“New and a bit alarming,” as Belle would say.
The story of of the film’s famous songs — “Be Our Guest,” “Beauty and the Beast,” “Gaston,” and more — is one of frustrated promise.
Academy Award-winning Broadway and film composer Alan Menken, recipient of the 2013 Oscar Hammerstein Award for “Lifetime Achievement in Musical Theatre,” was welcomed on stage at the Hudson Theatre by Bernadette Peters singing “Some Enchanted Evening” from the Rodgers–Hammerstein musical “South Pacific.”