The Princess Blog

Earlier this year, Disney launched the Ultimate Princess Celebration , a year-long event to honor all things princess. In August, the event culminated with World Princess Week , during which they premiered the music video for  "Starting Now,"  the newest Disney Princess anthem. However, the festivities did not end there. To continue the celebration, Disney just released the first doll from their new set of designer princess dolls , the Ultimate Glamorous Collection . Instagram has also been abuzz with upcoming Disney Princess goodies including a sneak peek at Disney Princess: The Concert  and the 30th anniversary of the classic animated Disney version of "Beauty and the Beast."  Let's dive in to explore the latest announcements from the Ultimate Princess Celebration! Princess Jasmine takes the spotlight this month with the first release from the Ultimate Glamorous Collection, the newest set of Disney Princess designer dolls. I was hoping that Disney would relea...

Disenchanted the Musical is a project that began in 2009 and made its way to off-Broadway theaters in 2012. Not to be confused with  the upcoming Disney+ sequel to  Enchanted , this stage show is a parody  of the Disney Princess brand that is in no way sanctioned by Disney, as proven by the public domain-approved character autographs on the poster. The show contains far too many Disney-specific references to be an interpretative musical about fairy tales in the vein of Stephen Sondheim's Into the Woods . Disenchanted! is far less sophisticated than Into the Woods with a focus on low-brow humor and an overall lack of plot, which explains why it never could have been a contender for the elite world of Broadway . It must instead settle for off-Broadway and low-budget local productions like the one I streamed over the weekend. The show's childish humor about cartoon princesses might imply that it is meant for very young audiences , but the light swearing and song abou...

When I attended the D23 Expo last month , one of the things I was most excited about was the chance to play a demo of the new Match 3 cell phone app, Disney Princess Majestic Quest . The ads for this game taunted me on social media for months, dating back to before they had even selected a title. I took an online survey to share my opinion on which of three titles I thought would work best--Disney Princess Gems, Disney Princess Match, or Disney Princess Majestic Quest. It was a long wait before I could finally download the game on my own smart device, and I am pleased to say it was well worth it. The game was advertised to only include Jasmine and Belle at launch, even though there was a big Ariel billboard for it on display at the D23 Expo. When it became available, I was surprised to see that not only was Ariel included in the launch, but she was also featured the game's menu icon. If you're not familiar with Match 3 games, they are a digital craze that was made popula...

Another Aladdin  production , another Jasmine song. With the recent addition of "Speechless," Jasmine has had a different solo song in every incarnation of the story. Yes, "A Whole New World"  is consistently used as the romantic duet, but it is not seen as Jasmine's signature song in the same way that "Part of Your Wold," "Someday My Prince Will Come," or "A Dream Is a Wish Your Heart Makes" is associated with their respective princesses because it is just as much Aladdin's song as it is Jasmine's. While Ariel and Rapunzel have many original solos scattered throughout The Little Mermaid and Tangled series , the Aladdin series sadly did not contain any original songs . As a result, Jasmine's songs are buried within so many different productions of Aladdin  that even die-hard fans might have trouble finding them all. That's why I decided to compile this list of my top three Jasmine solos along with a little backgrou...

I think it goes without saying that Disney's 1992 Aladdin  was a childhood staple for anyone who grew up in the '90s, and I am no exception. Therefore, my initial reaction when I found that they were doing a live-action remake  was rather cynical. I have  not been a fan of the remakes Disney had done in the past, and the last original live-action princess movie I saw from them left me with a bad taste in my mouth. Therefore, I went into the Aladdin  remake with high hopes and low expectations . Is it possible to recapture the magic of the original film without coming off as lifeless clone like the 2017 remake of Beauty and the Beast ? Spoiler alert: The answer is an enthusiastic yes. After seeing one Disney disappointment after another and spending a great deal of time studying the art of screenwriting this year,  I was beginning to think that perhaps I was becoming jaded. Maybe the sense of wonder I felt after seeing a new movie for the first time si...

By now, I'm sure I've made my feelings about Disney's live-action remakes perfectly clear. In fact, when I saw the first trailer they released for their upcoming live-action Aladdin  remake , it only reassured me that this would be a bland shadow of the original 1992 animated classic . However, Disney's clever marketing team  has been stealthily dropping TV spots and other campaigns for the film over the past few weeks that make it look like it might be worth watching as its own entity. That's not to say that it won't be comparable at all since it does still feature the same songs, characters, and plot. Yet, there appears to be a bit more creativity in this remake than the watered down Beauty and the Beast  clone they released in 2017. Of course, that could also be the result of a very well edited commercial. This "Rags to Wishes" promo shifted many of expectations about the movie I will be seeing on May 24th in a good way. The promo starts wi...

The internet went a little crazy when Entertainment Weekly released Disney's first promo photos of the fully costumed actors from their upcoming Aladdin  remake last week. Many were disappointed with what they saw, which unfortunately tends to be the case for live-action remakes . For instance, Aladdin's signature purple vest was changed to red, making it closer to the Broadway version of the show. He was also given a relatively nice shirt underneath, which is more than a little confusing for those of us who remember how poor he was in the original film. Will Smith  as the Genie looked a little too much like a normal human instead of a mystical blue entity, but apparently that's still coming . Princess fans were most excited to see previews of Jasmine's wardrobe. In terms of quantity, the internet did not disappoint. We now have images of three of Jasmine's looks that will be featured in the movie as well as a peek at her new handmaiden. For me, this regal...

While compiling songs for my next princess karaoke medley , it occurred to me that an overwhelming amount of princess songs are about freedom. It's no secret that freedom is a common theme among fairy tales and princess-like characters , but the concept goes much deeper than that. What's particularly interesting about it is the fact that it applies just as much to characters who were born princesses as it does to the ones who found their freedom by becoming princesses. The desire to be free is such a universal concept that it transcends status, power, or race. Everyone can feel as though they are trapped at some point in their life. The beautiful song written for Princess Jasmine in the retired  Aladdin: A Musical Spectacular  show was entitled  "To Be Free"  (which got replaced by "These Palace Walls"  in the inferior Broadway production )  The song's opening line, "Lucky bird inside a gilded cage," is recited with perfect irony because t...

In 2003, an amazing stage show based on  the 1992 animated classic  opened at Disney's California Adventure park called  Aladdin: A Musical Spectacular . Sadly, that show recently closed in 2016 and was replaced with a Frozen  stage show. Now the only opportunity to see an official Disney stage production of Aladdin  rests in the hands of the 2014 Broadway play , which I saw on tour tonight at the Pantages Theater in Hollywood. This new musical production barely had a chance of winning my favor in my heart because I was already such a huge fan of the retired Disneyland version. My low expectations were barely met. I found the new musical to be inferior to the Disneyland show in every possible way. I had a pleasant experience with the theater itself. It was my first time at the Pantages, even though I've lived in California for over seven years. The layout is very similar to Disney's El Capitan Theatre , where they screen the latest Disney movies. The theat...

In 1994, Disney created an animated series of their 1992 masterpiece, Aladdin . The movie was an incredible work of art which recently joined the ever-expanding list of princess anniversaries  in November to celebrate its 25th anniversary. Unfortunately, the television series fell rather flat in comparison to the film. Though it lasted a grueling 85 episodes, most of it has been forgotten by the general public with the exception of a small handful released alongside episodes of The Little Mermaid series on VHS featuring Princess Jasmine. I recently took the liberty of watching all 85 episodes to see if the show could withstand the test of time. My findings were not promising. The Aladdin  series was introduced with  The Return of Jafar , Disney's first  sequel , and one of the worst. It's no wonder, then, that the series sports the same cheap animation, flimsy storylines, and lack of character growth as its intro movie.Though it occasionally gave the characte...