Alan Menken, Glenn Slater on Composing Music for GALAVANT: 'It Was a Big Learning Curve'

In a new interview with Variety, Broadway vets Alan Menken and Glenn Slater discuss the challenges of composing music for ABC's musical comedy GALAVANT, including fundamentally changing the way they worked to accomodate a demanding time schedule.

"It was a big learning curve," explains Slater of composing for a 23-minute episode "And that changes the way you hear the songs and the way the songs function."

Commenting on creating the GALAVANT theme song, Menken shares, "I remember picturing (Galavant) on horseback," he continues, "It's obviously irreverent and it's obviously swashbuckling in its basic tone but at the same time a rock arrangement underneath it. And the lyric content, very sophisticated and theatrical because we're telling all these stories and hopefully weaving them as economically as possible into this song."

Adds Slater, "It was just (about) trying to establish tone quickly. Letting the audience know that this is not a show for kids, that this was not going to be polite, and that this was not old-fashioned." He adds, "I think it's important to tell the audience that this is not the kind of musical that you don't like. This is the kind of musical that you love."

He goes on to explain, "When we saw the first dailies coming off of that set, and saw how they were actually captured, it was like 'Oh my god, we actually did what we set out to do.' "

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About the show:

Screenwriter/executive producer Dan Fogelman ("Crazy, Stupid, Love," "Tangled," "Cars") teams up with Broadway and Hollywood award-winning musical team-composer Alan Menken ("The Little Mermaid," "Aladdin," "Beauty and the Beast") and lyricist Glenn Slater ("Tangled") - for a musical comedy fairytale of epic proportions. Once upon a time, the dashing hero, Galavant (Joshua Sasse), lost the love of his life, Madalena (Mallory Jansen), to the evil King Richard (Timothy Omundson). Now, our fallen hero is ready to take revenge and restore his "happily ever after." But it won't be without a few twists and turns along the way.

"Galavant" stars Joshua Sasse as Galavant, Timothy Omundson as King Richard, Vinnie Jones as Gareth, Mallory Jansen as Madalena, Karen David as Isabella and Luke Youngblood as Sid.

"Galavant" was written by Dan Fogelman who also serves as executive producer. Executive producers are Alan Menken, Glenn Slater and Chris Koch. "Galavant" was directed by Chris Koch. Abbey C Studios Ltd. produces "Galavant" for ABC Studios.

Photo credit: ABC/Nick Ray