20 facts you might not know about 'Tangled'

Glen Keane, a supervising animator at Disney, had the idea of adapting Rapunzel back in 1996. It wouldn’t be until 2001 that Keane was able to pitch the idea to Michael Eisner, then the CEO of Disney, and get approval to go ahead with the film.

Yes, Eisner was willing to go ahead with Keane’s Rapunzel movie, but he had a request. The CEO wanted the movie to be computer animated. Keane wanted it to be a traditionally animated film, but in the end, Eisner was the CEO, and he got his way.

In 2003, a Rapunzel movie was announced for a 2007 release. (Animation takes a while.) At the time, the film was not titled “Tangled.” Instead, it was called “Rapunzel Unbraided.”

When “Rapunzel Unbraided” was announced, it was pitched as a Shrek-style film, which is to say, an irreverent fairytale. At least partially, Eisner pitched the movie as set in modern San Francisco. Initially, two San Francisco teens, Claire and Vince, were going to be transported into the Rapunzel fairy tale as Rapunzel and Prince Beau, respectively.

Soon after “Rapunzel Unbraided” was announced, names started to be floated for the film. Kristen Chenoweth was in the running to voice Rapunzel, and Reese Witherspoon was in the mix. We don’t know what role Witherspoon was in discussions for.

In 2005, Keane’s film was pushed to 2009 to give him more time to work on the story for the film. Then, in 2006, “Rapunzel Unbraided” was shut down. It was a dead project…for about a week. Soon after Keane got the bad news, Ed Catmull and John Lasseter took over at the studio. One of the first things the duo did was get “Rapunzel Unbraided” back into production.

In 2008, after over a decade of shepherding a Rapunzel movie, Keane stepped down as director. At the time, it was said that he (and co-director Dean Wellins) had “other commitments.” After Tangled came out, Keane revealed that he had left the film because he had suffered a heart attack.

With Keane out, Disney turned to Bolt. The 2008 film didn’t make a considerable impact itself, but it proved a fine feeder system for Tangled. Dan Fogelman wrote both films. Additionally, Byron Howard, a co-director of Bolt, and Bolt storyboard director Nathan Greno became the duo in charge of what would become Tangled.

Moore had been a teen pop star. She had a role in Disney’s Brother Bear 2. However, Moore had to go through several auditions before being cast as Rapunzel. They even made her sing a song as part of her audition. It was a requirement of the auditions, sure, but it still feels weird. Moore sang “Help Me” by Joni Mitchell, a cover song she had included on her 2003 album Coverage.

When Disney was auditioning for Flynn Rider, they only wanted English actors. The character was intended to be British. Levi is American, but he used an English accent for the audition. Disney gave Levi the role, but they decided they were OK with him using his natural American accent for the part.

Sometimes, animated movies feature cast members recording together. Not so much with Tangled. Moore and Donna Murphy, who voiced Mother Gothel, never met. Moore and Levi, meanwhile, only met to record the song “I See the Light.”

Alan Menken is as synonymous with Disney as anybody. The composer has worked on films like The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin. He’s an EGOT winner with eight Oscars. The dude co-wrote “Under the Sea” and “Be Our Guest!” This was the first Disney animated film Menken had worked on since 2004’s Home on the Range, not exactly his best work. This one turned out a bit better.

There was one big issue for Tangled during the animation. Namely, they couldn’t figure out how to animate hair satisfactorily. For a Rapunzel story, that’s a problem. Software engineer Kelly Ward spent six years writing computer programs to try and get the hair right. In fact, it wasn’t until March 2010 that they finally figured it out. The movie, by the way, came out in November 2010.

After doing all their recording and waiting out the animation, Moore and Levi got to see the finished version of Tangled. Their response? Negative, at least toward their own work. Moore said she thought she sounded “shrill,” while Levi said he thought his voice work was “incredibly nasally.”

“Rapunzel Unbraided” had become "Rapunzel," and then another name change was announced. This time, they decided to call it, yes, “Tangled.” Part of the party line from Disney was that they considered the film a two-hander between Rapunzel and Flynn, so they didn’t want just to call it “Rapunzel.” Another assertion is that Disney was worried that a movie called “Rapunzel” would not appeal to boys, and they wanted it to be a film that appealed to a broader audience.

All those years of production and all that time spent writing programs to animate hair cost a pretty penny. Reportedly, Tangled cost $260 million to make. Yes, that is a lot of money. It is the most expensive animated movie ever made, and one of the priciest films ever, full stop.

That massive budget had to have Disney worried. In the end, Tangled pulled through. It made $200.8 million domestically and $391.6 million internationally. All in all, it earned $592.5 million worldwide, enough to make it the eighth-highest-grossing film of 2010 — a success.

Surprisingly, given the audience response and general positivity from critics, Tangled was not nominated for Best Animated Feature. It was only nominated for one Oscar, Best Original Song. “I Saw the Light,” a collaboration between Menken and lyricist Glenn Slater, was nominated but did not win. The song did win a Grammy, though.

In 2012, we got something of a sequel to Tangled. It just happened to be a short film attached to a 3D re-release of Beauty and the Beast instead of a feature-length film. Tangled Ever After is a six-minute short that focuses on the wedding of Rapunzel and Eugene, also known as Flynn.

In 2017, the Disney Channel aired a made-for-TV movie called Tangled: Before Ever After. The film takes place between Tangled and Tangled Ever After. It was primarily designed to serve as a pseudo-pilot to a new TV series, though. Tangled: The Series, renamed Rapunzel’s Tangled Adventure, aired for three seasons and 60 episodes.