Disney's Making A Live-Action Snow White

The Hollywood Reporter broke the news on Monday that Disney has announced its latest classic cartoon revival: a live-action Snow White. The film is still in its very early stages, but Erin Cressida Wilson, who adapted The Girl On The Train, is in talks to adapt the script and Into The Wood's Marc Platt will produce it. It's unclear whether the adaptation will include any of the same songs from the 1927 Disney original, but Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (who wrote the music for the Broadway version of A Christmas Story) will write new songs for the upcoming film.

As you are probably aware, Disney has been making a lot of live-action versions of its beloved classic animated films in recent years. There's been The Jungle Book, Maleficent (based on Sleeping Beauty), and Cinderella so far, and real life versions of Beauty and the Beast, Mulan, and The Lion King are coming soon. Versions of the Snow White story, both the Disney version and the original Brothers Grimm fairy tale, have appeared on the TV show Once Upon a Time and in the movies Mirror, Mirror and Snow White and The Huntsman. It was only a matter of time before they decided to make a real-life version of Disney's first-ever animated feature.

It won't necessarily be an easy adaptation, though. Thinking about the Snow White story, a few challenges arise. First, there are the dwarves; Snow White And The Huntsman received criticism from the Little People of America foundation for choosing to make CGI versions of taller actors instead of cast actors with dwarfism. The story also has a history of racism, starting with the problematic fact of the main character's white skin being associated with her beauty (and her name). Finally, many recent live-action adaptations have adapted the source material for a more feminist time, and I'm interested in how the creators will deal with Snow White, one of the more passive Disney heroines. But considering Disney's Cinderella was a beautiful and timely rendition, I have faith this adaptation will be equally as effective.

Now, a slightly more fun question: who will be Snow White? If they are going with someone who looks like the cartoon, I could see Elizabeth Olson, Rooney Mara, or Krysten Ritter in the role. But who knows? Disney might take a cue from Hamilton /Harry Potter and The Cursed Child/the upcoming Heathers adaptaion and make the movie more diverse than its source material. The film is probably still years away, so we have plenty of time to speculate. I'll be rewatching the original until then.

Image: Disney