Disney’s live-action Prince Charming movie has found its writer and potential director in Stephen Chbosky. Prince Charming was first announced in 2015 following the overwhelming success of Kenneth Branagh’s live-action Cinderella film, starring Lily James as Cinderella and Richard Madden as the Prince. Over the past two years, the Mouse House has been pushing forward with more live-action remakes, re-imaginings, prequels, and sequels, of which Prince Charming is one of them.
Disney’s Prince Charming movie, although it will center on the prince himself, will follow the prince’s brother and tell Charming’s story from the sibling’s point-of-view. This creative decision falls in-line with the studio’s other live-action re-imaginings – such as Cruella and Maleficent – to retell iconic fairy tales from different perspectives, thus providing audiences with a sense of nostalgia while also presenting something new. Big Mammas: Like Father, Like Son screenwriter Matt Fogel wrote the film’s first draft, but it seems Disney has decided to go in a different direction.
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THR reports that Disney has hired Stephen Chbosky to write and potentially direct their live-action Prince Charming film. Chbosky will be reuniting with Mandeville Films producers David Hoberman and Todd Lieberman, who produced his latest project, Wonder, as well as Bill Condon’s Beauty and the Beast, a movie Chbosky co-wrote the script for. Considering that Wonder is earning rave reviews and that Beauty and the Beast is currently 2017’s highest-grossing film, it make sense for Disney and Mandeville Films to want to continue their relationship with Chbosky.
Chbosky is primarily known for creating the cult-favorite TV series Jericho – about a small town in Kansas struggling to survive, with the residents eager to find out what happened to the world after several nuclear bombs devastated major cities across the continental United States – as well as adapting his 1999 young adult novel, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, onto the big screen in 2012, starring Logan Lerman, Emma Watson, and Ezra Miller. The film was well-regarded by critics and audiences alike, and it established Chbosky’s ongoing professional relationship with Watson.
It’s unclear at the moment if the Prince Charming movie will be connected to Branagh’s Cinderella and if it will feature Madden’s Prince, or if the story will merely stand apart and star a different actor in the role of Charming. Regardless, the Prince Charming film will provide Disney the opportunity to explore the prince’s background, which has been largely a mystery since the character’s debut in the 1950 animated Cinderella movie. After all, he didn’t even have a first name until Branagh’s film came along.
