But heck, did we squeeze in a lot more chat… And its not all light stuff, either.
The songBelle, and the sequence, is extremely watertight.
Was that as challenging a part of the film to put together as any other?
It took a lot of refining.
The key was that we make a lot of mistakes and create a lot of garbage.
Howard was struggling with AIDS at the time, so we went to his house in Upstate New York.
For this they almost wanted to use a Gilbert & Sullivan operetta style.
And so, the prologue was the last thing we wrote.
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Cut off the prologue, and we start withBelle.
And animation even makes that easier.
When that song first came in, I think we were all shocked.
Howard and Alan were not sure wed like it.
They were very hesitant.
Theyre going to think were nuts.
But we liked it a lot, and we didnt change a bit.
Its one of the few songs in the movie that we didnt restructure, or change, or anything.
It gave you all that depth in an encyclopaedic way, and made it entertaining.
Otherwise, its exposition and youd be sitting there having characters talk and read, and its dull.
Now you have the same information, but its entertainment.
But thats the brilliance of Howard, and animation, and musical theatre, I think.
We kept saying later, later, later.
Fall in love before the last petal fell.
That was one of the very last things we added to the movie.
Was there ever any talk of lifting the prologue out altogether, given how much work the songBellegets through?
I think that the prologue sets up more thanBelledid.
It sets up the character of the beast.
He was young, he was spoiled, he was cursed by a sorceress.
You couldnt put that into the opening song, or at least we never anticipated it.
And that was what the prologue was all about.
After that, were ready.
Did you see theSouthParkmovie?
I loved it.The Simpsonshave done the same thing too.
They ripped it off!
I actually had dinner with Matt Groening and talked about it.
Its high praise when people do that.
How low does it get, and what were you fighting?
It was a crossroads in many ways.
You had people in their 60s and people in their 20s.
So, there was a divide in the studio.
We all wanted to.
Some people left, some people were fired.
And I cant tell you enough about Howard and his effect on us.
And how that turned into a revolution.
A revolution that would change animation, and still does to this day.
I dont think anyone has been able to match him since.
Ive just made a documentary about this period…
Waking Sleeping Beauty?
I cant wait to see it.
I think youll like it.
In it, Roy Disney likens Howard Ashman to Walt Disney.
And when he said that in his interview, I thought, Did you say that?
AndLittle Mermaid, and the other films.
Did we have great directors?
Did we have great art directors, and artists, and animators?
But teaching us how to tell stories in music…
Its theKill The Beastsong that gets me.
We dont like what we dont understand, in fact it scares us… You got back toLittle Mermaidas well, lovely turns of phrase such as the hot crustacean band.
Things that just shouldnt glue together.
And Howard was struggling with AIDS at the same time.
TheKill The Beastsong was almost a metaphor for that.
He was really dealing with a debilitating disease, in an era when it was stigmatised.
And so, there were so many of those underpinnings to the movie that people may not have seen.
And shouldnt have seen.
It wasnt about the HIV epidemic at all.
And your film,Waking Sleeping Beauty, puts him across in a three dimensional light?
It doesnt shy away from the fact that he was a difficult man to deal with at times?
He was one of the funniest guys Ive ever met.
Obviously, incredibly smart.
He could have been a trial attorney.
But the truth is, to a person, we loved him.
He wasnt the kind of guy who was an idiot and a screamer.
We loved him, and he was charming.
Its just he didnt suffer fools.
He expected the best of us, as we did of him.
Do you think the loss of Howard Ashman changed the way animated films tackled songs?
Certainly not in such a theatrical way.
Some films lose the music altogether.
Pixar never picked up music.
Elton not so much, but Tim was.
Very different stylistically, though.
Howard believed in putting plot in the songs.
Lets not stop the movie and sing a song, lets put the movie in the song.
Theres a very fundamental difference there.
There are certainly plotted songs inThe Lion KingandTarzan…
The Hunchback Of Notre Dame, as well.
Hunchbacks probably the closest, because Stephen Schwartz is a genius.
I think theHunchbackscore is probably the most sophisticated that weve done.
But theres only one first love.
I think thats whereLittle MermaidandBeauty And The Beastcome from.
It was a time of innocence, and discovery, and first love.
You mentioned the clash between the retiring old guard and the new people coming in.
Who was winning the fight?
Theyd been sitting on the fence for many years, and now they were in charge.
And they were wonderful gentlemen, but just not as brilliant as the first generation of Walt Disneys people.
And they were in power when we made movies such asThe Black Cauldron.
There was a lot of friction between the young guys and them.
The young guys and I include myself in that, too wanted to do something special.
We wanted to do it better than Walt Disney.
Whether we did or not, only history will tell.
But I suspect we didnt.
I think Walt Disney was a one off.
But we wanted to try.
And to that extent, it took us probably ten or 15 years before we really started trying.
Its like working your way towards the team.
Youve said all along that its teamwork, of course.
In your book, for instance, you talk about the sweatbox being the ultimate peer review.
Youve talked there about the clash between two bunches of people, effectively, but wheres the line there?
Because surely one persons teamwork is another persons committee?
I think its about the collective agreement that youre going to share your work and be brutal about it.
Walt Disney did this great.
He insisted we ran dailies and looked at our work, which we never did in Disney.
Pixar does the same.
And its never perfect.
So why not go out there and show it, and together, well share our mistakes.
And we can have that growth together as a studio.
So, its not committee as much as it is brutal family around the dinner table.
And brutal is the word for it.
You have to be able to speak the truth.
And its the secret of Pixar, and the secret of Disney.
To be able to say, Thats not good enough.
Its counter-intuitive to working for a large corporation.
A large corporation you go, oh, you madeIronMan.Lets make another one.
Lets make more of them.
So, you dont want to take risk, you want to repeat those successes.
But the very thing you want to do is take risk.
I think thats where Disney succeeded, where Disney Animation has been struggling.
Look at a movie likeRatatouille.
Its the worst idea for a movie ever.
Rats in a kitchen.
And then phonetically explain the name on the poster…
Because you cant pronounce it!
one of my favourite movies.Up.
Lets put an 80-year-old guy in house with a boy scout.
Which is probably illegal!
Send him up in a balloon.
Terrible idea, one of my favourite movies of all time.
So, thats risk taking.
In its day,Beauty And The BeastandLittle Mermaidwere risk-taking.
Did he have a beard at that point, too?
[Laughs] He did not.
But it was a risk!
He had had a flop on Broadway calledSmile.
Not only were you bringing in a guy from the outside, but he had a huge flop!
In the midst of makingBeauty And The Beast,The Little Mermaidhit big.
But for most, it was back, and it was what are they doing next.
Did they change the pressure of the production for you?
I remember being scared!
[laughs] I remember hoping we could live up toThe Little Mermaid.
I remember hoping that we wouldnt be compared to it adversely.
I remember thinking, Can we do this?
I dont want to steal fromThe Little Mermaid.
I want to make this our own.
We had great directors.
Kirk Wise and Gary Trousdale.
Love those guys and still do.
Still working with Kirk.
They were so great at being fresh and fearless.
And we came to work with fear, in a very positive sense!
Just touching on your work onThe Lion Kingthere for a minute, then.
And all of a sudden the expectation level exploded?
I wish you could have seen the rest of that movie when the trailer was playing.
The movie was a shambles.
We had one good four minute chunk of movie, and thats what we sent out.
As a marketing idea it was brilliant.
It really got people excited.
And we went Yeah!
But again, thats like better step up.
You cant have egg on your face.
Thats where something like having two directors on a project kicks in, though?
If one is beginning to lose confidence, it doesnt matter.
Youve not got a choice.
All of us together are better than any one of us.
But if you collaborate honestly and thats not capitulating…
I think that committee is sitting around and capitulating.
I dont really agree with it.
Its the collaboration, though, that makes the movie great.
Just going back toBeauty And The Beast, Im keen to talk about Gaston as a villain.
Again, he stands against the Disney villain book.
When you meet Cruella de Vil for the first time, for instance, shes very obviously a villain.
The same with most Disney films.
You said it yourself, hes a jerk.
Gaston is comedic, if anything.
The pitching, I thought was extraordinary.
It must have been tempting, though, to play him nastier, earlier?
Yeah, but not as interesting.
I love that movie and show, and Howard did too.
We were looking for a character who was the opposite of the beast.
The beast had a big heart, he was sincere, hed made a mistake.
Gaston was incredibly handsome, the Beast ugly…
… both covered in hair, though!
[Laughs] Yeah, both covered in hair!
So, you have that contrast, and as the movie goes on, they change places.
The Beast becomes more human, Gaston becomes more of an animal.
And thats why that character is so effective.
If he had started out as a moustache-twirling villain, he would have been much less effective.
He is disarming to the audience, funny to look at, and sings a comic song.
And slowly, during theKill The Beastsong, you realise hes actually insane.
Wheres that up to?
Well, were starting to shoot.
The sets are up, the puppets are built.
Its interesting, because Tims [Burton] directing it himself.
You must have more story to tell, its based on the Frankenstein plot.
So, were set up, were shooting, and I think its going to be a real treat.
Will you keep the 80s feel to the film, with the toys and the posters?
I cant say, but you wont be disappointed!
Lets just put it that way.
[laughs]
Finally, were you involved in the talked-about revival ofThe Snow Queen?
You know, I was, but were putting it on the shelf right now.
But I was involved in it, yeah.
So, in terms of your own animation future, itsFrankenweenieat the moment?Yeah, thats it.
But Im dying to do another one after that!
Don Hahn, thank you very much!
Beauty And The Beast is out on Disney Diamond Edition Blu-ray right now.
