“I have carried these characters in my heart for thirty years”

Eighteen minutes and not one more. This is the time granted by Disney to speak with American songwriter Lin-Manuel Miranda about his contribution to the remake of The little Mermaid, for which he wrote new songs. “You are my longest interview of the day”, he specifies. Journalists around the world want to talk to this 43-year-old man who, under his air of Mr. Everyman, can claim a stratospheric career.

Since the hit on Broadway in the mid-2010s,hamilton, musical comedy rapped about the life of one of the founding fathers of the United States, Alexander Hamilton, Lin-Manuel Miranda reigns supreme over the genre. Thus, he has just adapted an absolute classic, New York, New York (1977), by Martin Scorsese, starring Liza Minnelli and Robert De Niro, which opened at the St. James Theater on Broadway in March. “A declaration of love to my city that says that, even if it is hard to survive here, I would not want to live anywhere else. »

Mine still a little tired, Lin-Manuel Miranda gives his interviews by Zoom from the basement of The Drama bookstore, in Manhattan, specializing in theater and of which he is co-owner. But it is in the court of Hollywood that he plays today.

His son baptized in tribute to the crab

On The little Mermaid, he worked alongside Alan Menken (the eight-time Academy Award-winning composer who wrote the music for both the original version andAladdin or of The beauty and the Beast) : “A childhood dream. I saw The little Mermaid three times at the cinema when it was released in 1989, and I called in sick at school the day the film appeared on VHS. I have carried these characters in my heart for thirty years. »

Proof of his attachment to the Disney universe, his first son, Sebastian, born in 2014, was baptized in tribute to the character of the composer and butler crab who accompanies Ariel in his adventures. Miranda has been collaborating with Walt Disney Animation Studios since the early 2010s when he was a rising figure in American theater. Over the years, he signs songs for Star Wars, The Force Awakens (2015), the cartoon Moana (2016), Mary Poppins Returns (2018) or even Encanto (2021).

Among these films, many testify to the desire of the studio, long accused of offering only white heroes, of opening up to non-Western cultures, as well as to its audiences… And Lin-Manuel Miranda, who claims its Puerto Rican roots, is the perfect cast, with its passionate stances in favor of migrants.

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