No matter how old the story, sometimes it needs to be told differently. The “Disney’s Beauty and the Beast” tour, which will be held at The Bushnell from April 7 to 12, is not a replica of the tours that visited Connecticut many times in the 1990s, 2000s and 2010s. This script is different from those used in countless schools, community theaters, and other musical productions. And, as always, the stage version of Beauty and the Beast includes songs and scenes that were not included in the 1991 Disney animated feature film on which it is based.<\/p>\n
The director and choreographer of this carefully reimagined production, Matt West, was not only the original choreographer of 1994’s Beauty and the Beast, but was also part of the team that convinced Disney to create its Broadway division and first produce the show live.<\/p>\n
West produced shows for Disney theme parks, including the acclaimed live version of “Dick Tracy,” which he had to invent himself because Warren Beatty wouldn’t let him see the then-in-progress film on which West’s live show was ostensibly based. He has been dancing in Disney shows since he was 13 years old, and it was Disney that gave him his first professional choreography job.<\/p>\n
The musical’s original Broadway run ran from 1994 to 2007, first at the Palace Theater and then at Lunt-Fontanne. The show was central to the revitalization of New York City’s Times Square in the 1990s. A five-part national tour of Beauty and the Beast ran from 1995 to 2003, followed by a tour that lasted from 2010 to 2016. In 2004, local theaters and amateur theaters were able to obtain the rights to perform shows, including “Disney’s Beauty and the Beast Junior.” A variation for school drama programs was created in 2008. Disney also adapted the stories and songs for theme parks, ice shows, and other projects.<\/p>\n Matthew Murphy<\/p>\n Belle (Kyla Bell Johnson), a voracious reader, and an ensemble of townsfolk from Disney’s Beauty and the Beast. The show’s national tour will run from April 7th to 12th at The Bushnell. (Matthew Murphy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n The new tour reunites most of the original creative team and is the result of a close study of the original work, West said. Not to reproduce the work, but because it could serve as the basis for a new vision of the material.<\/p>\n Some well-known aspects of “Beauty and the Beast” lie outside of its story and design. Stephen Mark Lucas, who plays the musical’s self-obsessed villain Gaston, played the heel to Nicky Arnstein, the husband of another musical theater villain, Fanny Brice, in the 2024 national tour of Funny Girl, where he played Bushnell. Lucas also played the morally compromised Lancelot in Camelot at Westport Country Playhouse in 2016, and starred as Joe Hardy, the man who sells his soul. In 2014, he made an offering to the devil to become a baseball player during “Damn Yankees” at the Goodspeed Opera House. West happily said that other than being handsome, Lucas bore no resemblance to Gaston in real life. “Stephen is the nicest guy in the room,” the coach said. “He’s generous with his work. He’s really on the move here.”<\/p>\n The tour will feature Kyla Bell Johnson, who played Sophie on the Mamma Mia tour, as Belle, and Fergie L. Phillippe, who played Hercules Mulligan\/James Madison for three years in Broadway’s Hamilton, as Beast. Kathy Wojtko, who starred in the musical “The Flamingo Kid” at Hartford Stage and toured nationally with “A Gentleman’s Guide to Murder” and “Evita,” plays Mrs. Potts. Javier Ignacio, who appeared in both the Broadway and touring productions of “Company,” plays Cogsworth, Harry Francis as LeFou, and Kevin Ligon as Maurice.<\/p>\n West said he had never worked with anyone in this cast before and was fascinated by the enthusiasm they all put into their roles. “They’re all really talented and love what they do. On holidays, they decorate their dressing rooms and entertain each other. They’re really great people. The actors connect with each other, and I don’t remember anything like this ever happening. I’m giddy to play on this show again,” he said.<\/p>\n Matthew Murphy<\/p>\n Kyla Bell Johnson and Fergie L. Phillippe play the title roles in the national tour of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast. (Matthew Murphy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n West is full of stories about the musical’s triumphant 1994 premiere. When the Beauty and the Beast animated film was completed but not yet released, West, Robert Jess Ross, and several of his Disney theme park live show colleagues approached then-Disney President Michael Eisner. “We said we wanted to take Disney to Broadway, and he said no. But he said, ‘You can ask me one more time.'” After the Alan Menken and Howard Ashman songs were compared to the best Broadway musicals and the film received critical acclaim, a second proposal was accepted: a stage adaptation with Ross as director and West as choreographer. However, it was a huge learning curve for the Disney organization.<\/p>\n \u201cWe needed to open a new theater division for the company,\u201d West said. “They didn’t know how to do Broadway. They trusted us. It was just baby steps. But Michael Eisner was very smart. He had been to Broadway many times as a kid.”<\/p>\n Mr. West said Mr. Eisner was particularly pleased with the stage trick of making a child actor look like Chip in a teacup.<\/p>\n Adapting the show for the stage required adding many new songs. Ashman, the show’s lyricist, died in 1991, leaving Tim Rice to work with Menken.<\/p>\n While the experience was satisfying, West didn’t rest on his laurels when he returned to the show decades later. “When Disney approached me to direct and choreograph this production, I jumped at it, and part of the deal was that I could reinvent it. Disney said, ‘Absolutely.'”<\/p>\n \u201cI started with Linda Wolverton,\u201d West said of the playwright who wrote the screenplay for the original \u201cBeauty and the Beast\u201d and the book for the musical, and went on to write Disney\u2019s \u201cThe Lion King\u201d and \u201cMalificent\u201d as well as Tim Burton\u2019s \u201cAlice in Wonderland.\u201d “We went over every page word for word. We updated certain words. We also wrote two completely new scenes. We threw out the original dance and started over. We completed new orchestrations. We worked on this for about two years.”<\/p>\n West said the result was “a Beauty and the Beast that has more heart than the original. It’s more honest in many ways. I’m very proud of the original show, but it needed a makeover.” The main guideline he set for creative upgrades was “to make it tourable. We didn’t want to increase ticket prices.”<\/p>\n Matthew Murphy<\/p>\n Magical Objects from \u201cDisney\u2019s Beauty and the Beast\u201d at Bushnell from April 7th to 12th. (Matthew Murphy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n West described the new scenic design by Stanley A. Meyer, who also designed the original 1994 production, as “like a ballet in the air. There’s a giant scroll that makes up the castle, and it twists and turns and flies through the air.” West’s direction and choreography further enhanced its dreamlike fluidity by devising what he called a perfect homage to legendary 1930s Hollywood director Busby Berkeley, “using an overhead camera shot” for one of the ensemble dances.<\/p>\n Original costume designer Anne Hold-Ward reworked the design “to better fit the movement,” West said. The color palette has been changed, and Cogsworth’s character (the Beast’s loyal major who transforms into a clock) is now dressed in green instead of brown. “We wanted more color, so we made it look like green marble,” West said.<\/p>\n One practical consideration when creating the costumes for this show, West said, was: “Live flames are used on stage. We have to be very careful about the fabrics we use. All fabrics are fire-resistant. There’s a lot of testing.”<\/p>\n One relatively subtle change that got a big response was making Bell wear glasses when reading, which he loves. “There were a lot of kids in the audience who wore glasses, so we decided to put glasses on Belle while she was reading. The kids are very aware of that. It creates a connection.”<\/p>\n Overall, West said, “It’s more of an adult show now. Kids are smart, in my opinion. Theater has to compete with video games for good. We wanted to show the seriousness of the curse that was placed on this castle. We took out the 330 sound effects, the banging and falling sound effects, because we didn’t think it was funny.”<\/p>\n West, who is also a director and choreographer, says, “I see the big picture. As a choreographer, I’m especially conscious of who’s going where and how the actors leave and go on stage. It’s a lot of work, but you get to build the whole show and be in one room while all the parts are happening. I love this part of the job. It’s like working on a puzzle. For example, in one song, ‘Be My Guest,’ the actors change clothes four times.” I can’t run to the dressing room upstairs, and the theater might be different.<\/p>\n “I’ve worked for other companies. I run my own company and have been for about 35 years. I’m a consultant. But Disney was always thinking about coming back home. This was my first Broadway experience.” West is currently working on growing the “Beauty and the Beast” company in Vienna and elsewhere. He’s also working on a brand new Disney project…”but I can’t talk about that,” he said.<\/p>\n \u201cDisney\u2019s Beauty and the Beast\u201d runs from April 7 to 12 at the Bushnell, 166 Capitol Avenue in Hartford. Performances are Tuesday through Friday at 7:30 p.m., Saturdays at 2 and 7:30 p.m., and Sundays at 1 and 6:30 p.m., and prices range from $50.50 to $215.50. bushnell.org.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n #Beauty #Beast #tour #Bushnell #honors #original #adds #fresh #vision<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" No matter how old the story, sometimes it needs to be told differently. The “Disney’s Beauty and the Beast” tour, which will be held at The Bushnell from April 7 to 12, is not a replica of the tours that visited Connecticut many times in the 1990s, 2000s and 2010s. This script is different from … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":632,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,1],"tags":[2357,1275,2353,17,2341,2348,2344,2346,2342,350,2358,2350,2352,2355,2345,2349,2356,2347,2354,1621,2343,2351],"class_list":["post-631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beauty","category-uncategorized","tag-adds","tag-art","tag-beast","tag-beauty","tag-beauty-and-the-beast","tag-broadway","tag-bushnell","tag-ctnow","tag-disney","tag-entertainment","tag-fresh","tag-hartford","tag-hartford-coolant","tag-honors","tag-matt-west","tag-musical","tag-original","tag-theater","tag-tour","tag-vision","tag-walt-disney","tag-what-to-do"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/631\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Kyla](\"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1775384847_289_New-Beauty-and-the-Beast-tour-at-Bushnell-honors-the.jpg\")
![\"fascinating](\"https:\/\/chabrok.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1775384847_337_New-Beauty-and-the-Beast-tour-at-Bushnell-honors-the.jpg\")