For some, today is just Thursday, June 26th. For Disney fans however, today is Stitch Day. The name coined by Walt Disney Studios in honor of its lovable alien mascot Stitch, who was only known as experiment 6-2-6 before he met Lilo.
While the company has already commemorated the occasion by officially announcing a sequel to the live-action adaption, we at The DisInsider wanted to commemorate it by sharing a recent interview we did with the film’s composer, Dan Romer.
Just a few weeks ago, our Editor-in-Chief Dempsey Pillot got the chance to chat with Romer. In the interview, Romer expressed how he got the gig, the difficulty of creating something original for an already-existing brand and more!
READ: Live-Action ‘Lilo & Stitch’ Actor Surprisingly Passes Away
Now, this isn’t Romer’s first collaboration with Disney. He previously scored Pixar’s Luca and the (now-defunct) live-action Disney+ movie Crater. He says that he first got on the studio’s radar after working on the Academy Award-nominated film Beasts of the Southern Wild.
Almost immediately after Luca, he says he was approached about Lilo & Stitch. “They asked me, and I said, ‘Oh my God, I love that film.’ So I went in for a meeting with the director and we just felt like family immediately.”
He highlighted director Dean Fleischer Camp’s vision for the film, praising how similar it was to the source material while still being admirably different. However, he also said he related to what he imagined Fleischer Camp struggle was in delivering something fresh for fans of the original.
“Alan Sylvestri is just a master of his craft who scored the original 2002 film – and a a zillion other films that are the most gigantic films in the world,” he said. “His score is so beautiful for Lilo and Stitch. My mission on this was not to try to do what Alan did, not try to try to do it the way that he did it, but to try to do a score that had more traditional Hawaiian influence in it.”
He added that leaning more into the Hawaiian culture for this adaptation would provide some fresh inspiration for how to handle the new version of the story.
READ: Why You Didn’t See That One Character In ‘Lilo & Stitch’
When asked about Disney’s decision to reboot the franchise- and whether it was necessary – Romer explained that he doesn’t view the new film as a reboot because the franchise never died.
“They’re just both such incredible characters that people relate to so much and resonate with so much,” he said, adding that their “punk rock nature” is undoubtedly the reason the film has done so well at the box office. “They’re characters that you don’t commonly see in things that are mostly for kids to watch. You know? And I think that the fact that this movie is doing so well is really so much a testament to how much people love those characters.”
You can listen to the full interview below!
Lilo & Stitch, like its animated predecessor, tells the story of “the bond formed between a lonely human girl named Lilo and a dog-like alien named Stitch, who is engineered to be a force of destruction. Pursuing aliens, social workers and the idea of the bond of family figure into the proceedings.”
Directed by Dean Fleischer Camp, the film stars Maia Kealoha as Lilo Pelekai, with original Lilo & Stitch writer-director Chris Sanders reprising his voice role as Stitch. It also stars Sydney Agudong, Zach Galifianakis, Billy Magnussen, Hannah Waddingham, and Courtney B. Vance, with original cast members Tia Carrere, Amy Hill, and Jason Scott Lee also appearing.
You can read our review here!
