The Prince and the Knight

The Prince and the Knight would be an American musical fantasy romance hand-drawn animated film directed by Andreas Deja and Stephen Anderson and written by Dan Fogelman and Bill Kelly, while Don Hall would serve as co-director. Loosely based on the children's picture book Prince & Knight by Daniel Haack and Stevie Lewis, the film would star the voices of Tarell Alvin McCraney, Darryl Stephens, Janelle Monáe, Corey Burton, and Alan Tudyk, while Jeffrey Wright would serve as the film's narrator. Monáe would also write the songs for the film, while composer Hans Zimmer would provide the score for the film.

Disney would start developing an adaptation of Prince & Knight in early 2022, with Deja and Anderson set to direct the film, with the film marking Deja's directorial debut. Fogelman and Kelly would join as writers in mid-2022, while McCraney and Stephens would join the cast in the lead roles in December 2022. The filmmakers would develop the film as an homage to films from Disney's early ages. Several animators from The Princess and the Frog and Winnie the Pooh would be brought in to work on the movie. The film would also mark Disney's first time using the "Deep Canvas" software since Treasure Planet (2002), with the software being promeniently used at the film's climax.

The Prince and the Knight would be released on May 16, 2025, and would become a critical and financial success. Critics would call the film "a wonderful love letter to Walt Disney's fairy tale films", and would praise the film's vocal performances, direction, writing, animation (particularly its use of hand-drawn animation), songs, sense of nostalgia and musical score. The film would earn 996 million dollars at the worldwide box office over a budget of 105 million dollars. The film would be nominated for a GLAAD Media Awards for Outstanding Film – Wide Release, as well as three Academy Award nominations for Best Animated Film, Best Original Song, and Best Original Score.

Synopsis
Once upon a time, in a far away kingdom, lived a prince named Steven who, in spite of having everything he could want to have, longs for something more in his life, but is too worry of what may happen if he dares to change his life. Also in the kingdom, there was a knight name Clarance, who feels that he has everything in his life because he's one of the best knights in the kingdom. However, both of their lives end up crashing when a terrible dragon named Thadeus attacks their kingdom in order to destroy it, capturing the king and queen in the process. As the two, alongside the a guard named Joan, try to stop Thadeus from destroying the kingdom, the prince and the knight develop a bond that finally opens their eyes on wha they truly want and need in their lives: love.

Voice cast

 * Tarell Alvin McCraney as Steven, a young prince who longs for more in his life, but fears what may happen if he does find it. McCraney would say that the character "longs for change, but at the same time fears it due to how his responsabilities may be affected by". The character would be named after novel writer Steven Corbin.
 * Darryl Stephens as Clarance, a workaholic knight who, being one of the kingdom's best, feels that he has everything he needs in life. Stephens would refer to his character as "the classic sympathetic workaholic".
 * Janelle Monáe as Joan, the guard at the kingdom with wishes to become their captain, who is left in charge of them after Thaddeus attacks the kingdom. Monáe would describe the character as "somebody who feels she is can do a lot more than what she does now, which is just listening orders".
 * Corey Burton as Thaddeus: A dangerous and egocentric dragon who sets out to destroy Steven's kingdom. The filmmakers would cast Burton on the role due to his ability to replicate Tony Jay's "elegantly evil voice". Burton would say that "Thaddeus sees himself as above everything else, and, for him, destroying the kingdom is both a showcase of power and a message to everyone that dosen't respect him", and would describe the character as "a combination of Maleficent and Shere Khan". Co-director Stephen Anderson would describe him as being "a Walt era-like villain. Without a backstory or a sympathetic aspect. He's just an elegant and evil dragon".
 * Alan Tudyk as Othello, a dim-witted lizard who is Thaddeus' sideckick. Tudyk would ad-lib several of his scenes during recording.

Music
Janelle Moáne, who would provide the voice of Joan im the film, would write several songs for the film, which would be performed by the film's cast. Directors Andreas Deja and Stephen Anderson would select Moáne to write the film's songs because they would want "a songwriter that was flexible in style and who could write songs that were charming and sensible". Moáne would work closely with the filmmakers while writing the songs in order for them to "fit with both her style and the film's tone". Moáne would also perform an end-credit version of one of the songs for the film's end-credits, something Deja would compare to the end-credit songs for films of Disney's renaissance era.

Hans Zimmer, who previously composed the score for Disney's The Lion King (1994) and worked on several live-action Disney films, would compose and produce the film's score. Zimmer would draw inspiration from the scores for Disney films like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1930) and Cinderella (1950) while composing the film's score, as he would want to create a score that "catches the spirit of the movie". Instead of creating themes for each character, Zimmer would use elements of their solos in the score.

Reception
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film would have an approval rating of 98%, with an average rating of 9.1/10, based on 200 reviews. The website's critical consensus would read, "A charming and nostalgic romantic tale with catchy tunes and wonderful performances, The Prince and the Knight is both an incredible LGBTQ+-led film and an undoubtely great return for the company to traditional animation". On Metacritic, the film would have a weighted rating of 79 out of 100, based on 50 reviews, indicating "generally positive reviews".

Trivia

 * This would be Disney's first fully traditionally-animated film since Winnie the Pooh (2011).
 * Bill Kelly previously wrote Disney's Enchanted (2007).