Aladdin Central Messageboard

[Salukfan]

Stones should have backed off the "spirit of the original thing" and just gone for "a hell of a lot better than ROJ." At least this film looks great in some scenes.
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"This cow's been covered with flour!"

[Salukfan]

It's time for the final section! After I post it, I'll post any other quotes (from the biographies) that I find interesting.

The Music:

ALADDIN AND THE KING OF THIEVES features five sparkling, brand new musical numbers: two from the pen of David Friedman (conductor and vocal arranger of "Beauty and the Beast," the first "Aladdin," "Pocahontas," and the newly released Walt Disney Animated Masterpiece, "The Hunchback of Notre Dame"), and three from the team of Randy Peterson and Kevin Quinn (songwriters from the second installment of the trilogy, "The Return of Jafar").

According to Friedman, "The task was to make our songs refer to the earlier films and then take it from there." Brad Kane, who provides the singing voice of Aladdin, feels they succeeded: "When I first heard the music to this film, I thought, 'Wow! It sounds a lot like the original Aladdin.' They have really echoed the sentiments of the first film."

"They're finally gettin' married!" is the cry in "Party in Agrabah," the rousing opening production number which underscores the hustle and bustle as they city prepares for Jasmine and Aladdin's wedding. The song is a showcase for Robin Williams as Genie-- songwriter Friedman wanted the catchy lyrics to be "all over the place, as character-filled as possible." And indeed they are, filled with wild transformations and lightning-fast jokes as the Big Blue Guy impersonates such familiar faces and voices as Woody Allen, Walter Cronkite and Sylvester Stallone's "Rocky." "It was one of the thrills of my career to have Robin interpret my song," marvels Friedman. "He just took it and opened the flood gates, pouring out all this crazy stuff that he does."

After learning that his father is alive, Aladdin is uncertain whether or not to seek him out. In the beautiful contemporary ballad, "Out of Thin Air," the young man expresses what it was like growing up without a family, not knowing his roots, as if he had sprung from "thin air." In a moving counterpoint duet, Jasmine assures her fiance that he is indeed his father's son, and that she has faith in his integrity as he seeks the answers to his past.

"Welcome to the 40 Thieves" is a ragtime production number in which the unscrupulous brotherhood introduces Aladdin to their wicked ways (which include not brushing your teeth). By defeating the sinister Sa'luk in combat, Aladdin is automatically entitled to membership in their infamous company, although the new recruit declines the offer!

The newly reformed Cassim is feeling out of place at the Sultan's palace. In the gently humorous song "Father and Son," Genie encourages him to reject the dark past of the King of Thieves for a bright new future with Aladdin. Whirling through the fantasy world of Genie's amazing transformations, the pair agree they'll be side by side, on fishing trips, playing games. "Your solo days are done!" Genie sings. "You'll be two of a kid, spending quality time together-- as father and son."

Believing that they have been betrayed by their King, the scattered band of thieves is persuaded to regroup and follow a new leader in the ominous "Are You In or Out?," sun by veteran musical performer Jerry Orbach as the evil brigand Sa'luk. Scoffing, he goads his cohorts into casting aside Cassim's "soft-hearted dream" and returning to their roots, the glory days when crime paid. "I'm the one you need for a dirty deed," he assures them. "I'm the best-- success is guaranteed. Want a fearless leader, one that's strong and stout? Better vote for me! Are you in or out?"

These infectious new songs are woven into the action of the film so expertly that they are an integral part of the storyline. "I love the fact that every once in a while in a cartoon you can break out in pure song and dance," says Robin Williams. "You can't do that in normal life. That's the wonderful thing about being in magical places!"

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Additional quotes:

* Gilbert's "I worked like DeNiro" quote from the original's DVD is in here.

* "In a desperate attempt to provide for his family, Cassim fell into bad company, and only the love of his son can possibly reform him."

* I'm just going to type up part of Orbach's biography, because it makes me smile/admire the "Sa'luk is teh evilz!" quality of it all:

JERRY ORBACH (Sa'luk) snarls his way through the role of the thoroughly rotten brigand who betrays his commander, the King of Thieves, in his greedy desire to obtain the golden Hand of Midas.

Ironically, this is not Orbach's first experience with the intrepid hero of the timeless tale of the boy and his Genie. The 40-year veteran of stage, television, and film, enjoyed his first exposure to acting in a puppet show when his fourth grade teacher was auditioning his classmates for the role of... Aladdin! "My first reaction was, 'Those kids aren't reading it right'," Orbach remembers. "And when I read for the role, she said, "OK, you're Aladdin!"

* VAL BETTIN (Sultan) took over the role of the Sultan in "The Return of Jafar" and is back for the final chapter to see his precious Jasmine wed. "The Sultan knows when he has to put his foot down," Bettin explains, "but he can be very, very childlike. He is terribly whimsical. And I thought, 'By Jove, that's more or less like me!' I'm only a grown-up child myself."
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"This cow's been covered with flour!"

[AladdinsGenie]

He even sounds like the sultan woth that "By Jove!" comment

[Calluna]

[AladdinsGenie]

He ended up realizing he liked it more at his hovel and decided to stay there? That "you murdered my father!!" situation was too much for him to handle

[Salukfan]

[AladdinsGenie]

Yeah, cause couples who are engaged don't move in with each other before they're married. They gotta be married or no dice. They'll be heathens!!

I hate people sometimes

[Calluna]

Yeah, but the same people who wrote RoJ wrote the series, so if they knew they were going to have to backpeddle on that, why put it in? It's not really necessary...
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"If only I could believe you. Perhaps I can! After all... you do bear the name of a flower." -- Arbutus

[Salukfan]

Maybe they put it in, then realized afterward that it'd be better to have a place outside of the palace/a place for the "guys."

I'm looking at the production order and we don't see Aladdin's hovel for quite a while. We see it in "My Fair Aladdin," but that's not real evidence that he lives there... in so much as he went back there after humiliating himself. I'll take "Some Enchanted Genie" as a reference to it (because how else could Abis Mal have just bothered Aladdin/Abu/Genie in the taking of the lamp? I imagine Iago just rolled over, said "screw it" and went back to sleep. ) We don't actually see them living there until "The Vapor Chase."

I could be missing something here (forgotten stuff in the hovel, etc), but it seems like they ended up living in the hovel again out of convenience, rather than it being something they planned on the entire time.
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"This cow's been covered with flour!"

[Calluna]

I think you're probably right.

The only thing I can't explain, though, is that scene in From Hippsodeth With Love:

Iago: Well, guess we're staying here [at the palace] tonight!
Jasmine: Just for tonight.

It sounds like they're usually not allowed to stay, but Jasmine's making an exception just this once. Maybe it's only Iago who's not allowed, and everyone else is staying out too to spare his feelings.
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"If only I could believe you. Perhaps I can! After all... you do bear the name of a flower." -- Arbutus

[Salukfan]

I'm trying to figure out when it officially went back to "the gang lives in the hovel," rather than the palace.

It just occurred to me that in "Scare Necessities," Iago and Abu take Squirt back to the hovel in the middle of the night.... and Genie shows up, in the morning, to take Squirt back. Obviously Aladdin didn't sleep there that night. Unless he got the benefit of "... you got me a locket, you sleep in a nice bed tonight," he wasn't living the hovel.

That episode is about 10 after "Vapor Chase...." so unless they just put the gang in the hovel for a plot contrivance, something's kinda weird there Of course, VC aired before SN, but that's also not the best evidence of a straight storyline. We go to "Poor Iago" (five eps after SN) and Aladdin's living in the hovel again.

Jasmine's "... just for tonight" kind of implies that she orchestrated Aladdin going back to hovel land. Maybe the move happened because she and Aladdin realized that they weren't going to get married for a while and still needed time to live apart and have separate lives? Or, in the realm of "...well, they do kiss a lot," maybe things almost went too far and they decided that it's just better for everyone if they live apart?
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"This cow's been covered with flour!"

[AladdinsGenie]

[Salukfan]

[AladdinsGenie]

Yeah, they totally did something they weren't suppose to

[Salukfan]

Re-watching "Forget Me Lots."

Iago says "I won't miss visiting the palace!" This is a really early episode (and we thank it for elongating the time line )... which implies that Aladdin doesn't live in the palace.

... clearly thinking about this too much was a mistake.
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"This cow's been covered with flour!"