Beauty and the Beast: 16 Magical Moments From the New Trailer

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

Beauty and the Beast may feature a tale as old as time — but Disney just released a brand new trailer for its live-action remake of the company's 1991 animated classic (out March 17, 2017). Here's a deep dive into the world of enchanted household objects, a Prince badly in need of a shave, and a heroine with beauty and brains...

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

After a distant glimpse of Dan Stevens' cursed Beast looking at the enchanted rose — whose falling petals could seal his monstery fate — the trailer zeroes in on a painting, presumably of the young prince and his two parents. The image is part of the filmmakers' plan to fill out the main characters' back stories. "We all agreed that there are certain things you can get away with in an animated film that you can’t get away with in a live-action film," says producer David Hoberman. "Who are the characters? Where did they come from? What kind of human being was the Beast? What was his mother? What was his father?"

03 of 15

'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

Next, we follow Maurice — the father of Belle — as he is captured by the Beast. In the 1991 film, a lost Maurice comes across the castle while on his way to present his latest invention at a fair. In the live-action version, it is Belle who is the inventor of the family, so it isn't clear why the character is in the vicinity of the Beast's frozen home. But we can say for certain that he is played by Oscar-winning A Fish Called Wanda star Kevin Kline. "I loved working with Kevin so much," says Watson. "He became a dear friend. He very kindly gifted me a few of his paintings that he did whilst we were on the shoot, and which are now framed in my home."

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

Maurice's disappearance prompts Watson's Belle to go searching for him until she too winds up at the Beast's castle, only to find that her father has been imprisoned by the Prince. "Do you wish to take your father's place?" asks an unseen, though beastly-sounding, voice. Which leads us to…

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

...our first proper look at Dan Stevens' Beast. The actor essentially had to perform the role twice — once from the neck down wearing a performance-capture suit and stilts, and again from the neck up, with his expressions captured by an array of tiny cameras and then transformed, via CGI, into those of the enchanted prince. "There was the physical puppeteering and [then] the facial stuff," he says. "Essentially, you go from these incredibly lavish practical sets, these amazing, tangible practical sets — and there's me looking like a crash-test hippo on stilts — then you've got to do all that again, but you’re now essentially in Tron, wearing a black T-shirt in a sort of UV booth with 27 cameras. It felt like pure magic how they fused these two experiences together."

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

After the Beast instructs his magic mirror to "Show me the girl!" we are introduced to the Belle-befriending household staff, starting with the candelabra Lumière (voiced by Ewan McGregor) and the clock Cogsworth (Sir Ian McKellen). "What if she is the one?" asks Lumière, "The one who break the spell?" This of course refers to the curse put on the prince — and the staff — which can only be lifted if he can find someone to look past his fierce exterior and fall in love with him. "The message is just so absolutely true, and always relevant, that true beauty lies within," says director Bill Condon. The staff are depicted very differently in the new version. Why did director Bill Condon take this photo-realistic approach rather than aping their cartoonish look in the original? "Because then why do it, right?" says the filmmaker. "Then it’s just the other movie. The whole point here is now we're able to do this. Now, we're able to look at a teapot, and have it sing, and believe that that thing is real." Speaking of teapots...

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

...well, here is the film's teacup, Chip, who is voiced by newcomer Nathan Mack. "Disney wanted to wait until a certain point [before announcing Mack's casting]," chuckles Condon. "So, this poor kid had to go to school every day with this secret. It was driving him absolutely crazy!"

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

Now, here is the teapot, Mrs Potts, with the voice of Emma Thompson reassuring Belle that Beast is "not as terrible as he appears." "No one can replace Angela Lansbury," says Condon of the actress who played the role in the original film, "But, my God, Emma Thompson is a treasure in her own right."

09 of 15

'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

After fleeing the castle, Belle is beset by wolves, who are seen off by The Beast. Hoberman jokes that the familiarity Condon gained depicting such creatures while directing the last two Twilight movies helped him secure the Beauty and the Beast gig. "We had wolves in here," says the producer, "he had wolves in there..."

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

"I say we kill the Beast!" In a moment from deep in the movie, we are introduced to Belle's handsome, but egomaniacal, suitor Gaston, played by Welsh actor Luke Evans (The Hobbit films, Fast & Furious 6). "He's very, very funny and just perfect as Gaston," says Watson.

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

Finally! We get a glimpse of Belle and the Beast in the ballroom scene, during which they fall deep in love accompanied by the sound of the film's title track. "It was lit beyond beautifully," says producer Hoberman. "I gave a little speech after we finished. I just said, 'It would be really easy for us to just say goodbye, and move on to the next set, and move forward. But I want everybody — you know, a couple hundred people — to sit here, and think about the artists that built this ballroom, and all of you who made this set come alive. I just want everybody to take a couple of minutes, look around, and appreciate what we've done, because it is the most beautiful set I've ever seen.'"

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

Inbetween shots detailing the villagers' attack on the castle, and the showdown between the Beast and Evans' character, we are introduced to Josh Gad's character Le Fou, the comedic sidekick of Gaston. "I've wanted to do a cinematic musical forever," says Gad, who originated the role of Elder Arnold Cunningham in the Broadway musical, Book of Mormon. “So, to be a part of an ensemble musical, which is essentially what this is, was just another bucket-list checkmark."

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

This is likely a shot from the "Gaston" sequence, in which Evans’ boorish hunk performs a song in tribute to himself. The tune appears in the original film but in the live-action version will be amended with previously unused lyrics by the late Howard Ashman. "We had a treasure trove of lyrics that Howard had written that we did not put in the movie," says Alan Menken, who wrote the songs in the original with Ashman. "When Bill found out about those lyrics, he said, 'Oh my god, can we please look at that, because it would be a wonderful way to add an extra freshness to the movie.' So, yes, you're going to hear some unheard Howard Ashman lyrics."

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

Lumière's dance partner is the feather duster Plumette, voiced by Black Mirror actress Gugu Mbatha-Raw. "Everybody else got to go to the read-through, and we did some rehearsals," says Condon. "But she and Ewan were both shooting, almost until they arrived. So, they were thrown in the deep end. She was an unbelievable trooper and really pulled it off."

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'Beauty and the Beast' enchants with new trailer

Will the Beast find his happy ending before that final rose petal falls to the ground in Condon's live-action version? You'll have to wait until March 17 to find out.