Disney’s Lion King will surely receive more awards soon as the film has been blessed with a new director.
Disney’s Lion King hailed Barry Jenkins as the upcoming project’s new director.
EW confirmed this week that the Jenkins recently signed to release a new version of The Lion King for the mass media company. The project will be the follow-up film to John Favreau-directed 2019 remake of the award-winning animated classic.
Since the new director formerly helped his sister to raise two young boys a few decades ago, he became familiar with the Lion King‘s characters.
″Having the opportunity to work with Disney on expanding this magnificent tale of friendship, love, and legacy while furthering my work chronicling the lives and souls of folk within the African diaspora is a dream come true.” the Moonlight director said in a statement.
Disney’s Lion King Release Date and Cast?
https://www.instagram.com/p/B8CAkIzBErS/
Unfortunately, Disney has not released any details about the new Lion King movie yet.
However, in a report posted by Deadline, Jenkins’ version may be a prequel instead. The news outlet also revealed that it might focus on the origin story of Mufasa.
Jeff Nathanson will work alongside the new director. Nathanson, who wrote the 2019 film, will be responsible for writing the new script, as well.
It is worth noting that Favreau’s Lion King presented Donald Glover, Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, Seth Rogen, Billy Eichner, and Chiwetel Ejiofor as their main cast. It remains unknown whether they will reprise their roles or not.
Meanwhile, Jenkins needs to bead the previous box office hit, which raked more than $1.6 billion of gross sales worldwide.
Jenkin’s Milestones
Before the company welcomed Jenkins to the family, the director recently wrapped up their shooting on the Amazon limited series The Underground Railroad. The series is based on the Colson Whitehead novel.
Moreover, he also grabbed a trophy in Oscar for the script he made for the best-picture-winning Moonlight.
Jenkins enjoyed nomination for the screens play of the 2018 film If Beale Street Could Talk.
Last year, he made plans to spearhead a film about the life of choreographer Alvin Ailey. He worked on it in partnership with Disney’s Searchlight Pictures.
The director truly received more blessings as after he bagged the chance to breathe life to Steven Soderbergh through period drama titled The Knick. This will cast Andre Holland as their lead star.
Currently, despite scarce information about Lion King, fans expect that Jenkins can truly make his own style of it soon.
Featured image courtesy of DisneyMusicVEVO Official Youtube Channel