In July 2011, a musical theatre version of Aladdin premiered in Seattle, Washington, at the 5th Avenue Theatre. Status and Revivals Īccording to Ashman's sister, Sarah Ashman Gillespie, after production was halted on her brother's original draft, he thought about "getting the rights back from Disney and doing something along the lines of Shelley Duvall’s brilliant 'Faerie Tale Theater' with it." However, these plans were abandoned, possibly due to Disney's continued work on the property,
To fill in the holes now left in the score, Menken wrote various songs by himself, before lyricist Tim Rice was hired to complete the final film score with him.Īll story problems were successfully worked out by the film's release date of November 25th, 1992. Due to this, various story elements were cut or streamlined, resulting in further cuts to Ashman and Menken's score. With the fate of the film in jeopardy, Musker and Clements brought on writers Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio to rewrite the script yet again. "I was so disengaged that all through the movie, I was working on the guest list for my wife’s surprise birthday party!" Around the same time, the storyboard reel was shown to Jeffery Katzenberg, who told Musker and Clements afterward (Ashman, who had been diagnosed in 1988 as HIV positive, was beginning to show signs of his illness.) Due to this, the directors, along with producer Don Ernst, flew over and visited Ashman whenever possible to make sure he was involved.Īshman died from complications due to AIDS on March 14th, 1991, after completing a few new songs with Menken. "I just want to let you know before you come out here… I’ve been ill."
Also around this time, as Musker and Clements were preparing to fly out to New York (where Ashman lived), Ashman told Musker during a phone call Around this time, it was decided that Ashman and Menken's original score would be used when possible with the duo coming on board to write new material when needed. Soon after, the story was handed off to writer Linda Woolverton, and, once his work on Mermaid was nearing completion, Ashman, along with Menken, was brought in by studio chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg to save the troubled Beauty and the Beast production.Ĭhosen as a follow up to Mermaid by directors John Musker and Ron Clements, the duo looked through everything that had already been done for Aladdin and decided to combine the best aspects off all the different drafts and treatments, as well as adding more animation friendly characters (namely Abu the monkey and Rajah the tiger), and began working on a new draft of the script. Though the head of Disney animation at the time called it the best treatment he had ever read, Disney passed on it, and as per Ashman's contract, the company owned both the treatment and the score. As he began work on Disney's upcoming feature The Little Mermaid, writer and lyricist Howard Ashman pitched an idea of a possible new animated feature to the studio, and in January 1988, he turned in a 40-page treatment of Aladdin, featuring a complete score, with lyrics by him and music by his frequent collaborator Alan Menken.