The History of Aladdin Part 1: Howard Ashman's Early Disney Days (1985-1988)

In the premiere episode of The History of Aladdin, we are going to go back in time to the year 1986, the year composer-lyricist duo Alan Menken and Howard Ashman were hired by The Walt Disney Company to compose songs for upcoming films such as Oliver and Company and The Little Mermaid, hot off the heels of the success of the 1982 off-Broadway musical adaptation of the Roger Corman film, Little Shop of Horrors as well as the success of the musical Smile, which would later receive a film adaptation in 1986 starring Rick Moranis, Ellen Greene, and Levi Stubbs (writer's note: the film adaptation is a personal favorite).

(Little Shop of Horrors, 1982 Act 1 Audio-Only)

Howard worked with Disney with a simple goal in his mind, to bring the company and the films they created back to their roots, letting the music tell the story in conjunction with the animation onscreen similar to how it was done in films such as Pinocchio, Mary Poppins, and The Jungle Book. However, before he was signed on to compose The Little Mermaid, he was tasked with composing the opening song for Oliver and Company, Once Upon a Time in Central Park.

 (Once Upon a Time in Central Park, Howard Ashman and Huey Lewis)

While working on the song, he was informed of another project which his frequent collaborator Alan Menken would also be involved in, an adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid, a project Disney himself attempted when he was alive but shelved due to story complications. Howard and Alan began to work on a score of songs, with now classic songs such as Under the Sea and Part of Your World. Speaking of the latter, according to the documentary Waking Sleeping Beauty, Part of Your World was nearly cut from the final film due to lack of audience engagement during test screenings of the film. Had it not been for Howard intervening and literally giving threats to former President of Disney Jeffrey Katzenberg to keep the song in the final film, Part of Your World would have probably ended up in the deleted scenes section on disc two of The Little Mermaid.

 

(Source: Waking Sleeping Beauty, Howard Ashman and Jodi Benson, Part of Your World)

 

Another of Howard's contributions to the film was in the character Sebastian. Originally, Sebastian's character was supposed to be a stuffy, stereotypical English butler type of character, but Howard suggested "Why not make him Jamaican?" which also gave birth to the Disney classic, Under the Sea, a Jamaican-Calypso style song used for the "showstopper" song in the film.

 (Under the Sea, Howard Ashman Demo)

 To critique the score of the film, while not being a huge fan of The Little Mermaid myself, I do admit the entirety of the demo score is filled with Howard's energy and passion that he personally injected, from the original extended demo of the opening number Fathoms Below to the original demo of the film's finale. Howard also wrote at least two songs that while they did not make it into the final film, they served as prototypes of songs that did. These songs were One Dance and Silence is Golden, prototypes of Part of Your World and Poor Unfortunate Souls, respectively. 

  

(Silence is Golden, The Music Behind the Magic, Walt Disney Records)

 

(One Dance, Walt Disney Records)

 However, while he was ecstatic and passionate about his work on Mermaid as well as beginning work on the film to be released afterward, Beauty and the Beast, he was preparing to pitch a project he had wanted to do since he began work at Disney, an adaptation of the Arabian Nights story, Aladdin. In the next episode, we will journey to the early days of the film's production with a look at the original forty page treatment written by Ashman himself.

Sources:

Gillespie, Sarah. "John Musker Countdown Question 9." Part of His World. Sarah Ashman-Gillespie, 21 Feb. 2012. Web. <http://howardashman.com/>. 

Waking Sleeping Beauty. Dir. Don Hahn. Perf. John Musker, Ron Clements, Roy Disney, Christopher Emerson. Walt Disney Studios, 2009. Amazon Instant Video. Documentary detailing the events of the first half of what is known as The Disney Renaissance, and the constant conflicts with Jeffrey Katzenberg.

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