Disney's Beauty and the Beast (1991)

***Beauty and the Beast*** is a 1991 American animated musical romantic fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures. It is based on the 1756 fairy tale of the same name by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont (who was only credited in the French dub),[6] while also containing ideas from the 1946 French film also of the same name directed by Jean Cocteau.[7] The film was directed by Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise (in their feature directorial debuts) and produced by Don Hahn, from a screenplay by Linda Woolverton.

*Beauty and the Beast* focuses on the relationship between the Beast, a prince who is magically transformed into a monster and his servants into household objects as punishment for his arrogance and cruelty, and Belle, a young woman whom he imprisons in his castle in exchange for her father's freedom. To break the curse, the Beast must learn to love Belle and earn her love in return before the last petal from an enchanted rose falls, or else he will remain a monster forever. The film stars Paige O'Hara and Robby Benson as the voices of Belle and the Beast, respectively, as well as the ensemble voices of Richard White, Jerry Orbach, David Ogden Stiers, Jesse Corti, Rex Everhart, and Angela Lansbury.[8]

Walt Disney first attempted to adapt *Beauty and the Beast* into an animated film during the 1930s and 1950s, but was unsuccessful. Following the success of *The Little Mermaid* (1989), Walt Disney Pictures decided to adapt the fairy tale, which Richard Purdum originally conceived as a non-musical period drama. After seeing a test reel, Disney chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg scrapped Purdum's idea and ordered that the film be a musical similar to *The Little Mermaid* instead.[8] Composer Alan Menken and lyricist Howard Ashman, both of whom previously worked on *The Little Mermaid*, returned to write this film's songs. Ashman, who additionally served as the film's executive producer, died of AIDS-related complications six months before the film's release, and the film is thus dedicated to his memory.

*Beauty and the Beast* premiered as an unfinished film at the New York Film Festival on September 29, 1991, followed by its theatrical release as a completed film at the El Capitan Theatre in Los Angeles on November 13. The film grossed $331 million at the box office worldwide on a $25 million budget and received widespread acclaim for its romantic narrative, animation (particularly the ballroom scene), characters, and musical numbers. *Beauty and the Beast* won the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, the first animated film to ever win that category. It also became the first animated film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture at the 64th Academy Awards (ultimately losing to *The Silence of the Lambs*), where it won the Academy Award for Best Original Score and Best Original Song for its title song and received additional nominations for Best Original Song and Best Sound. In April 1994, *Beauty and the Beast* became Disney's first animated film to be adapted into a Broadway musical, which ran until 2007.

An IMAX version of the film was released in 2002 and included the new song "Human Again", originally an eight-minute storyboarded musical sequence ultimately replaced with "Something There", but later revised in the 1994 musical as a five-minute piece. That same year, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".[9][10] After the success of the 3D re-release of *The Lion King*, the film was reissued in 3D in 2012.[11] In 2014, *Time* magazine ranked *Beauty and the Beast* as the greatest film of the Disney Renaissance[12] and one of the greatest animated films of all time.

Other derived works and material inspired by the film, include a 2017 live-action remake of the film directed by Bill Condon, which was released on March 17, 2017, and a 2022 musical presentation of the film on ABC as part of *The Wonderful World of Disney*.

## Plot

A cruel and selfish prince is visited in a castle by an enchantress disguised as a beggar woman, who offers him an enchanted rose in exchange for shelter from a storm. When he refuses, she reveals her identity and transforms the prince into a beast and his servants into household objects. She warns the prince that the spell will only be broken if he learns to love another and be loved in return before the last petal falls, or he will remain a beast forever.

Several years later, in a nearby village, Belle, the book-loving daughter of an eccentric inventor named Maurice, dreams of adventure. She frequently tries avoiding Gaston, a narcissistic hunter who wants to marry her because of her beauty. En route to a fair to showcase his latest invention, an automatic wood chopper, Maurice gets lost in the forest and seeks refuge in the Beast's castle; There, the Beast finds Maurice and imprisons him for trespassing. When Maurice's horse returns alone, Belle ventures out searching for her father, finding him locked in the castle dungeon. Belle agrees to take Maurice's place as the Beast's prisoner in exchange for her father's freedom.

Belle befriends the castle's servants: Lumière the candelabra, Cogsworth the clock, Mrs. Potts the teapot, and her son Chip, the teacup; they serve her a dinner through song. When she wanders into the forbidden west wing and finds the rose, the Beast catches her and angrily forces her to flee the castle. In the woods, she is ambushed by a pack of wolves, but the Beast rescues her, and is injured in the process. As Belle nurses his injuries, a rapport develops between them and as time passes, they begin to fall in love.

Meanwhile, Maurice returns to the village and fails to convince the townsfolk of Belle's predicament. Hearing Maurice's statements about the Beast, Gaston hatches a plan: He bribes Monsieur D'Arque, the warden of the town's insane asylum, to have Maurice locked up as a lunatic. Gaston will use this to force Belle into marrying him in exchange for Maurice's release. Before they can act, however, Maurice leaves for the castle to attempt a rescue alone.

After sharing a romantic dance with the Beast, Belle uses the Beast's magic mirror to check on her father and sees him collapsing in the woods. The Beast releases her to save Maurice, giving her the mirror as a memento. After Belle takes her father to the village, a band of villagers led by Gaston arrives to detain Maurice. Belle uses the mirror to show the Beast to the townsfolk, proving her father's sanity. Realizing that Belle loves the Beast, a jealous and outraged Gaston locks Belle and her father in the cellar, and rallies the villagers to help him slay the Beast. Chip, who arrived at their house as a stowaway, activates Maurice's wood-chopping machine, freeing Maurice and Belle from the cellar.

When the villagers arrive at the castle, the Beast's servants fend them off. Meanwhile, Gaston attacks the Beast, who is too depressed from Belle's departure to fight back but regains his spirit upon seeing Belle return. He defeats Gaston but spares his life before reuniting with Belle. However, Gaston fatally stabs the Beast before losing his footing and falling to his death.[a] The Beast dies in Belle's arms before the last petal falls. Belle tearfully professes her love to the Beast, and the spell is undone, reviving the Beast and restoring his human form along with his servants and castle. The Prince and Belle host a ball for the kingdom, where they dance happily.

## Voice Cast

Main article: List of Disney's Beauty and the Beast characters

* Paige O'Hara as Belle,[14] a bibliophilic young woman who seeks adventure and offers her own freedom to the Beast in return for her father's. In an effort to "enhance" the character from the original story, the filmmakers felt that Belle should be "unaware" of her own beauty and made her "a little odd".[15] Wise recalls casting O'Hara because of a "unique tone" she had, "a little bit of Judy Garland", after whose appearance Belle was modeled.[16] James Baxter and Mark Henn served as the supervising animators for Belle.
* Robby Benson as Adam/the Beast,[14] a young prince who is transformed into a talking beast by an enchantress as punishment for his arrogance and selfishness. The animators drew him with the head structure and horns of an American bison, the face of a antelope, the arms and body of a bear, the ears of deer, the eyebrows of a gorilla, the jaws, teeth, and mane of a lion, the tusks of a wild boar, and the legs and tail of a wolf. Chris Sanders, one of the film's storyboard artists and visual development artists, drafted the designs for the Beast and came up with designs based on birds, insects, and fish before coming up with something close to the final design. Glen Keane, supervising animator for the Beast, refined the design by going to the zoo and studying the animals on which the Beast was based. Benson commented, "There's a rage and torment in this character I've never been asked to use before." The filmmakers commented that "everybody was big fee-fi-fo-fum and gravelly" while Benson had the "big voice and the warm, accessible side" so that "you could hear the prince beneath the fur".
* Richard White as Gaston,[14] an arrogant and ruthless hunter who vies for Belle's hand in marriage and is determined not to let anyone else win her heart. He serves as a foil personality to the Beast, who was once as egotistical as Gaston prior to his transformation. Gaston's supervising animator, Andreas Deja, was pressed by Jeffrey Katzenberg to make Gaston handsome in contrast to the traditional appearance of a Disney villain, an assignment he found difficult at first. In the beginning, Gaston is depicted as more of a narcissist than a villain, but later he threatens to put Maurice in a mental institution if Belle does not marry him, and eventually leads all the villagers to kill the Beast, enraged that Belle would love a beast more than him.[18]
* Jerry Orbach as Lumière,[19] the kind-hearted but rebellious French-accented maître d' of the Beast's castle, who has been transformed into a candelabra. He has a habit of disobeying his master's strict rules, sometimes causing tension between them, but the Beast often turns to him for advice. He is depicted as flirtatious, as he is frequently seen with the Featherduster and immediately takes a liking to Belle. A running gag throughout the film is Lumière burning Cogsworth. Nik Ranieri served as the supervising animator for Lumière.
* David Ogden Stiers as Cogsworth,[20] the Beast's majordomo, the head butler of the household staff and Lumière's best mantel clock, who has been turned into a clock. He is extremely loyal to the Beast so as to save himself and anyone else any trouble, often leading to friction between himself and Lumière. Will Finn served as the supervising animator for Cogsworth. Stiers also narrates the prologue.
* Angela Lansbury as Mrs. Potts,[21] the housekeeper, turned into a teapot, who takes a motherly attitude toward Belle. The filmmakers went through several names for Mrs. Potts, such as "Mrs. Chamomile", before Ashman suggested the use of simple and concise names for the household objects.[13] David Pruiksma served as the supervising animator for Mrs. Potts.
* Bradley Pierce as Chip,[22] Mrs. Potts's son, who has been transformed into a teacup. Originally intended to only have one line, the filmmakers were impressed with Pierce's performance and expanded the character's role significantly, eschewing a mute Music Box character.[13] Pruiksma also served as the supervising animator for Chip.
* Rex Everhart as Maurice,[14] Belle's inventor father. The villagers see him as insane for crafting devices believed impossible to construct in reality, but his loyal daughter believes he will be famous one day. Ruben A. Aquino served as the supervising animator for Maurice.
* Jesse Corti as LeFou,[14] Gaston's often abused yet loyal and bumbling sidekick. He looks up to Gaston as his hero, and sings a song with the other villagers to cheer him up. His name is French for "The Madman" and also a phonetic play on "The Fool". Chris Wahl served as the supervising animator for LeFou.
* Jo Anne Worley as the Wardrobe,[23] the castle's authority over fashion, and a former opera singer, who has been turned into a wardrobe. The character of Wardrobe was introduced by visual development artist Sue C. Nichols to the then entirely male cast of servants, and was originally a more integral character named "Madame Armoire". Wardrobe is known as "Madame de la Grande Bouche" (Madame Big Mouth) in the stage adaptation of the film and is the only major enchanted object character whose human form does not appear in the film. Tony Anselmo served as the supervising animator for the Wardrobe.
* Hal Smith as Philippe,[24] Belle's horse. Russ Edmonds served as the supervising animator for Philippe.
* Mary Kay Bergman and Kath Soucie as the Bimbettes,[25] a trio of village maidens who constantly fawn over Gaston, known as the "Silly Girls" or "Les Filles De La Ville" (the village girls)[26] in the stage adaptation.
* Jack Angel, Phil Proctor, Bill Farmer, and Patrick Pinney as Tom, Dick, Stanley, and Gramps, respectively, Gaston and LeFou's circle of friends.
* Brian Cummings as the Stove,[27] the castle's chef who has been transformed into a stove. He is named Chef Bouche in 1998's *Belle's Magical World*.
* Alvin Epstein as the Bookseller,[28] the owner of a book shop in Belle's village.
* Tony Jay as Monsieur D'Arque,[29] the sadistic warden of the Asylum de Loons. Gaston bribes him to help in his plan to blackmail Belle.
* Alec Murphy as the Baker,[30] the owner of a bakery in Belle's village.
* Kimmy Robertson as the Featherduster,[31] a maid and Lumière's sweetheart, who has been turned into a feather duster. She is never mentioned by name in the 1991 film (listed as Featherduster in the credits); Babette is the name given to this character later in the 1994 stage adaptation of the film; Fifi in the 1998 animated musical film *Belle's Magical World* and Plumette in the 2017 live-action remake.
* Frank Welker as Sultan,[32] the castle's pet dog turned into a footstool.