Alan Menken Filmography

Born:: January 1, 1949
Occupation:: Composer (Music Score), Songwriter
Biography:: Distinguished composer/lyricist Alan Menken is responsible for penning many of the catchiest tunes of the Disney features of the late '80s and '90s, including such chart-toppers as "Whole New World" (from Aladdin) and "Colors of the Wind" (Pocahontas). A graduate of New York University, Menken got...Read More

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Enchanted

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Songwriter

Actors: Amy Adams, Patrick Dempsey, James Marsden, Timothy Spall

Synopsis: Classic Disney animation meets contemporary urban chaos when a frightened princess is banished from her magical animated homeland to modern-day New York City in a romantic comedy penned by Bill Kelly (Blast from the Past), directed by Kevin Lima (Tarzan), and featuring music by composer Alan Menken Read More

11/21/07
The Shaggy Dog

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Tim Allen, Robert Downey, Jr., Kristin Davis, Danny Glover, Spencer Breslin

Synopsis: An unexpected transformation helps a workaholic attorney learn that there's more to life than the courtroom in this remake of the 1959 Disney canine classic of the same name. Deputy District Attorney Dave Douglas (Tim Allen) takes his job in the halls of justice very seriously -- so seriously in Read More

3/10/06
Finding Kraftland

Actors: Alan Menken, Christophe Beck, Danny Elfman, David Zippel, Graeme Revell

2006
Noel

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Penélope Cruz, Susan Sarandon, Paul Walker, Alan Arkin, Marcus Thomas

Synopsis: A group of disparate characters look for understanding and compassion in the midst of a lonely holiday season in this comedy drama. Rose (Susan Sarandon) is a middle-aged divorcée whose mother is in the hospital with an advanced case of Alzheimer's disease; while Rose wants one more chance to tell Read More

11/12/04
Home on the Range

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Roseanne, Judi Dench, Jennifer Tilly, Cuba Gooding, Jr., Randy Quaid

Synopsis: Disney presents the animated musical Western Home on the Range, featuring an original musical score by Alan Menken. The Little Piece of Heaven family farm is about to go under and outlaw cattle rustler Alameda Slim (voice of Randy Quaid) sets his sights on it. Three dairy cows -- tough Maggie Read More

4/2/04
Christmas Carol: The Musical

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Kelsey Grammer, Jesse L. Martin, Jane Krakowski

Synopsis: Differentiating this TV-movie version of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol from the hundreds of other adaptations of the same Yuletide classic is its tongue-in-cheek ambience and a bundle of memorable tunes by perennial Disney composer Alan Menken and former Schoolhouse Rock lyricist Lynn Ahrens. Read More

2004
Hercules

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Tate Donovan, Josh Keaton, Roger Bart, Danny DeVito, James Woods

Synopsis: Disney's animation team dipped into the rich well of ancient mythology for this musical comedy. The son of Greek gods Zeus (voice of Rip Torn) and Hera (Samantha Eggar), Hercules (voice of Josh Keaton) is stolen as a boy by the minions of Hades (voice of James Woods), lord of the underworld. Read More

1997
The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Songwriter

Actors: Tom Hulce, Demi Moore, Kevin Kline

Synopsis: After the critical and commercial success of The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King, the Walt Disney Pictures animation studio embarked on their most serious and ambitious animated feature to date with this adaptation of Victor Hugo's classic novel Notre Dame de Paris. Read More

1996
Pocahontas

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Irene Bedard, Mel Gibson, Judy Kuhn, Linda Hunt, Russell Means

Synopsis: History gets the Disney kiddie treatment and a politically correct interpretation in the studio's 33rd feature-length animated movie, the first to be based on actual events and people. Pocahontas (Irene Bedard) is the daughter of Algonquin chief Powhatan (Russell Means), who promises her in Read More

1995
Life with Mikey

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Michael J. Fox, Christina Vidal, Nathan Lane, Cyndi Lauper, David Krumholtz

Synopsis: James Lapine, whose Broadway credits as a writer/director includes work with Stephen Sondheim, made his Hollywood debut with this comedy. Michael J. Fox plays Michael Chapman, who once upon a time was a wise-cracking child star on a situation comedy called "Life With Mikey." Now in his thirties Read More

1993
Aladdin

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Brad Kane, Scott Weinger, Robin Williams, Linda Larkin, Lea Salonga, John Freeman, Frank Welker, Gilbert Gottfried

Synopsis: Robin Williams's dizzying and hilarious voicing of the Genie is the main attraction of Aladdin, the third in the series of modern Disney animated movies that began with 1989's The Little Mermaid and heralded a new age for the genre. After a sultan (Douglas Seale) gives his daughter, Jasmine (Linda Larkin Read More

11/11/92
Newsies

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Songwriter

Actors: Christian Bale, David Moscow, Luke Edwards, Max Casella, Ann-Margret, Ele Keats, Marty Belafsky

Synopsis: A failed effort to revive the big-budget movie musical, Newsies attempted to create toe-tapping, song-and-dance excitement out of the true story of an 1899 strike by newspaper boys against publishing magnate Joseph Pulitzer. The "newsies" band together to protest a pay cut by Pulitzer (Robert Duvall Read More

4/8/92
Lincoln: The Making of a President, 1860-1862

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Synopsis: A shrewd politician, Abraham Lincoln had the intelligence, ambition, and principles to grow into his job as president. This is the first of four videos in the Lincoln series, which originally aired on PBS. Produced and directed by Peter W. Kunhardt, this program is narrated by renowned actor James Read More

1992
Lincoln: The Pivotal Year, 1863

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Synopsis: President Abraham Lincoln leads the Union in the fight to end the awful bloodshed of the Civil War. The year is 1863. The president had a continuous struggle with the commanders of his army, and the bloodshed from the fighting at Antietam and Fredericksburg distressed him greatly. 1863 was the Read More

1992
Lincoln: Now He Belongs to the Ages, 1865

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Synopsis: This video is the fourth installment of the Lincoln series, originally aired on PBS. This volume focuses on the last days and hours of Abraham Lincoln's life. Viewers watch as Lincoln's enemies plot their final revenge on the man they believed had dishonored their heritage. The video also reveals Read More

1992
Lincoln: I Want to Finish This Job, 1864

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Synopsis: By the third year of the Civil War, personal and national tragedy had worn down President Lincoln. However, he focused on his job tenaciously, having a strong sense of history. This is the third of four programs in the Lincoln series, which originally aired on PBS. Produced and directed by Peter Read More

1992
Beauty and the Beast

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Songwriter

Actors: Paige O'Hara, Robby Benson, Jerry Orbach, Angela Lansbury, Richard White, David Ogden Stiers

Synopsis: Beauty And The Beast is widely considered the best animated Disney feature of the studio's 1980s/1990s renewal of the form. Based on the classic French fairy tale, it tells the story of Belle (voiced by Paige O'Hara), an intelligent young woman scorned by her townspeople for being a bookworm Read More

11/13/91
The Little Mermaid

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Songwriter

Actors: Jodi Benson, Pat Carroll, Sam Wright, Kenneth Mars, Buddy Hackett

Synopsis: Disney's The Little Mermaid was the first in a series of blockbusters that restored the venerable firm's reputation as the world's premiere animated-feature factory. The title character is a precocious teenager named Ariel, the daughter of Triton, king of the Sea. Against her dad's wishes, Ariel Read More

11/15/89
Little Shop of Horrors

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Rick Moranis, Ellen Greene, Vincent Gardenia, Steve Martin, Levi Stubbs

Synopsis: It started as a 1960 Roger Corman horror comedy, filmed in two days; it then inspired a lavish 1982 Broadway musical with music and lyrics by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman. Finally in 1986, Little Shop of Horrors (1960) graduated into a multimillion-dollar, all-star film musical. Rick Moranis Read More

12/19/86