The live-action musical comedy sequel Disenchanted picks up 15 years after the events of Enchanted, with Giselle (Amy Adams) disillusioned with the real world and yearning for a more fairy tale life. While she thinks moving with Robert (Patrick Dempsey), his teenage daughter Morgan (Gabriella Baldacchino), and their baby Sophia into an idyllic suburb will do the trick in giving them an exciting new beginning, she quickly realizes that it doesn’t and turns to magic which proves to be a bit more villainous than she expected.
During this press conference to discuss the film, co-stars Adams and Maya Rudolph (who plays queen of suburbia Malvina Monroe), along with director Adam Shankman, producer Barry Josephson, and composer Alan Menken talked about continuing the story while also telling something new, how they approached the score and writing the songs, the evolution of Giselle, what made this a wish fulfillment moment for Rudolph, working in Ireland together, incorporating so many Easter eggs, and when they realized just how much fans loved this world.
Question: Adam and Barry, what was most important for you, in continuing the story, but also telling a new one?
BARRY JOSEPHSON: It just was such a joy. Amy really was our starting point, of wanting to play Giselle again. And then, when Adam joined our development process, it was into the stratosphere because he brought with him Richard LaGravenese, who developed the script and really took it to another level. Then, Brigitte Hales came on to work with Adam and Amy and I. It was just such a joy to see the script come together and become something really joyous that was a musical with comedy and the right amount of drama, all pivoting around what Giselle’s new dilemma is. It was about, how do we progress from the original movie, and yet make something that’s definitively a new movie, and a fresh new start for her character and the other characters that everybody loved from the first movie. Adam just really understood what the music elements needed to be and how all the characters needed to grow.
ADAM SHANKMAN: I was talking to Sean Bailey, the president of Disney, and he was talking about how the project was sitting there. As we discussed it, I said, “Well, basically, Giselle is the stepmother. She’s Morgan’s stepmother.” That, for me, became the absolute jumping-off point. I was like, “That’s low-hanging fruit.” It’s perfect, in terms of a continuation, because she has this now-developed daughter, who probably doesn’t believe in magic anymore. It was just a thrill ride from there. It was a luge of finding stuff like that. But the whole thing started with Amy and Giselle. I had wanted to work with Amy for so long because we speak a very similar language. We’re friends, and we’re both musical nerds and Disney nerds. I suddenly thought, “I wanna make a movie, not just with Amy, but for Amy, as well.” As an actor, she inspires me so much. That’s just the truth.
Alan, where did you begin with this project?
ALAN MENKEN: In a way, you start from the first Enchanted, which has the most amazing premise, where we start in the world of early Walt [Disney] animation, and this animated princess has a spell put on her and is thrown into Times Square, where she’s totally unequipped to deal with what happens. The score grows up with her, as she begins to adapt to this world. And in the new version, she longs for that world. There’s no happily ever after in our world, unlike in an animated ending, and she longs for that, so she makes this wish that throws us into this amazing storyline, which has all this fun in it because of what happens from that wish.
How does knowing who’s going to be singing impact how you write the songs?
MENKEN: Rather than writing for any individual actors, (lyricist) Stephen [Schwartz] and I, in the case of this musical, write for the characters and the storyline, and then take it from there. It just so happens that the actors are perfect for this.
Amy, what was it like for you to come back to this character?
AMY ADAMS: It was interesting because we were looking at where Giselle would be now. When we left her in the last movie, there had been an evolution, from the beginning of Enchanted, to who Giselle is, at the end of the movie. It was about taking that evolution of who she might be, after spending 10 years in this world, but also making sure we keep her grounded in the truth of her feelings, without losing that joy, naïveté, innocence and purity that makes Giselle so special. My launching place was taking everything that I loved about Giselle in the first movie, and then just getting this opportunity to spin it throughout this one. It was really such a pleasure, getting the returning cast together. It was so fun to get to see everybody step back into it. We were lucky enough to have everybody come join us, and I can’t thank them enough. I’m very appreciative. And then, for our new cast members, I was just so pleased to get everybody we have.
Maya, how was your experience in joining this world?
MAYA RUDOLPH: We really did have so much fun. Even though I’ve had a chance to sing in things before, it was nothing like this experience. And knowing that I was going to get to sing this Menken and Schwartz song was really, truly a life fulfillment. I was running the marathon I’d been training for, my whole life. That’s what it was, every day. We’d go to vocal rehearsal, and we’d go to dance rehearsal, and we were working towards the day when we shot the song. And then, we shot it, and we got to record it. It was amazing, truly.
MENKEN: I’m not worthy.
RUDOLPH: Oh, God. I’m not worthy. It was such a dream come true. There are no words for stuff like that. This was little Maya’s dream of what it’s like to be in a musical. This is truly it.
Did you get to enjoy being together in Ireland, at all?
RUDOLPH: I was there with my family, so we discovered a lot of beautiful places, and places to climb, and things like that. The crew was an integral part of our experience in Ireland. The people that welcomed us there and showed us where we were and what to do there were genuinely loving people who were so welcoming. They created a little world for us. It was a very scary time. It was the first time a lot of us left home, period, since the pandemic had started. And to travel out of the country, in the early vaccine days, a lot of people weren’t doing that, so it was all a really big leap of faith. That’s a true testament to the first film and why we all wanted to be a part of this. It was just that special to all of us. We’ve all made friends for life. We’ll be connected forever, and we got to be in a beautiful place when the world felt unsafe. It’s one of those places that, if you want to feel welcomed and loved, and a pride in where people live, and they [want to] show you where they live, and they want you to enjoy it, then you should go to Ireland.
Adam, you have so many nods to Disney movies in Disenchanted. What was the process for bringing those nods to life and incorporating those Easter eggs?
SHANKMAN: The sending up of all the tropes is the fundamental construct of Enchanted. It’s one of my favorite things about the movie and about participating in it because, to my knowledge, it’s the first time Disney ever winked at itself. I don’t think Disney has ever allowed winking at itself, so this was such an incredible opportunity. If you look around, when the town turns into a fairy tale town, every sign of every shop has some Disney winking involved in it. It’s super subtle. And then, there are not so subtle nods in [Gabriella Baldacchino’s] solo song. Every shot in that song is something that’s a nod to another “I want” song. Pip turns into Lucifer. Giselle turns into many Disney villains. The magic mirror is a replica of the magic mirror from Snow White. Everywhere you look, you’re [going to] hit a trope. That was really, really fun. With the actors, we talked about some of them, but a lot of them I just laced in there. Ruby and Rosaleen’s ball dresses are literally the stepsisters’ dresses from Cinderella. The movie is full of that. And we get everybody singing songs, that Alan and Stephen very specifically wrote, that are referential.
The 15th anniversary of Enchanted is coming up November 21st. Is there something about the movie’s release, or just a moment when you realized people loved it?
ADAMS: With Enchanted, we were taking a big leap. I knew how much I loved Giselle and how much I believed in her spirit, but we got into it not really knowing what it would be, or if people would get it. So, I do remember feeling really scared, the first time I watched it with an audience. It was in London, and it was very quiet for the first bit of the movie while people were starting to understand what they were seeing. And then, I remember after “Happy Working Song,” there was a shift in the energy where the audience started to go on the journey with us. That was a really overwhelming feeling for me. It let me know that they understood what we were doing and that they were understanding Giselle’s purity. That was a really wonderful moment. That was very special. It was a very special moment for me. It was really early on in my career, too. This movie has meant so much to me, in so many ways. I’m just grateful to get to come back and revisit Giselle, at this point in my life.
JOSEPHSON: For me, the moment between Giselle and Robert, in the “I’m angry” scene, was such a definitive scene in the original movie. That stayed with a lot of people. I just remember that cementing the emotion of that first movie so well.
MENKEN: After we did Enchanted, to see the roles that Amy has done, which have such guts and meat, and real-world consequences for the characters, I wondered if she’d ever be able to come back to Giselle. It must be almost like an out-of-body experience for her to come back to this. On the first movie, I remember talking to her about how she had done daily theater musicals up in Minnesota.
ADAMS: Coming back, I feel like Giselle never left me. We were in the meeting with Disney, and I just flipped right back into it, talking about where I thought she was, and I realized that it was the right time. She was in there, ready to come out.
SHANKMAN: And things were getting really complicated, out in the world, when we started all of this. There were a lot of conflicts going on, so it felt like it was a good time. The stars definitely aligned. The movie is coming out at the right time.
Disenchanted is available to stream at Disney+.