Despite featuring songs in several of its earlier films, DreamWorks Animation has yet to produce a full-blown musical. Well, that’s all changing with the company setting up **Monkeys of Bollywood **and corralling Slumdog Millionaire/127 Hours composer AR Rahman and others to create the soundscape.
Taking inspiration from epic Hindu poem The Ramayana, the adventure will be a full-on Bollywood-style outing, set in Mumbai and focusing on two monkeys who must stop an ancient demon from taking over the world.
In addition to Rahman, the production team has recruited Stephen Schwartz (usually found writing lyrics for Broadway shows and the man behind the songs in hit musical Wicked, but who also produced the score for DreamWorks’ **The **Prince of Egypt) and married filmmaking duo Gurinder Chadha and Paul Berges, who brought us **Bend it Like Beckham **and Bride and Prejudice.
"As soon as I heard that DreamWorks Animation envisioned making an animated Bollywood movie, I knew I wanted to be a part of it," said Schwartz in a statement. "The fact that AR Rahman got involved made it an even more exciting project."
According to Variety, there’s no specific schedule for the film’s production or release just yet, but that the studio is looking to prod this one on to the fast track…