Though legendary lyricist Howard Ashman died far too young, his impact on Broadway, movies, and the culture at large were incalculable. Told entirely through rare archival footage and interviews with Ashman’s family, friends, associates, and longtime partner Bill Lauch, Howard is an intimate tribute to a once-in-a-generation talent and a rousing celebration of musical storytelling itself.
Howard Ashman Alan Menken Bill Lauch Don Hahn Sarah Gillespie Shirley Ashman Kyle Renick Nancy Parent Dennis Green Jodi Benson Jeffrey Katzenberg Chris Montan Rob Minkoff Roger Allers Glen Keane Gary Trousdale Thomas Schumacher David Friedman Paige O'Hara Richard White Jerry Orbach Angela Lansbury Ray Ashman Stuart "Snooze" White Brynn O'Malley Kurt Vonnegut Edith Vonnegut Holly Villaire Jonathan Hadary Show All…
ハワード ディズニー音楽に込めた物語 -, Howard - La vita, le parole, Howard: Sons de um Gênio, הווארד, 하워드, 霍华德, ハワード －ディズニー音楽に込めた物語－, 迪士尼的經典樂章
USA
Tribeca Film Festival
RomaniaAP
AustraliaG
France
Germany6
India
ItalyT
JapanG
SingaporeNC16
South Korea15
UK
USAPG
Australia
France
Germany
India
Italy
Japan
Romania
Singapore
South Korea
UK
USA
Really touching tribute to an artist we lost far too soon. There's not much available footage of his pre-Little Shop life, which makes the front end of the documentary less engaging than it should be, but it's worth it to see the inspiring, tragic story of his life's work.
I wish Howard Ashman were still with us for many many reasons, but chief among them is to see the b-roll of him losing his mind in the studio as Emma Watson tries her best to sing Belle. He would've hated that shit. Three and half stars!
what William Shakespeare was to english literature, Howard Ashman is to movie musicals
RIP Howard Ashman, you would've hated the live action remakes
Solid doc on the late lyricist, though Don Hahn's weird tactic of using thought bubbles rather than talking heads is really distracting-- and a liability whenever the interviews still up emotion. The best stuff here is footage of the studio sessions, like watching Angela Lansbury and Jerry Orbach in adjacent recording booths singing their parts of "Be Our Guest." (They nail it.)
So it's not a coincidence that The Little Mermaid (1989) and Beauty and the Beast (1991) are my two favorite Disney films!
Probably the most interesting piece of trivia is that the character look for Ursula was based on Divine. Some of these things you just don't consider when you're a kid. Also, very surprised but pleased when the documentary burned Disney several times. Not sure how it even ended up on their streaming platform with these criticisms intact, but it makes it all the more worth it!
R.I.P. Howard Ashman
Vegan alert:
-Howard's dad took hi fishing
-Reference to corned beef pastrami
Watched on: Disney+
Lovely and sad and lovely and hearing his rendition of Poor Unfortunate Souls was gorgeous and theatrical and emotional the whole thing was emosh
an absolute disgrace that this was even considered to be removed from disney+, especially a week before pride month and a week before the little mermaid remake comes out. this world was never meant for one as beautiful as you, howard.
kind of emblematic of the worst of bio doc filmmaking: piecemeal, unfocused, overly honorific, devoid of understanding of what an artist does or how an artist works. also deeply infuriated by the line, "The best thing about his work was that it WASN'T political!!!!"
I cried a normal amount.
Worth a look just to hear Howard Ashman talk about the composition and intentionality of LITTLE SHOP OF HORROS.
Solid but emotionally distant documentary about the great Howard Ashman, who perhaps was the most important piece of the Disney renaissance puzzle. It’s full of fascinating behind-the-scenes footage and painfully generic b-roll in almost equal measure, and the choice to exclude filmed talking-head interviews is much odder here than in Waking Sleeping Beauty. Ashman’s story is undeniably moving, even in a project as rushed as this one.
