Disney Debuts Nostalgic Trailer for ‘The Lion King’
LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – It’s the circle of life — the first full length trailer for Disney’s live action remake of “The Lion King” dropped during Sunday’s Oscars.
The new footage didn’t reveal much about the upcoming feature, although it did seem to almost mirror the original 1994 animated classic. The latest trailer began with a familiar scene set to the chant from “The Circle of Life” as the sun rises and Rafiki lifts Simba over the kingdom.
The voice cast includes James Earl Jones, returning to his original role as Mufasa from the original film, along with Donald Glover as Simba, Beyonce as Nala, Chiwetel Ejiofor as Scar.
The first teaser trailer became Disney’s most watched trailer in a day, racking up a record 224.6 million views in its first 24 hours.
Jon Favreau, the filmmaker behind movies such as “Iron Man,” “Elf,” and “Spider-Man: Homecoming” is directing “.” He recently directed Disney’s live-action remake of “The Jungle Book” in 2016. The fantastical CGI adventure became a massive box office smash, grossing $966 million worldwide.
Disney is rebooting a number of its classics this year. A live-action version of “Dumbo” is slated to release on March 29, while Guy Ritchie’s “Aladdin” is arriving on May 24.
“The Lion King” hits theaters July 19. Watch the trailer above.
