Composer Hans Zimmer can't seem to get away from "The Lion King."
The emotional score has gotten him jobs, his only Oscar and secured him a place in the hearts of children and adults. But he wasn't sure he wanted to come back when Jon Favreau approached him to revisit the soundtrack for his technologically advanced reimagining of the animated film, which opens nationwide Thursday night.
"I'm always the one saying no to everything," Zimmer, 61, said. "I suppose I'm the reluctant bride."
This July 10, 2019 photo shows composer Hans Zimmer posing for a portrait at the Montage Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif., to promote the film "The Lion King." (Photo by Rebecca CabageInvisionAP)
He only agreed to do "The Lion King" a quarter of a century ago because of his daughter. She was 6 at the time, and his movies at that point weren't exactly child-friendly.
"I couldn't take her to a Tony Scott bloodbath," Zimmer said.
He had one stipulation: That it wasn't going to be a musical.
"I said I don't want to do a musical, I hate musicals," Zimmer said. "And they said, we'll guarantee you this will not become a musical ever." How it ended up that way is, "another story."
But it's not the only way "The Lion King" diverged from his expectations. What he thought was going to be a "nice cartoon" turned into something much darker. The story about a young prince who loses his father hit a nerve for Zimmer, who also lost his father at a young age.
"All that stuff that one had managed to cover up so well, I had to go and open up and actually write from that point," Zimmer said. "I had to write what it felt like to be a little boy who loses his father."
And yet Zimmer is always somewhat surprised to find that people have such a connection to it. Terrence Malick only approached him for "The Thin Red Line," which would earn him another Oscar nomination, because of "The Lion King."
He remembers being at a dinner with Malick, Werner Herzog and others and overhearing, "The voices of the two great filmmakers passionately arguing with each other which piece in 'The Lion King' they prefer."
"I'm going, they're talking about a KIDS movie," Zimmer said, still slightly baffled and amused. "Terry Malick and Werner Herzog arguing about 'The Lion King!'"
And when Pharrell Williams convinced Zimmer to play at Coachella in 2017, he said fine, but that, "The one thing we're not going to do is 'The Lion King'."
A 23-year-old member of his band told him to get over himself. "It's the soundtrack of my generation," the young man declared. Zimmer conceded and had a bit of a revelation in the desert.
"I look out throughout the shambles of a field with all these people and see grown men and women truly touched and I'm realizing it's not because it's sentimental but because it's emotional, it's the truth, and my band is playing every note with total conviction," Zimmer said. "(I thought) maybe we can pull this off with an orchestra and maybe because everybody in the orchestra will know the material they will play it with the same sort of passion and conviction."
That was the convincing he needed. And Favreau had shown him some majestic concept footage of what the film would actually look like.
"He wasn't just my portal into the music, which is arguably the most important aspect of this film," Favreau said. "It's difficult to appreciate just how significant a collaborator he was."
When it finally got down to recording, he assembled his band and hand-picked orchestra from around the world in Los Angeles. And it turned out to be just as he'd dreamed: An emotional experience .
Zimmer even got to do something rather special this time around. He recorded with a live audience at The Barbra Streisand Scoring Stage where they've recorded everything from "Gone With the Wind" and "Lawrence of Arabia" to "E.T." and the most recent "Star Wars" films.
"I wanted it to be a performance. Therefore I needed an audience. I had 102 people in the orchestra and the band. And then I put 20 chairs upfront for the filmmakers who made the movie who actually never get to come to the recording sessions," Zimmer said with a smile. "It's the circle of life, or completing a circle or whatever. The force is strong on this!"
Follow AP Film Writer Lindsey Bahr on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ldbahr
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — As Iran returned to uneasy calm after a wave of protests that drew a bloody crackdown, a senior hard-line cleric called Friday for the death penalty for detained demonstrators and directly threatened U.S. President Donald Trump — evidence of the rage gripping authorities in the Islamic Republic.
Trump, though, struck a conciliatory note, thanking Iran's leaders for not executing hundreds of detained protesters, in a further sign he may be backing away from a military strike. Executions, as well as the killing of peaceful protesters, are two of the red lines laid down by Trump for possible action against Iran.
Harsh repression that has left several thousand people dead appears to have succeeded in stifling demonstrations that began Dec. 28 over Iran’s ailing economy and morphed into protests directly challenging the country’s theocracy.
There have been no signs of protests for days in Tehran, where shopping and street life have returned to outward normality, though a week-old internet blackout continued. Authorities have not reported any unrest elsewhere in the country.
“Iran canceled the hanging of over 800 people,” Trump told reporters in Washington, adding that "I greatly respect the fact that they canceled.”
Trump did not clarify who he spoke to in Iran to confirm the state of any planned executions.
The U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency on Friday put the death toll at 3,090. The number, which exceeds that of any other round of protest or unrest in Iran in decades and recalls the chaos surrounding the 1979 revolution, continues to rise. The agency has been accurate throughout the years of demonstrations, relying on a network of activists inside Iran that confirms all reported fatalities.
The AP has been unable to independently confirm the toll. Iran’s government has not provided casualty figures.
In contrast, the sermon by Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami carried by Iranian state radio sparked chants from those gathered for prayers, including: “Armed hypocrites should be put to death!”
Khatami, a member of Iran's Assembly of Experts and Guardian Council long known for his hard-line views, described the protesters as the “butlers” of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and “Trump’s soldiers.” He said Netanyahu and Trump should await "hard revenge from the system.”
“Americans and Zionists should not expect peace," the cleric said.
His fiery speech came as allies of Iran and the United States alike sought to defuse tensions. Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke Friday to both Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and Israel's Netanyahu, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
Russia had previously kept largely quiet about the protests. Moscow has watched several key allies suffer blows as its resources and focus are consumed by its 4-year-old war against Ukraine, including the downfall of Syria’s former President Bashar Assad in 2024, last year’s U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran and the U.S. seizure of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro this month.
Days after Trump pledged “help is on its way” for the protesters, both the demonstrations and the prospect of imminent U.S. retaliation appeared to have receded. One diplomat told The Associated Press that top officials from Egypt, Oman, Saudi Arabia and Qatar had raised concerns with Trump that a U.S. military intervention would shake the global economy and destabilize an already volatile region.
Iran’s exiled Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi urged the U.S. to make good on its pledge to intervene. Pahlavi, whose father was overthrown by Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution, said he still believes the president's promise of assistance.
“I believe the president is a man of his word," Pahlavi told reporters in Washington. He added that "regardless of whether action is taken or not, we as Iranians have no choice to carry on the fight.“
“I will return to Iran,” he vowed. Hours later, he urged protesters to take to the streets again from Saturday to Monday.
Despite support by diehard monarchists in the diaspora, Pahlavi has struggled to gain wider appeal within Iran. But that has not stopped him from presenting himself as the transitional leader of Iran if the government were to fall.
Khatami, the hard-line cleric, also provided the first overall statistics on damage from the protests, claiming 350 mosques, 126 prayer halls and 20 other holy places had sustained damage. Another 80 homes of Friday prayer leaders — an important position within Iran's theocracy — were also damaged, likely underlining the anger demonstrators felt toward symbols of the government.
He said 400 hospitals, 106 ambulances, 71 fire department vehicles, and another 50 emergency vehicles also sustained damage.
Even as protests appeared to have been smothered inside Iran, thousands of exiled Iranians and their supporters have taken to the streets in cities across Europe to shout out their rage at the government of the Islamic Republic.
Amid the continuing internet shutdown, some Iranians crossed borders to communicate with the outside world. At a border crossing in Turkey’s eastern province of Van, a trickle of Iranians crossing on Friday said they were traveling to get around the communications blackout.
“I will go back to Iran after they open the internet,” said a traveler who gave only his first name, Mehdi, out of security concerns.
Also crossing the border were some Turkish citizens escaping the unrest in Iran.
Mehmet Önder, 47, was in Tehran for his textiles business when the protests erupted. He said he laid low in his hotel until it was shut for security reasons, then stayed with one of his customers until he was able to return to Turkey.
Although he did not venture into the streets, Önder said he heard heavy gunfire.
“I understand guns, because I served in the military in the southeast of Turkey,” he said. “The guns they were firing were not simple weapons. They were machine guns.”
In a sign of the conflict’s potential to spill over borders, a Kurdish separatist group in Iraq said it has launched attacks on Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard in recent days in retaliation for Tehran’s crackdown on protests.
A representative of the Kurdistan Freedom Party, or PAK, said its members have “played a role in the protests through both financial support and armed operations to defend protesters when needed.” The group said the attacks were launched by members of its military wing based inside Iran.
Amiri reported from New York. Associated Press journalists Will Weissert and Darlene Superville in Washington and Serra Yedikardes at the Kapikoy Border Crossing, Turkey, contributed.
Iranian opposition leader Reza Pahlavi speaks during a news conference on Friday, Jan. 16, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
A woman crosses an intersection in downtown Tehran, Iran, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
People cross an intersection in downtown Tehran, Iran, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Vehicles drive in downtown Tehran, Iran, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
A street vendor adjusts clothes for sale in downtown Tehran, Iran, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Vehicles drive in downtown Tehran, Iran, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
FILE - Iranian senior cleric Ahmad Khatami delivers his sermon during Friday prayer ceremony in Tehran, Iran, Friday, Jan. 5, 2018. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi, File)
