To celebrate ‘Hunchback of Notre Dame’ 25th Anniversary, producers and staff who created the animation have been interviewed to talk about making the film and revealing secrets on the wat. The interview called “‘The Hunchback of Notre Dame’ at 25: An Oral History of Disney’s Darkest Animated Classic” has been released by Slashfilm.
During the interview, Composer Alan Menken said:
“I met Michael Jackson when we were looking for someone to sing “A Whole New World” for Aladdin. Michael wanted to co-write the song. I could get a sense of who Michael was. He was a very unique, interesting individual…in his own world.”
Oh boy, can you imagine Michael Jackson singing “A Whole New World” but I digress here as this is about Hunchback.
He continued:
“I get a call out of nowhere from Michael’s assistant, when Michael was at the Four Seasons Hotel in New York. He had to [deal with] allegations about inappropriate behavior with underage kids, and the breakup with Lisa Marie Presley. He’s looking to change the subject. And he obviously loves Disney so much. So I mentioned Hunchback. He said he’d love to come to my studio, watch the movie and talk about it. So we got in touch with Disney Animation. They said, “Meet with him! If he likes it…well, see what he says.” [laughing]
There’s three songs. One was “Out There,” one was “God Help the Outcasts,” one was “Someday.” Michael said, “I would like to produce the songs and record some of them.” Wow. Okay. What do we do now? Michael left. We got in touch with Disney. It was like somebody dropped a hot poker into a fragile bowl with explosives. “Uh, we’ll get back to you about that.”
Finally, predictably, the word came back, “Disney doesn’t want to do this with Michael Jackson.” I go, “OK, could someone tell him this?” You can hear a pin drop, no response, and nobody did [tell him]. It fell to my late manager, Scott Shukat, to tell Michael or Michael’s attorney.”
It is a true shame that Michael was never picked to do the soundtracks for one of Disney’s movies Like Elton Jones or Phil Collins.
We also know that Michael loved the story of Quasimodo and maybe related to the story of the outcast and he might have given the songs of the movie a whole different meaning and feeling.
SOURCE: Slashfilm
