ryan). Belle often finds herself persuaded by the town’s rich and handsome moneylender Avenant (Lloyd), who seeks Belle’s hand in marriage (to the jealousy of Belle’s sister), yet to his annoyance she constantly rejects him, as she desires to instead focus on caring for her father.
One day however, Marcel comes home, claiming to have come into great wealth which he must go to a nearby city to pick up. Promising to return with gifts for his daughters, his eldest daughter ask for Marcel to gift her beautiful jewels and dresses, while Belle asks only for a red rose as a gift. However, unknown to Marcel, this newfound wealth was in fact a scam by Avenant. Worse, Avenant had previously managed to convince Marcel to sign a contract with him, which Marcel hopes to pay off with his new wealth. Since there is in fact no new wealth and the contract allows Avenant to sue if Marcel doesn’t pay him back before a certain point, it soon becomes clear that Avenant wants to put Marvel in a great debt that he will not be able to pay in time, which Avenant will only forgive if Marcel agrees to let Belle marry him.
One of Bluth's early sketchs of Belle and the Beast. (source: Wikia.com)
Upon arriving in the city, and discovering he was scammed, a distraught Marcel finds that he is too poor to pay for lodging. Forced to return home through the forest at night, Marcel soon gets lost and finds himself at the gates of a mysterious and foreboding castle. Seeing a beautiful rose garden in the castle grounds, and remembering his promise to his youngest daughter, Marcel plucks a rose from the garden only to be attacked by a shadowy figure, which leads his horse to run away in fright.
Said horse returns to Belle’s home, leading to Belle, upon realizing her father must be in trouble, to race off to find him. Finding the same mysterious and magical castle her father did, Belle finds her father imprisoned by the Beast (Rickman), who agrees to let a pleading Belle trade places with her father. A saddened Belle, now a prisoner of the Beast, soon learns that the Beast is in fact a prince, one who has been cursed along with his servants. Only his mother Queen Livia (Redgrave), whom the Beast seems to be a puppet of, seems to have managed to avoid the curse which befell the castle and its inhabitants.
The now imprisoned Belle is then informed by the Beast she will have free reign over the castle, but that every night she must eat dinner with him and that every day after dinner, the Beast will ask her to marry him, ironically echoing Avenant’s own persistent asking of Belle to marry him. Like with Avenant, Belle ends up rejecting the Beast every day, yet unlike with the arrogant Avenant, Belle finds herself growing increasingly fond of the Beast and grows close to him. Over a year or two passes and the two grow ever closer, yet all the while Belle becomes more and more wary of the Beast’s ever-mysterious mother, Queen Livia, who is unnaturally youthful and beautiful, yet also seems to have a unusual amount of control and influence over her son.
As we soon learn, Belle has good reason to be wary of her, as Queen Livia (who is heavily based on classic Disney villains such as the Evil Queen from Disney’s Snow White and Maleficent from Disney’s Sleeping Beauty and is probably one of if, not the single most twisted and evil villain in animation and film history) is unsurprising in fact the one responsible for the curse which infects her son and the castle’s servants[11]. Livia, as we grimly discover, cursed her son with a parasitic spell that she administers via regular doses of rose-based potion, that keeps her alive and in power forever and turns him into a progressively animalistic inhuman beast. If the Beast then rejects his humanity and gives in to full despair, the spell’s effects will become permanent and he will become a Beast for all time[12]. If the Beast however were to try and embrace his humanity by becoming compassionate, selfless, and noble, would she instead begin to lose her beauty and immortality and begin to slowly wither away and die. Furthermore, if someone were to learn to love the Beast unconditionally despite his hateful traits, and if he were to love them back, the spell would be permanently broken and he would become human again[13].
Bluth's early sketches for the Beast from 1982. (source: Wikia.com)
Livia’s goal therefore in seeking to allow to the Beast to keep Belle imprisoned is that she hopes that Belle’s horror and misery of having to spend her days with the Beast will finally cause him to reject humanity and become a mindless wild animal, thereby making the spell and curse permanent. Yet to her horror, she is instead beginning to grow old and ugly, leading her to begin to realize that Belle and the Beast are instead growing far too close and fond of one another, and that the spell is now close to breaking. Desiring now to break them apart, she curses Marcel to grow sick and deathly ill, and then gives the Beast a magic mirror and magical Pegasus named Magnificent, which she instructs the Beast to gift Belle. He does so after the two have dinner and dance in the Castle ballroom, and upon learning that her father is ill, a horrified Belle pleads for the Beast to let her visit her father. He does so, but warns Belle she must eventually return to him. If she does not do so, then he will at last fall into disrepair and reject humanity, permanently becoming a Beast for all time.
Returning home after having lived with the Beast for two years, Belle goes to her father and begins to care for him, slowly helping him recover his health. While there, she learns that her father has been left to live mostly in poverty and debt by Avenant, while everyone else now believes Belle to be dead (as no one had believed Marcel’s claims that Belle had been imprisoned by a Beast), and that Avenant has married Belle’s sister Adelaide. When both Avenant and Adelaide visit Marcel, they are shocked to learn Belle is alive and that she truly did live with a Beast in a castle. Unsurprisingly, Avenant becomes filled with greed at the thought of the riches which lie in the Beasts Castle and quickly plans to take it for himself. Adelaide meanwhile reluctantly agrees to help him, as she is afraid that despite her pregnancy that her husband will leave her to once again try to pursue her sister Belle, whom he still clearly lusts after.
On Avenant's orders, Adelaide steals Belle’s mirror and gives it to Avenant, who has Belle imprisoned in her home and then uses the mirror to convince and rally a number of the villagers, terrifying them at the thought of the Beast and getting them to move to storm the castle with him to kill the Beast. Queen Livia meanwhile, now closer than ever to achieving her final goal, tries to convince her son that the villagers attack is proof that Belle has rejected him and that clinging to what is left of his humanity is hopeless. Though he does not yet give in despair, it is obvious he is close and becoming more animalistic as he fights with Avenant to defend the castle to Livia’s delight. When Avenant manages to wound the Beast, it seems that the Beast will at last give in, but before he can do so Belle arrives on Magnificent (having been aided and freed from house imprisonment by Adelaide, who discovers and is moved by her sister’s love for the Beast), much to the horror of Livia.
Realizing Belle has returned to him brings the Beast back from the abyss, and that she in turn has grown to love him and fear losing him, Belle at last tells him she will marry him. An enraged Avenant takes advantage of the Beasts distraction to stab the Beast in the back, seemingly killing him to Belle’s horror. Shockingly, the Beast’s own curse is seemingly broken as he arises once more as the human Prince Ardent, while the castles knights and servants regain their humanity. Furthermore, Magnificent himself also returns to a human form, revealing himself to be none other than Prince Ardent’s elderly father, King Henri (voiced by Leonard Nimoy). An enraged Queen Livia, now dying and fearing for her life, tries a last-ditch effort to restore the curse, using weaker spellwork instead of a potion, but finds that Belle, Ardent, Henri, and the castle servants are now protected from such a spell. Ironically enough, the spell instead turns Avenant into a Beast and the villagers who rallied with him into wolves. Unfortunately for the now-cursed Avenant, he instantly gives into despair and rejects his humanity upon looking into a mirror and realizing he is now a monstrous beast, thus effectively makes his own curse permanent[14].
Belle, from sketch to the final result. Originally intending Belle to be blonde, similar the Belle from the 1946 film, as well as Cinderella from Disney's Cinderella and Princess Aurora in Disney's Sleeping Beauty, Belle would in the final 1998 film end up being a redhead, with her appearance based primarily upon that of her voice actress, Daphne Roane, based on images of Roane when she was younger. Ironically, this means that this timeline’s Belle will somewhat also resemble Anastasia/Anya from Bluth’s Anastasia film in our timeline. (Image Edit by @Nerdman3000)
The transformed Avenant and villagers are quickly driven from the castle by Prince Ardent and the restored knights while Queen Livia herself begins to wither away and grow increasingly old, as her spell is revealed to not have saved her life. Afterwards, Belle and Ardent embrace, with both agreeing to marry, and King Henri officiating their marriage in a great marriage ceremony, under the joyful watch of Marcel, Adelaide, and Adelaide’s newborn daughter Félicie[15]. In the end, Belle and Ardent live happily ever after.
Release:
As the film neared its 1998 release, it would find itself facing two hurdles Bluth hadn’t foreseen when he went ahead with making the film. First, the film would ironically find itself unintentionally being the third such telling of what was essentially the same type of story in the past two years. In 1996, Disney and Universal/Hollywood Animation both put their own loose adaptation and spin on the tale, with Disney’s Medusa telling what was essentially a gender-bent semi-variation of the Beauty and the Beast story that starred the Greek monster of the same name. Hollywood/Universal’s Heart and Soul meanwhile was based on the myth of Eros and Psyche, which was itself the story which originally inspired the original telling of Beauty and the Beast. While ultimately excusable, since neither would be exactly the same to Bluth’s own straight adaptation of the story, it was nonetheless something which reportedly caused Bluth no end of misery, to the point that he reportedly openly cursed out loud after watching both films.
The second, and truth be told much bigger concern to Bluth, was that due to the various delays the film had suffered, it would be dualling with two different animated films in Fall/Winter of 1998: Disney’s upcoming Heart of Ice and Universal Animation’s East of the Sun and West of the Moon. While there would be almost three weeks between the planned release of Snow Queen and BATB, Katzenberg had decided to release East of the Sun and West of the Moon the week after Beauty and the Beast, a fact which both infuriated and deeply worried Bluth, even if Eisner initially seemed not to mind or see the issue when Bluth first brought it up (undoubtedly because he partially did found himself eager at the thought of going toe to toe with Katzenberg’s new film). It was easy to see that Katzenberg and Universal had chosen to specifically adapt East of the Sun and West of the Moon to bother Bluth, and unfortunately for him, it was very much working. EofSaWotM had been a film Bluth had planned to work on in the 1980s before the failure of The Secret of NIHM resulted in it being cancelled, and years later Bluth had then tried to resurrect while working at Hollywood Animation before his departure.
More than that, Beauty and the Beast, East of the Sun and West of the Moon, and Heart of Ice were all animated musical princess films and Bluth feared that releasing all three together would just risk cannibalizing the success of all three films. Considering this was the film Bluth intended to be his magnum opus, it’s therefore unsurprising that, as the film neared release, Don Bluth was reportedly a turning into a giant ball of nerves, seemingly waiting for the shoe to drop and wondering if his animated magnum opus would instead turn out to instead be a colossal failure. In fact, Bluth's nerves got so bad that in September 1998, as the animation studio neared completion, Bluth collapsed and had to be rushed to the hospital due to essentially experiencing a complete nervous breakdown and him being forced on mandatory rest. With Bluth hospitalized, Didier Brunner moved with determination to take over much of the load of his friend while he rested while the studio moved with fierce determination to finish the film. The most unexpected result of Bluth's hospitalization however would come from none other than Michael Eisner himself.
French Producer and Animator Didier Brunner, who would join Bluth's studio following the completion of Valerian & Laureline. Becoming a close friend and partner of Bluth, he would eventually help Beauty and the Beast get to the finish line and completion, following Bluth's September 1998 hospitalization. (source: Cineuropa.com)
Eisner, in what is perhaps one of the most noteworthy and heartfelt moments of his career and one which proved that even Michael Eisner has a heart, chose to unexpectedly push forward the release of Beauty and the Beast by over three weeks to late October, where it had much less competition (at least in its main children and family demographic). Despite it seeming to suggest that Eisner had blinked in the potential upcoming face off with Katzenberg’s film (Katzenberg himself certainly reportedly believed it), in truth the reason for the release date change was that Eisner had found himself developing a very close friendship with Bluth over the past three years. It was reportedly in light of that friendship that Eisner was noted as growing to worry a bit about Bluth’s mental health in the weeks before the man's nervous breakdown. Thus, fearing what would happen to Bluth if the film failed, as the man in question seemed to almost unravel in nerves and stress in the final months before the film’s release, Eisner decided he needed to step in a do something to help his friend, even if that meant essentially losing face to Katzenberg.
Though officially Eisner claims that the move was “a shrewd business decision” to “be the first out of the gate” and take advantage of “reduced competition.”
It’s fair to say that to those that knew him, that Eisner’s decision to choose to focus on the mental health of his friend instead of his ego and rivalry with Katzenberg would ultimately came as a great surprise and brought disbelief, with Eisner’s own sister Margot Freedman reportedly even thinking the whole thing had to be a lie upon being told. Ultimately however, while the move undoubtedly put extra pressure and strain on Didier Brunner and the film’s animators (who reportedly only managed to completely finish the film and put it in the can a mere two weeks before the film’s release), it would turn out in hindsight to be a rather a good decision for the film itself.
Beauty and the Beast would, to great relief, open to become a huge critical and financial success (and later on a huge home video hit as well), going on to make $378 million dollars worldwide at the box office and becoming one of the highest rated animated films of all time. Yet despite those huge numbers, the film would find itself having to accept the position of second place, at least in terms of box office, due to the release of the massive critical and financial juggernaut that was Disney’s Heart of Ice, which of course went on to become the number one movie of the entire year of 1998 at the box office. In hindsight, it’s clear that had the film not been pushed forward, that Heart of Ice likely would have significantly hurt Beauty and the Beast’s overall box office performance[16], just like it ultimately did to East of the Sun and West of the Moon with said film itself getting completely annihilated by the Disney film in question following its release during EotSaWotM’s third weekend.
Michael Eisner, who famously proved he had a heart when he made the surprising heartful decision push forward the release of Beauty and the Beast in order to help Don Bluth’s mental health. In hindsight, it is notable that said action helped prevent the film from getting crushed by the unprecedented and massive juggernaut success of Disney's Heart of Ice. (source: Success Magazine)
For Don Bluth however, the fact that Beauty and the Beast ultimately got second place to Disney’s Heart of Ice or won Best Animated picture arguably didn’t matter to him. To him, the knowledge that two decades of work had paid off and that Beauty and the Beast was a critical and financial success was what truly brought him no small amount of joy. The film, which was the happy culmination of an almost two-decade-long journey, was truly and undeniably Bluth’s animated magnum opus and would serve as Don Bluth’s greatest legacy to the animation world, one that could defiantly stand toe to toe with the greatest of Disney’s own animation classics[17].
For that alone, Don Bluth couldn’t be any happier.
[1] The former pitch was known as The Baby Blue Whale and the later pitch was known as Satyrday. The latter was ironically an actual undeveloped film Bluth would work on in in our timeline, as a potential follow up to Titan A.E. The massive failure of that film at the box office however put an end to that, resulted in it being cancelled.
[2] In our timeline, Bluth began working on his pitch for BatB in 1984 and worked on it on and off for two years until 1986, when Disney announced their plans for doing their own animated BatB film. This led to Bluth pulling the plug on his version of BatB, since he was not convinced that he could complete it in time before Disney released their version. In this timeline, though, while Disney probably considers doing an adaptation of the BatB tale, as you know they ultimately do not adapt it (not fully anyways), so Bluth never cancels it and instead puts it on the backburner.
[3] In our timeline in 1989 Bluth’s dream of reviving his animation studio as an independent studio would be realized as he was able to form Sullivan Bluth Animation Studios (later known as Don Bluth Entertainment). However, because they had the very bad luck of essentially formed it right smack dab as the Disney Renaissance started and began to release its best films (the new studio’s first film, for example, All Dogs Go To Heaven, released against and got crushed by the massive success that was The Little Mermaid), meant that by 1995 the studio was closing its doors and Bluth was moving to work at Fox Animation Studios.
[4] Katzenberg’s later antagonism with the animators at Hollywood Animation following his 1995 ousting of Michael Eisner would lead to many of those very same animators who had been on the fence to finally follow Bluth.
[5] In our timeline’s 1987, Brunner formed the Trans-Europe Film production company, which he then left in 1994 to form the French animation studio, Les Armateurs. In this timeline, various butterflies result in him leaving Trans-Europe Film three years early and partnering with Pathé to form a animation studio, named Pathé Studio d'Animations. The first Astrix animated film is essentially an earlier version of the 1999 live action film of the same name, but animated and released in 1993.
[6] Didn’t happen in our timeline, but due to random butterflies in June 1996, a drunk driver ends up crashing his car into Bluth’s. While Bluth would survive, he would receive injuries that leave him hospitalized for over a month and help to delay the film.
[7] A original character who you may be familiar with if you’ve read my Beyond Halyx guest post, found here. Roane would, alongside fellow band member Miyuki Koyama (also original character), manage to have a number of live action acting and voice acting roles in this timeline, though Koyama more so than Roane, with Koyama going on to have a very successful acting career in Japan. For those wondering, Roane is a lyric soprano, and is a four-five octave singer, so basically similar to someone like Ariana Grande in terms of vocal range.
[8] Yes Alan Rickman can sing. Just watch Sweety Todd if you don’t believe me. He’s honestly not bad either.
[9] Though it shares the same name as our timeline’s Ashman and Menken song, plays during an almost identical moment of the film, and even features the words “Beauty and the Beast”, the song is otherwise nothing like the Disney version, at least in terms of lyrics. If there are any songs from our timeline that it even slightly resembles, I’d say it’s probably closer to something like “Can You Feel The Love Tonight” from The Lion King, “If I Never Knew You” from Pocahontas, or “At the Beginning” from Anastasia.
[10] In terms of potential comparisons from our timeline, “Reflections in Me” is the film’s I Want song and can be compared to “Reflection” from our timeline’s Mulan. “A Journey to Find Him” is partially the film’s equivalent of both “Journey to the Past” and “Once Upon a December” from our timeline’s Anastasia. “Dark Rose” is comparable to our timeline’s songs “Hellfire” from The Hunchback of Notre Dame and “Into the Dark of the Night” from Anastasia. Finally, “A Beast Forever More” is comparable to “Heaven’s Light” from our timeline’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame film and “Evermore” from the Live Action Disney Beauty and the Beast film.
[11] Unlike the Disney film from our timeline, the cursed servants are not major characters, with most screentime in the castle instead given over to Belle, the Beast, and Queen Livia.
[12] One gruesome and noteworthy detail Bluth wanted to include, as a way of invoking the grim twisted nature of the classic Brothers Grimm stories, was by adding an extra dark twist to Livia’s plans for after her son permanently becomes a mindless Beast where she will have her son killed, with his head stuffed and mounted on a wall, alongside Belle’s own stuffed and mounted head. While twisted and certainly fitting the classic Grimms Brother mood, unsurprisingly this never materialized in the final film. The closest nod to it in the final film is that Livia has two empty head trophies in her room, with no actual heads attached and mounted to them.
[13] To add further context, the huge rose garden seen earlier in the film is one Livia keeps in order to keep making the potions to keep her son beastly and herself beautiful. Obvious, but there's more to it than that. Basically, there are two potions here. One made of Rose hips and Petals for Livia, to maintain youth and surface beauty and cover her true nature. The other half is made from the thorns and roots of the flower, bringing the true nature of the drinker to the skin and the mind, smoothing all goodness, hence why Livia manipulated her son the act like a beast so that he would become one to the point where only an act of unconditional love could undo the effects. Both potions work in tandem, with one being unable to work without the other with the link being unbreakable after many doses, save for the unconditional love thing. Should a user who has consumed one potion for long enough a time ever then consume the other, their true nature will be revealed while they rapidly age and die. It’s meant to be a metaphor for how toxic people never get that way on their own and are usually raised to be as such, often for the benefit or, at least, narcissistic peace of mind of the manipulator.
[14] Basically, the main reason the spell work Livia casts doesn’t work here is because outright spell work fueled by darkness and hate is weaker and easier to break than potion-based spells, which is established earlier in the movie. Since the curse, which was derived from a potion-based spell, is considered broken, no simple dark spell work can break it or recast it. As a result, it the weak spell latched onto the closest people it could find, Avenant and the villagers. However, since unlike the stronger-willed Prince Ardent, who always viewed himself as human despite looking like a beast, Avenant instantly gave into despair upon seeing his reflection and viewed himself as being no longer human and so he instantly fulfilled the conditions necessary to make the more easily breakable spell permanent and he thus will forever more be a mindless beast.
[15] Félicie, it should be noted, is the same name as Belle’s other sister in the 1946 film, who was dropped in Bluth’s own film. Having Adelaide’s daughter share that name is mainly another last-minute nod toward the 1946 film by Bluth.
[16] This is almost certainly true. While the film certainly would have still been a critical success, it would never have done nearly as well as it ultimately did if it had released under its original November 1998 release date. The release of EotSaWotM a week after, followed by the monster that was Heart of Ice would have result in the film at most making $180 million, and possibly not even that high. Ironically however, the film which would have been hurt the most had Eisner not moved BatB up those three weeks would have been EotSaWotM, which would probably have actually flopped hard if BatB had not moved, as it would have completely struggled to go up against both BatB and HoI.
[17] In a bit of irony, but just like Bluth’s own Anastasia in our timeline and Heart and Soul in this timeline, Bluth’s Beauty and the Beast has a reputation of constantly getting mistaken for being a Disney movie by casual movie goers who don’t know any better, something which undoubtedly pisses off Bluth in this timeline. Personally, I find it funny to imagine that any successful animated non-Disney Princess film which is released in this timeline’s ‘90s is rewarded for that success by forevermore being constantly mistaken as having in fact been made by Disney. Some would probably think it’s a compliment, but I just think it’s hilarious.
It's certainly different... and feels like a hypothetical "late-stage-Bluth" movie, in a timeline where he doesn't - seemingly - go completely off his nut after All Dogs Go To Heaven (the idea OTL had a clairvoyant lizard and an escape artist dog - or is that the other way around?).
Unless I missed something - basically, they actually turned Eros into a monster rather than make Psyche think he did (would certainly make the film less confusing...) - I don't think audiences would necessarily call Heart and Soul a Beauty and the Beast story.
What would be terribly interesting is if "Beauty and the Beast"-type stories (or any future adaptation of BATB itself) start taking details from Medusa and/or Heart and Soul (e.g. the 'Beast' doesn't change back or the 'Beauty' is a bit more proactive in breaking her love's curse), principally because the actual adaptation of Beauty and the Beast found itself playing catch-up.
So Eisner does have a heart after all. 🤣
Very nice to see Don Bluth's career continue to prosper instead of languishing like OTL. Maybe through Eisner, it is where Bluth can truly shine, away from Katzenberg.
So, as well as the OTL live action movies, I guess this also butterflies OTL's Asterix Conquers America? Which wasn't that great either, to be fair.
I notice you don't say what form the curse takes. I'm pretty sure the talking crockery idea was made up by Disney, but according to Wikipedia, the earliest written version has parrots and monkeys acting as servants in the Beast's castle.
Oh, and absolutely yes to the idea that the real villain of the piece is the person who cast the curse, even if does sound a lot more convoluted than "enchantress who over-reacted to being spoken to rudely" or the original "evil fairy who hated the prince for turning her down".
Absolutely. Gotta maintain an image, right?
tbh, I feel it's better if it remains a background thing atm.
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