Beauty and The Beast

It might be a tale as old as time, but audiences have proven there’s still a few petals left on that old flower. Despite being projected to open at somewhere between $214–245 million worldwide, Beauty and the Beast knocked the pants off those projections, eclipsing $350 million at the international box office and setting a March record for domestic releases along the way. Let’s take a look at how things shook out this past weekend with some of the expected grosses.

Last week it seemed like the live-action Beauty and the Beast remake was about to make history with the Disney’s first openly gay character. But now director Bill Condon says the whole thing has been blown out of proportion.

When director Bill Condon confirmed that his live-action Beauty and the Beast remake features a gay character, it was only a matter of time before someone made a fuss over it. Turns out, that someone is a somewhere — a drive-in theater in Alabama, where the owner is refusing to screen the new Disney film because Josh Gad’s character, LeFou, is gay.

There}s one big question surrounding the upcoming live-action take on Disney’s Beauty and the Beast: Why remake something that’s considered by most to be Disney’s most perfect movie? We can write all the Stockholm syndrome thinkpieces that we want, but Beauty and the Beast still holds up as one of the studio’s animation and storytelling high points during the Disney renaissance of the ’90s (which includes The Lion King, Pocahontas, Aladdin, and Mulan). So why bother to even try to come close?

Finally, the moment we’ve all been waiting for ever since Disney announced this live-action remake of Beauty and the Beast: The Gaston song. Listen, this “tale as old as time” is sweet and magical and all that other wonderful stuff, but it’s okay to admit that you’re 100 percent here for Luke Evans as the nefarious, narcissistic master of swagger, performing what is, with apologies to Angela Lansbury, the actual greatest song from Beauty and the Beast (don’t @ me).

Ariana Grande, John Legend, Emma Watson, a horned beast man and several sentient parts of a tea set star in the video for the cover duet.

About a month and a half separate the viewing public from the much-hyped live-action remake of Disney’s essential fairytale Beauty and the Beast. While regular TV viewers and net-surfers can look forward to an uninterrupted stream of commercials and ads until then, Disney has given one last push of publicity today with the final trailer promoting their handsomely-appointed new film. And as if to sweeten the deal, they included a snippet of the previously announced re-recording of the majestic theme tune, as sung by La La Land jazz-diluter John Legend and travel-size pop starlet Ariana Grande.

The tale as old as time (OK, that’s an exaggeration) is returning to theaters this spring with Disney’s new live-action remake of Beauty and the Beast. With less than two months left to go until the studio’s latest reimagining (and guaranteed box-office hit) arrives, Disney has revealed when we’ll see the new — and final — trailer, and as an added bonus, they’ve thrown in some enchanted motion posters.

If anything, the live-action Beauty and the Beast will give us all the urge to curl up with some nice, cozy nostalgia for a few hours. With its faithful-to-the-cartoon costumes and songs, it’ll be like a leveled-up version of the classic, and today Disney has doubled-down on the nostalgia factor: Celine Dion, who recorded her own version of the title tune “Beauty and the Beast” for the original movie, is returning to the story with a new original song “How Does a Moment Last Forever.”

Emma Watson’s continuing media blitz in promotion of the upcoming Beauty and the Beast remake found her on the cover of the latest issue of Total Film (h/t E! Online), where she spoke about the moral underpinnings of the movie and her character Belle. In one quote in particular Watson declared that the film’s heroine Belle makes for a better role model than fellow Disney princess Cinderella.

Because we tend to think of him more commonly as “slick neo-soul songbird” or “La La Land’s chief threat to the integrity of jazz” or “husband of Chrissy Teigen,” it can be easy to forget that John Legend’s got an Oscar under his belt. The musician and composer took the golden statuette for Best Original Song with his original tune “Glory” from Ava DuVernay’s thunderous Martin Luther King biopic Selma, and ever since, he’s been Hollywood’s go-to guy for poppin’ fresh (is that still what the kids are saying?) theme music. And today, a new announcement from Disney reported by Deadline lines up Legend’s next big gig.

We never got to hear Emma Watson’s singing had she not turned down La La Land, but thanks what we’ve got the new Beauty and the Beast for. The latest TV spot for Disney’s live-action remake, which debuted during the Golden Globes, features Watson singing “Belle” from the classic animated movie.