Following the premiere of Disenchanted this month, original Enchanted director Kevin Lima has opened up on getting left out of the sequel's production. Released in 2007, the original Enchanted was helmed by Lima, who also directed other Disney movies like A Goofy Movie, Tarzan, and 102 Dalmations. The Bill Kelly-penned film stars Amy Adams, Patrick Dempsey, James Marsden, and Idina Menzel, all of whom reprised ther roles for Disenchanted.
While the Enchanted sequel brought back many of its lead cast members, however, Lima was replaced in the director's chair by Adam Shankman. In a new chat with THR, Lima shared his thoughts on the situation, revealing that he was never so much as given a phone call to discuss the possibility of helming the follow-up film. Lima says he was "shocked" by the snub, attributing the change to executive shake-ups at Disney along with behind-the-scenes politics. He says the whole thing just made him "very sad," and he hasn't been able to bring himself to watch Disenchanted on Disney+.
“A perfect storm of a change of executives and Hollywood politics made it so that I was uninvited to the party, unfortunately. It was a very, very sad turn. I haven’t seen the movie; I haven’t read the script. So I’m going to experience the characters that I helped create, grow and live on as the audience does.”
Despite his lack of involvement with the sequel, Lima is still proud of Enchanted and the film's accomplishments. Feeling that the original film accomplished its goal of effectively paying homages to classic Disney movies, Lima suggests that Enchanted itself has since become a timeless movie in its own way.
“Because we paid homage to those movies in a loving way, Enchanted has become timeless.”
Disenchanted Wasn't Met With Open Arms by Critics
The sequel to Enchanted is not quite the heavy hitter with critics that the original movie was. Over at Rotten Tomatoes, the film was slapped with a rotten score of 39% after getting pummeled with bad reviews. Its audience score was still rotten, though a bit better at 59%. Compare that to the certified fresh score of 93% for Enchanted, which boats an audience score of 80%.
Disenchanted was directed by Adam Shankman and written by Brigitte Hales, though its story was crafted by J. David Stem, David N. Weiss, and Richard LaGravenese. Returning cast members include Amy Adams, Patrick Dempsey, James Marsden, and Idina Menzel, while new cast members include Gabriella Baldacchino, Maya Rudolph, Yvette Nicole Brown, Jayma Mays, Oscar Nunez, and Griffin Newman. Alan Menken and Stephen Scwhartz also returned as the songwriters of the film with Menken composing the score.
In Disenchanted:
It has been more than ten years since Giselle (Amy Adams) and Robert (Patrick Dempsey) wed, but Giselle has grown disillusioned with life in the city, so they move their growing family to the sleepy suburban community of Monroeville in search of a more fairy tale life. Unfortunately, it isn’t the quick fix she had hoped for. Suburbia has a whole new set of rules and a local queen bee, Malvina Monroe (Maya Rudolph), who makes Giselle feel more out of place than ever. Frustrated that her happily ever after hasn’t been so easy to find, she turns to the magic of Andalasia for help, accidentally transforming the entire town into a real-life fairy tale and placing her family’s future happiness in jeopardy. Now, Giselle is in a race against time to reverse the spell and determine what happily ever after truly means to her and her family.
Disenchanted is streaming on Disney+.