You can read my full recap – all 2,900 words of it – of the marketing campaign for The Lion King at The Hollywood Reporter.
Online and Social
The content found on the movie’s official website won’t engage anyone for very long, consisting primarily of marketing materials and other basic information. There are social media profiles for the movie – including an oddly-abbreviated Twitter account – but most of the action is happening on Disney Studios’ own brand profiles.
Media and Publicity
The challenges faced by Disney as it seeks to mix the old and the new with all these remakes was the subject of a feature profile. Along those lines, Favreau promised there is something new here and that he didn’t just produce a shot-for-shot remake of the animated film and made it clear there’s no actual live action footage in the film. He also talked about how he was able to cast Beyonce in a voice role and how incredible it was to get Jones to reprise his role. Ejiofor shared his love of the original and how approached playing Scar while the pair of Eichner and Rogen explored how they wanted to approach their characters.
Favreau continued focusing on the technical aspects of production, a natural theme since there wasn’t much to discuss in terms of bringing a new vision to the story or anything else. That was also the topic of a feature discussing the VR tools used for filming and production.
Members of the cast mentioned the movie while promoting other projects, including Key talking about dealing with questions regarding Beyonce during the Toy Story 4 publicity tour.
Closer to release more of the cast – including Favreau, Glover, Rogen and Eichner – appeared on “Kimmel,” part of the in-company promotional push.
Rogen and Eichner did a joint interview about working together to create their own chemistry during voice recording sessions. And a profile of Favreau pointed out how this is just the latest – and not even the last – project he’s worked on for Disney as the studio’s recent go-to guy.
Overall
Picking Up the Spare
More IMAX promotions have been released, including an interview with the cast and others and featurettes on the making of the movie and the sound of the IMAX presentation in theaters.
Reports are that TV spending alone amounted to almost $30 million.
There were additional interviews with Favreau and Eichner following release.
John Oliver took to “Late Night” to talk about his role in the movie.
A key moment that has fun with another Disney classic was featured in a new TV spot. Meanwhile a more full look at “Circle of Life” was released as a clip and a new featurette continued the campaign’s late focus on Timon and Pumba while another focused on the movie’s music.
Another promotional video here for the movie’s tie-in lion conservation campaign.
Cinematic Slant 