Disney are making a live-action remake of “The Lion King,” just like they’re making a live-action remake of just about every single successful animated Film they’ve brought out in the past: from “Mulan” to “Aladdin” to “The Little Mermaid” to “Dumbo” to “Peter Pan” to just about every other one you could possibly think of. The massive successes of “Cinderella,” “The Jungle Book,” and now “Beauty and the Beast” only serve to confirm the Disney marketing team’s theory that these live-action remakes are a good idea and they should keep making them.
And now, the wheels are in motion on the new “Lion King,” with Beyoncé wanted desperately for the role of Nala.
Grammy winner is currently pregnant with twins
As everyone in the whole world is already aware and obsessed with, Beyoncé is currently pregnant with twins, so a movie role should realistically be the last thing on her mind. But “Lion King” director Jon Favreau (who also did “The Jungle Book” and is currently directing the pilot for "Young Sheldon," the "Big Bang Theory" prequel) has picked her as his number-one choice for the role of Simba’s love interest Nala.
So, while she’s yet to sign on, Favreau is (in order to incentivise the role and lure her in) willing to work the entire production around her pregnancy.
He and Disney and the creative team are supposedly willing to do absolutely anything it takes to fit around Beyoncé’s schedule and get her in the role of Nala.
She’ll join Donald Glover and James Earl Jones
If Beyoncé takes the role in “The Lion King,” she’ll be joining the two lead actors already cast: Donald Glover (best known for his ground-breaking contributions to TV comedy with “Atlanta” and “Community,” and his music under the stage name Childish Gambino), who’ll be playing Simba, and James Earl Jones, who’ll be reprising his role from the ‘90s original as Mufasa, because there’s literally no other human being on the entire planet who would be able to replicate his signature booming voice.
Despite being primarily a Grammy-winning musical artist (most recently bringing her racial heritage into her art), Beyoncé is already an accomplished actor, with other voice work in the animated flick “Epic” back in 2013 that came and went, largely unnoticed, as well as more well-known live-action roles in “Austin Powers in Goldmember,” “Dreamgirls,” “The Pink Panther,” and “Obsessed.”
