{"id":2157692,"date":"2025-11-15T00:13:13","date_gmt":"2025-11-15T00:13:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2157692"},"modified":"2025-11-15T00:13:13","modified_gmt":"2025-11-15T00:13:13","slug":"the-emperors-new-groove-disneys-comedy-classic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/the-emperors-new-groove-disneys-comedy-classic\/","title":{"rendered":"‘The Emperor\u2019s New Groove’: Disney\u2019s Comedy Classic"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Since hitting cinemas in 2000, Disney\u2019s The Emperor\u2019s New Groove<\/i> has become a cult classic. The movie\u2019s blend of sharp comedy, wacky slapstick, and arch metafiction set it apart from the studio\u2019s previous decade of animated adventure epics, from 1989\u2019s The Little Mermaid<\/i> to 1999\u2019s Tarzan<\/i>. Add a couple of much-loved songs written specially for the movie by Sting, and you\u2019ve got a Disney classic with a difference. But the movie could have turned out very differently.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/div>\n
\"Jaws<\/a><\/div>\n
\"Jaws<\/a><\/div>\n

Production began in 1994, with director Roger Allers \u2014 hot off the back of the phenomenal success of that year\u2019s The Lion King<\/i> \u2014 tasked by the studio with creating a story that explored the culture of the ancient Incas. Allers and his team developed Kingdom Of The Sun<\/i> using elements of the Incan creation myth, Mark Twain\u2019s 1881 novel The Prince And The Pauper<\/i> and The Prisoner Of Zenda<\/i>, the 1894 novel by Anthony Hope, and visited Machu Picchu, Peru, to study Incan artifacts and architecture.<\/p>\n

Looking to the success of Elton John\u2019s songs for The Lion King<\/i>, Disney approached Sting<\/strong><\/a> to write original material for Kingdom Of The Sun<\/i>. It was a no-brainer for the former frontman of The Police, as he explained to the Daily Record<\/i> in 2000, \u201cI\u2019ve grown up with Disney \u2014 films such as The Jungle Book<\/i>, Pinocchio<\/i>, and Sleeping Beauty<\/i> \u2014 and I thought, OK, if you\u2019re going to have a legacy into the future, what better way than to write for one of these films that people are going to watch in 30 years\u2019 time. And I have six children. I thought my stock would rise if they saw their dad doing a Disney film.\u201d<\/p>\n

As well as an opportunity to impress his kids, the project presented Sting with a challenge as a songwriter and an opportunity to break out of his comfort zone. \u201cI leapt at the idea of writing for Disney characters. Writing funny songs, sad songs, love songs\u2026 songs that have nothing to do with my life.\u201d Sting and collaborator David Hartley set to work writing songs based on the snippets of plot information given to them by the production team.<\/p>\n

Sting and Hartley ended up writing six songs for Kingdom Of The Sun<\/i>. Among them, \u201cSnuff Out The Light\u201d was a highlight \u2014 a sultry, Latin-flavored dance number sung by Eartha Kitt as Yzma, the villain of the film, detailing her determination to do whatever it takes to keep her youthful looks. Elsewhere, the jaunty earworm \u201cWalk The Llama Llama\u201d \u2014 originally intended to introduce the movie\u2019s hero, humble villager Pacha, and underline the importance of the llama to the Incans \u2014 was performed with gusto by country favorites Rascal Flatts. Meanwhile, the sophisticated pop of \u201cOne Day She\u2019ll Love Me,\u201d a duet sung by Sting and Shawn Colvin, was intended to soundtrack the burgeoning relationship between Pacha and the emperor\u2019s partner, Nina.<\/p>\n

Despite the strength of the songs, Kingdom Of The Sun<\/i> underwent a radical shift in direction following a screening of a work-in-progress version for executive producers Thomas Schumacher and Peter Schneider. \u201cI remember people saying there\u2019s too many elements in the movie,\u201d story supervisor Steve Anderson told Vulture<\/i>. \u201cIt was The Prince And The Pauper<\/i>. It was also the transformation of somebody into a llama. It was Yzma, who wants to raise the dead, snuff out the light, and have a world of darkness, but she also wants eternal youth and beauty. So it\u2019s like, OK, but which one does she want?\u201d Mark Dindal replaced Allers as director, and the original idea for Kingdom Of The Sun<\/i> drastically changed. The project would now be a zany and irreverent buddy movie called The Emperor\u2019s New Groove<\/i>, focusing on a spoiled emperor being turned into a llama.<\/p>\n

That meant that Sting and Hartley needed to come up with two new songs for The Emperor\u2019s New Groove<\/i>. The rambunctious Latin hip-shaker \u201cPerfect World\u201d sets the scene perfectly, introducing us to Emperor Kuzco with a witty lyric from the perspective of the emperor\u2019s personal singer, which heaps praise upon the ruler (\u201cHe\u2019s the sovereign lord of the nation, he\u2019s the hippest dude in creation\u201d). Though Disney wanted Sting to sing \u201cPerfect World,\u201d he felt it should be sung by a younger artist. When it was decided that the emperor\u2019s singer would be a Vegas-style lounge lizard, the production team hit upon the idea of using Tom Jones, who belts out the song with his customary vim and vigor, despite being 11 years Sting\u2019s senior. Over the course of the accompanying sequence, it becomes apparent that Kuzco is absurdly indulged and ruling with fear, suggesting that Jones\u2019 character is a decidedly unreliable narrator. A reprise toward the end of the film changes the lyric to underline the importance of friendship, emphasizing the lessons learned by Kuzco along the way.<\/p>\n

Sting and Hartley also contributed \u201cMy Funny Friend And Me,\u201d which played over the film\u2019s credits and earned the songwriting duo an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song at the 73rd Academy Awards in 2001 (they lost out to Bob Dylan\u2019s \u201cThings Have Changed\u201d from Wonder Boys<\/i>). The moving ballad is sung by Kuzco to Pacha, describing the way that their unlikely friendship has changed him. The lyric, \u201cThe world is not my playground, there are other things that matter,\u201d reflects that journey and complements the film\u2019s ending, in which Kuzco decides not to go ahead with his plan to destroy Pacha\u2019s village to build a theme park.<\/p>\n

In the end, The Emperor\u2019s New Groove<\/i> was a hilarious and lovable classic that has a special place in the hearts of Disney fans. And there was a happy ending for the songs Sting worked on for Kingdom Of The Sun<\/i>, as they went on to appear on The Emperor\u2019s New Groove<\/i> soundtrack album \u2014 so now you too can \u201cWalk The Llama Llama.\u201d<\/p>\n

Buy The Emperor\u2019s New Groove<\/em> soundtrack now.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t<\/p><\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.udiscovermusic.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Since hitting cinemas in 2000, Disney\u2019s The Emperor\u2019s New Groove has become a cult classic. The movie\u2019s blend of sharp comedy, wacky slapstick, and arch metafiction set it apart from the studio\u2019s previous decade of animated adventure epics, from 1989\u2019s The Little Mermaid to 1999\u2019s Tarzan. Add a couple of much-loved songs written specially for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2157693,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25179],"tags":[23301,413261,358551,348945,364453],"class_list":["post-2157692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music","tag-disney","tag-on-this-day","tag-soundtracks","tag-sting","tag-the-emperors-new-groove"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/The-Emperors-New-Groove-Disneys-Comedy-Classic.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2157692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2157692"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2157692\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2157694,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2157692\/revisions\/2157694"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2157693"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2157692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2157692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2157692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}