Disney Developing Live-Action ‘Snow White’

The Girl on the Train’ screenwriter Erin Cressida Wilson will pen the script for the project, which will feature new original songs.

Who’s the fairest of them all?

Disney is ready to take on another of its classic fairytales with a new musical, live-action version of Snow White.

Erin Cressida Wilson, who penned the adaptation of The Girl on the Train, is in negotiations to write the script for the film, which will expand upon the story and music from the beloved animated classic.

The movie will include new songs, with songwriters Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, who most recently wrote the lyrics for La La Land, attached to pen the new music.

Marc Platt, who also is working with Disney on Mary Poppins Returns, is attached to produce.

Disney’s original Snow White animated film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs came out in 1937. Based on the Brothers Grimm fairytale, Snow White was Disney’s first animated feature film and a massive success for the studio. It won an honorary Oscar at the 11th Academy Awards and is considered one of, if not the most, successful animated films of all time.

There have been several other adaptations of the classic tale over the years, of course. Two more recent attempts include the 2012 film Mirror Mirror, starring Julia Roberts and Lily Collins, and Universal’s darker take, Snow White and the Huntsman, starring Kristen Stewart. Snow White also is a character on the TV series Once Upon a Time.

Disney has been on a roll with its new takes on its animated classics, including such successes as Maleficent, The Jungle Book and Cinderella. The studio’s next live-action fairytale release, which also features another empowered heroine, will be Beauty and the Beast, starring Emma Watson, which is set to open March 17. Disney also is developing a live-action version of Mulanfor 2018, and has brought back Jon Favreau to helm a new take on The Lion King. A live-action Aladdin also is in the works, with Guy Ritchie attached to direct.

Along with penning the script for The Girl on the Train, which was based on the Paula Hawkins book, Wilson also wrote the script for Jason Reitman’s Men, Women & Children and produced the HBO series Vinyl. She is repped by CAA, Art/Work Entertainment and Schreck Rose.

Pasek and Paul are an award-winning Broadway songwriting team whose off-Broadway hit Dear Evan Hansen is about to open on Broadway. They recently wrote the lyrics for the film La La Landand are currently in production on the Fox musical film The Greatest Showman on Earth starring Hugh Jackman, for which they wrote all the songs. They are repped by CAA and Schreck Rose.

Source: hollywoodreporter.com