I don't think I'll ever recover from this!! 😭🥹😍🤩
Last Friday, I got to spend the afternoon at Notre Dame with Stephen Schwartz, who wrote the lyrics to Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame - both the animated film and the stage musical.
He also wrote the lyrics to Pocahontas, Enchanted and The Prince of Egypt. And he wrote the lyrics & music for several Broadway musicals including Pippin, Godspell, Children of Eden...and most famously, Wicked. I've loved Wicked since the OBC, and I finally saw it on Broadway in 2022. The Wizard and I certainly hits differently now! 🥹
In June, when I hosted "The Official Unofficial Fan Celebration for the 30th Anniversary of Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame" with the production team of the film, including Stephen, we all took a few minutes before the livestream started to test mics, sync Zoom/YouTube, do a bit of small talk, etc. I said to everyone "Let me know if you're ever back in Paris and want to see Notre Dame again!". And Stephen said "Ok! How about in 2 weeks!?" 🫨
I loved hearing all his stories about how he wrote the lyrics to the songs (especially Out There), and how the stage musical has evolved over the years!
So, fun fact! While Alan Menken was working on Beauty and the Beast (before working on The Hunchback of Notre Dame), he had already started playing around with melodies that would eventually turn into the song Out There. For the line "And out there, living in the sun", the note of "there" was originally written to go up, but while collaborating with Stephen, they decided to change the note to go down instead, because they felt it made the song sound more interesting and less classical! 🎶
Also, if anyone is wondering, the real reason why The Hunchback of Notre Dame stage musical has never been on Broadway or The West End (aside from the concert) is because of Disney and their branding! It "doesn't fit with the Disney brand" like the other more family friendly Disney musicals do... but the team behind the musical itself (Stephen, Alan, etc.) DO want to bring it to Broadway and/or The West End and they are trying very hard to make it happen! But professional productions are frequent in Europe and in languages other than English, and I'm excited for the new revival tour opening in Germany later this year! 😍
Of course I had to tell him about all of the different productions I've seen around the world, and how much of a die-hard fan I am of the original 1999 production of Der Glöckner von Notre Dame (hence the shirt!)...even though he already knew that. The first thing he said to me when he joined the fan celebration was "I see how much you love Der Glöckner...I see a lot of Der Glöckner stuff!", referring to my posters and merch in the background (a lot of which he signed this afternoon!).
I was also very happy to tell him that a piece of his work is inside Notre Dame! When I was given the opportunity to write a short note and sign it, and have it inserted into one of the beams of Notre Dame's new roof, I included a lyric from Top of the World, my favourite song in the stage musical.
I'm always hesitant to quote praise in fear of coming off as arrogant, but I just wanted to share my appreciation for the compliment he gave me while I was giving him a tour of the exterior, "I've learned so much, even more than I did while I was working the movie!" 🥹
Last August, I saw The Hunchback of Notre Dame in Concert on The West End. The day after, I found out that he had been sitting just a few rows ahead and I thought how much I would have loved to have met him... It's funny how life works sometimes! 😉
Unfortunately, there was a fluke issue with the photo files, so they're really pixelated. But oh well, it's the experience that's the important thing! 💜
