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Why are the new Disney songs so bad? | The musical theatre roots behind Disney's music problem
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That song slaps. Do not get me wrong, it's, it's, it's the rest of it that I objectively hate. Oh, my God. Hey. Welcome back to my theater themed YouTube channel. My name is Micky Jo and I'm obsessed with all things theater. I am a professional theater critic and content creator here on social media, predominantly talking about the West End and Broadway shows which I am invited to review. However, today we're going to be talking about something a little bit different. Different. If you're meeting me for the first time, hello to you. Hello. Also if you're listening on podcast platforms. Now, rather than talking about a live stage show, I want to turn my attention towards the world of Disney films. And there is a connection here because specifically in the music side of things, Disney has always been very closely linked to specifically the evolution of the Broadway musical. If we look back through the history of Disney's original scores, you can really see trends emerging in the way that that Disney sound shifted and evolved. That, in my opinion, are pursuant to the changes in the sound of the Broadway musical. Think about it. Your Cinderellas, your Snow whites, your sleeping beauties, it's all a very classic, traditional sound, not dissimilar to the Rogers and Hammersteins, to like the showboats of the world, your carousels, your Oklahoma's, your Sound of Musics, even. We're dancing, we're waltzing, the ball gowns along, everyone's from somewhere unspecified in Europe. And then we head a little bit later, you get to your Aladdins, your Little Mermaids, which of course was scored by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman, who at that point were also writing for the stage, had also written Little Shop of Horrors. Alan Menken would continue to write extensively for the stage. And the feel and the sound of those scores was sort of timeless, but also inherently very theatrical. If you're looking at songs like under the Sea, it's a production number for a big company. It's straight out of a Broadway show. Which is why when you know, the Little Mermaid was adapted subsequently for the stage, it was a great number in the show. Something like Poor Unfortunate Souls is this diva moment for a villain. I mean, all of the Disney villain songs have been always inherently very theatrical. Then we start to see more shifts. Again, looking at the Pocahontas, looking at the Hunchbacks of Notre Dame. This is where we start to get Stephen Schwartz's influence. It's a bit pippiny. It's beginning to sound a little bit more like Wicked. Elton John coming in with Sir Tim Rice for the Lion King, and we're starting to move towards a slightly more contemporary sound. The begin of contemporary musical theater having happened in the mid-90s. And I put to you that what we are hearing now is a real shift of Disney soundtracks towards this contemporary musical theater sound, what I call the Pasican Paulification of the musical theater score. And Lin Manuel Miranda is part of this as well, who of course is a part of Disney's current songwriting roster and is going to be a big part of today's conversation. Because my issue amidst this shift is I think Disney currently has a little bit of a score problem. Mr. Mouse, from one Mickey to another, I think you have an issue to address and that is that Disney have struggled to produce a strong score for their last few releases. Now, I was invited to preview screenings of Moana 2 and Mufasa, the Lion King, the Mufasa origin story just before Christmas. And while I was seeing them, they also showed a trailer for the upcoming live action Snow White adaptation of film, which has more than enough problems. But across both of those films and the trailer for that forthcoming release, I have concerns. Concerns which I am going to articulate today. Now, after the world's longest introduction, if you are still listening to what I have to say about today's topic as well as the world of musical theatre on Broadway and in the West End, make sure you hit subscribe somewhere down there below my face and turn on notifications so that YouTube lets you know every time I have shared a new video, which is very regularly. If for example, you are interested in the intersection between the musical theatre world and the screen, then I have made several videos recently about the first Wicked film and I will be making several more as we move towards the release of Part two, Wicked for Good. In the meantime though, let's stick with Disney, a brand that I have a lot of nostalgic and ongoing love for and try and figure out what is going wrong with their music these days. So let's begin with Moana 2, because this is the first one that I watched and already something strange had happened here because the songs for Moana 1 were great. Moana 1 having been one of, I think the most watched films on Disney plus it has huge popular popularity and Lin Manuel Miranda, of course, wrote the songs for the first Moana. Lin Manuel Miranda, obviously of the musical theater world who wrote in the Heights and the juggernaut hit Hamilton. He has recently developed a new musical theater concept album called the warriors along with Issa Davis. I reacted to that recently here on YouTube. Very excited to hear more about that project. But he also continues to work on screen not only for Moana, but also for Encanto and for Mufasa. We'll talk more about that one in just a moment. But because what would become Moana 2 was originally conceived as a Disney plus series, Lynn, who I believe was already attached to Mufasa, wasn't contracted to write the songs for that one. Instead, they chose a very interesting pair, Abigail Barlow and Emily Baer. Now, I say this is interesting because the last time I said those names here on my channel, I was talking about the drama surrounding their unofficial Bridgeton musical, which they wrote on Tick Tock and then turned into an album. They won the Grammy Award for best Musical Theater album. They started performing it in these live sett. And then they were threatened with legal action by Netflix, who had been permitting their unofficial Bridgerton musical adaptation to exist for a certain amount of time, based I guess just on goodwill, but were beginning to become concerned that it was taking business away from their own live Bridgerton inspired events. None of which is to say that the songs that Barlow and Bear had written for their Britain musical weren't absolutely banging. They were great. But it was something of a fall from grace, which is why it was surprising that Disney, of all brands, I mean, one of the biggest entertainment brands that there is, would immediately want to work with them. And, you know, I give Disney a lot of credit for doing that because I think they saw the talent that was there and, you know, I respect that. And I think for what it's worth, outside of this film and outside of this conversation, Barlow and Bear are a great match for Disney. And I think they do great work and they write great earworms. I think they were dealt an impossibly difficult hand, however, with trying to come up with new Moana songs. And for a Disney plus series, this may have seemed less of a challenge. But when it became Moana 2, suddenly the conversation became, wait. New songs by a different composer. Why is Lin not doing it? These aren't going to be as good as Lin's. Oh, it's come out. These aren't as good as Lin's. We hate these. Almost as a foregone conclusion. And I actually think the songs They've written for Moana 2 are very good. And here's the thing, this is why it's such a challenge and an impossibly difficult position to be in, because in writing songs for a Disney sequel, as different composers, it has to be some kind of A resemblance musically to the original. There has to be familiarity. You have to capture the voice of each of these characters. Moana still has to sing like she is Moana, and that has to be familiar of how she sung in the first film. The same with Maui. And we have to still feel like musically we're in the same world. But they also want to bring their own identity to it as songwriters, their own perspective, their own creative originality. And they don't want to be accused of just trying to purely emulate Lin Manuel Miranda. And what would be the point? Why would they be hired? They're also not songwriters who I thought beforehand wrote specifically in a way that was similar to Lin. But I give them an extraordinary amount of credit for retaining the sensibility of Moana in these songs. This is what I think people aren't saying enough is that the songs in Moana 2, you can hear the influence of Moana 1, and they do still have that kinship to the original songs. Moana's ballad in the second film is familiar of the first, while still standing apart. And the best song that they wrote for Moana 2 is the song they got to write for an entirely new character. The song Get Lost. I like that one. I think that's a great song. And it comes as no surprise because they had less restraint for this one. They didn't have to try and retain that character's voice because they were the first people to compose for them. And if we look back at previous Disney sequels, especially ones where the songwriters have changed from the first film to the second, there have been a lot of really terrible songs, and very few in history, I feel, have really contributed scores that could be called as strong as the first. There are great songs in the second Lion King film, for example. They're not as strong as the first. They didn't have the same impact as the first. You don't hear people singing them. They didn't get the same airtime on the radio. They didn't have the same cultural impact as the first. Not nearly. They did. However, interestingly enough, in bringing it back to the world of musical theater, some of them get incorporated into the Broadway stage show that continues to play in several countries around the world. It makes you wonder down the line, if Moana were to ever be adapted for the stage, which sounds just logistically challenging as much as anything else. I'm thinking so much water. Whether they would incorporate the songs from Moana 2 alongside Moana 1. It wouldn't be the first time that Lin Manuel Miranda has shared a songwriting credit on a stage musical. He's already contributed parts of a score to Bring it on and New York, New York. But anyway, I hope that Disney retains these two. I think they did a great job given the assignment that was offered to them, and I hope they have the opportunity to to score something a little more close to their own style, a little more contemporary. I think they are both hugely talented and I hope they get the chance to work on something original. I do think that they are part of this very contemporary musical theater Adjacent sound similar to Wish, similar to a lot of the stuff that Pasek and Paul do, similar to what Lim does, although he has very big stylistic differences. And so much of what was great about their Bridgerton stuff was the passion and the romance and the character of it all qualities that aren't really afforded to Moana. Now, I'm going to come back to these two, but let's talk for a moment about Mufasa, the Lion King. Now, this may have been an even more tall order because the Lion King has some of the most impactful, memorable, beloved, iconic music of all of the Disney films. You think immediately about several big songs. You think about Circle of Life, of course, and Nan and Gonya, all of that stuff. You think about I Just Can't Wait To Be King. You think about can youn Feel the Love Tonight, One of the biggest songs ever written for a Disney film. You think also about about one of the greatest villain songs in Be Prepared. There is so much brilliance in the Lion King. That's before we even begin to talk about all of the additional orchestral music written for the film. And once again, I love Lin Manuel Miranda as a songwriter. I think what he did for Encanto, some of his best work throughout his career. I would not have picked him to write the songs for a new film within the Lion King world. That just doesn't. That's not the first name I would have thought of. And with this one, unfortunately, I think a lot of the songs were objectively bad. I like that Brother song, and it's juvenile in a way that works because they're young lion cub characters singing it. So it gets to be a little bit silly and insincere. And it's already done very well on TikTok, which you've got to assume is half of what they're thinking about when they're writing some of these. Like they want that viral social media moment. But then you have songs that are needlessly flippant, like the villain song that we hear in Mufasa this contains spoilers for the film. He sings as he is about to murder Cannibalize another pride of lions. And it's so, like, campy. And he's like, bye, bye. You say bye. I cringe thinking about it. And yes, these are family films. Yes, these are going to have children watching them. But I don't think you could say of the original Lion King songs that they felt adolescent or juvenile, with the exception of I just can't wait to be King, which sounds like a fun, playful song that kids would sing because they were singing it. Oh, my God, I forgot about Hakuna Matata. How could I forget Hakuna Matata? Again, that feels more adolescent because that's where Simba was as a character at that point. But Circle of Life and can youn Feel the Love Tonight? Certainly don't feel like they're pandering to young audiences now. Mufasa has a lot of songs that seem to try and go for the same moments. There's a song called Malay at the beginning that, like, talks thematically a lot, like how Circle of Life does, about the concept of paradise and life and being an animal and wildlife and the natural order of things. I like that song. It's fine. It's no Circle of Life. Similarly, the romantic song that they give you in Mufasa is no can you feel the love Tonight? And I don't even think it's necessarily Lin's best work, if I'm being completely honest. Like the brother one sounds familiar of Encanto, but on several other occasions throughout the film, I thought, this sounds a lot like in the Heights. It sounds like a little bit of a regression for Lin, who has done really sensational work and has helped to push forwards the medium of musical theater and redefine what it can be and what it can sound like. And so I was surprised I was to be as disappointed by the score for Mufasa as I was, which is why it now feels pointless that he didn't do Moana 2 because he was working on that. So here is what I wish could have happened is that Lin could have done Moana 2, Elton John could have come back. He's still composing. He could have done the songs for Mufasa and kept it in that same voice for this new film in the Lion King series. I'm not saying that he would have written the same kind of bangers that he wrote for the first one. He could collaborate with Tim Rice again. I'm not saying it would have been just as good, but it would have done that same Disney sequel thing of sounding similar enough and a take on it and still feel decent and not actively kind of disorientating. Barlow and Bear, meanwhile, what could they have done? Well, it's not for Disney, but maybe they were the best placed people to write the score for the Devil Wears Prada musical. Disney seems faster to trust them than Broadway was, unless they had Broadway offers and they just took the Disney money, which, you know, power to them. But Elton's score for Prada has come under a lot of criticism. It doesn't rank up there with his best work. And if we're looking for something trendy and contemporary and girly and fashionable and exciting, then maybe Barlow and Bear would have been a better voice for that show. Everyone on the table just needs to stand up, take one step to your left, and then sit down at these new spots. And maybe those were the projects everyone should have been working on. Then we get to Pasek and Paul. And I have an awful lot to say about Pasek and Paul because I think they are brilliant. I think they deserve the awards. I think their sound has really shaped what contemporary musical theatre is now in the post 2010s, the same way that Jason Robert Brown did back in the day. Not that I think Jason Robert Brown necessarily impacted Disney as much as the likes of Stephen Schwartz and Wicked that you can hear in something like Frozen. But Pasek and Paul, with Dear Evan Hansen and I think specifically with the Greatest Showman have had a huge impact on this current theatrical sound that we keep hearing. And based on what I'm hearing for Snow White, you know, it's great songs. They write great songs for a lot of projects. It just feels tonally incongruous to the classic image that they are trying to maintain in this Snow White film. You know, she's wearing the dress that is familiar with the original Snow White dress. They have CGI'd those dwarves to look like the original dwarfs. We're going for this classic aesthetic even though it's a live action remake, but it doesn't have anything even proximal to that classic sound. It sounds like the Greatest Showman, which doesn't make sense for Snow White. I don't want to see the Greatest Snowman. I don't need that. I don't think any of us do. And honestly, I felt the same way with Wish. Like the songs are charming in Wish, but for this to this celebration of a century of Disney, then you know, you would have wanted rather than a completely new songwriter for it. To pay tribute to Disney's historic, nostalgic classic sound. And it makes you wonder why someone like Alan Menken wasn't the songwriter for Wish and possibly even for this Snow White remake. Alan Menken is still scoring films. Why is Alan Menken, why is Stephen Schwartz no longer working with Disney? Why are Disney seemingly so adverse to working with these brilliant, celebrated, award winning songwriters who have produced such brilliant material for them in the past? And I'm not rooting against the next generation, but these are like EGOT recipients or close to. These are award winners with Lin and with Pasek and Paul. These are not like new up and comers. And if we are looking at new emerging voices, which is what we should be doing, the theatre has plenty of those to offer as well. This is where Disney keeps finding so many of their songwriters is in the theatre world. And there are plenty of people who don't necessarily write in this very trendy contemporary musical theatre modern style. The likes of Pippa Cleary and Jake Brunger write stuff that can sound a lot more classic. Pippa Cleary absolutely understands that vintage nostalgic Disney sound. And in fact there are plenty of people, hundreds of people that would be able to give these films a little bit more of a unique musical identity rather than so many of the musicals we see on screen starting to sound similar because of the Pasek and Paul of it all. Again, no malice against Pasek and Paul here. I think they're brilliant. I'm very excited to see the Greatest Showman as one of the shows that Disney is developing for the stage next. I'm excited to hear how that score is even further theatricalized. Random hot take from me. They composed the songs for the film Spirited with Ryan Reynolds and Will Ferrell. It was a Christmas film that came out a couple of years ago. They cut a song from that called Ripple. That's a great song. I love that song. Put that right into the Greatest Showman on stage. That's a idea. You can have that from me. But as Disney develops these shows for the stage, as we look forward to Hercules arrival in the West End, it reminds you of what great music they used to have to accompany these brilliant films. How long until we can get the Hunchback of Notre Dame produced professionally on a British stage? Don't tell me it's too complicated. Don't tell me it's too expensive because you need a chorus of people. We have Les Mis. We have had Les Mis here for over three decades, almost four decades. We can make it work in the world of cinema. Meanwhile, Disney, look to your musical theatre composers. Look to the West End. Look to Broadway. Look to these exciting new voices. And also, you know, the brilliant songwriters who you worked with 10, 20 years ago who are still working. And more than anything else, though, it doesn't seem to be the way that the film industry specifically works. There is tremendous value, I feel, in matching the right composers and the right lyricists to the right projects, not just this exciting film and these exciting composers, if they're not necessarily right for it. Imagine if Alan Menken hadn't been the one to score the Little Mermaid. Imagine if Bobby and Kristen Anderson Lopez hadn't written the songs for Frozen. Those are my thoughts anyway, and I'm very intrigued to hear yours in the comments section down below. What do you think of the most recent Disney releases and the quality of their soundtracks? And what do you think about the Disney films that we are looking forward to on the horizon, as well as all of the forthcoming Disney theatrical ventures? If this is something you want me to talk about a little bit more, I'll be happy to make another video here on my channel. Let me know. In the meantime, make sure you're subscribed with the notifications turned on so you don't miss my upcoming coverage of Broadway and the West End. I hope that everyone is staying safe and that you have a stagey day. For 10 more seconds, I'm Mickey Jo Theatre. Oh my God. Hey, thanks for watching. Have a Stagey Day Subscrib.