Preview: Disney’s ‘The Lion King’: Keeping the Legacy Alive on Stage

By Mingsi Ma

Since the musical’s premiere in 1997, Disney’s The Lion King has staged more than 11,000 performances. This poses an interesting challenge: After years of touring, the performers know the lines, songs, and dances by heart. The muscle memory is ingrained. Yet audiences come precisely because The Lion King is a Broadway classic they have loved for decades. Every performance is expected to feel both familiar and alive in the moment. Behind the craft of such a balance are two people audiences never see on stage but whose work shapes every performance: Resident Director Monique Midgette and Resident Dance Supervisor Kellen Stancil.

Company of The Lion King on Broadway. “Circle of Life“. ©Disney. (Image by Matthew Murphy)

Monique Midgette and Kellen Stancil

Both Midgette’s and Stancil’s key responsibilities are maintaining the artistic integrity of the performance. Midgette watches The Lion King several times each week, ensuring the characters interact as intended, placing understudies into the show, and training new members. Stancil focuses on maintaining the choreography, observing performances to provide notes when needed, and ensuring newly joined dancers receive the training necessary to be seamlessly incorporated into the performance.

Midgette pays close attention to the small details that, in her words, “make sure the show feels like the stakes are high and the cast is as engaged as they should be every single time,” allowing The Lion King to communicate its core message.

“As a director, that’s about pacing, making sure that the actors are engaged with each other and it feels like they’re having the conversation for the first time. So that means where someone’s coming from before they come on stage and also, where they are going when they leave,” says Midgette.

She gives an example: “Like if Mufasa is coming on stage to look for Simba, we have to believe that he was running for 10 miles. So when he gets on stage, he might be a little out of breath, and he might be heightened, like, ‘My goodness, where’s my son? I have to find him.’ So he has to come on stage as if he was coming from running across the Savannah, as opposed to the actor coming on stage as if he just got some water before he walks on stage. It’s the little things like that that make something feel exciting in the moment.”

Stancil draws our attention to the puppetry in The Lion King: “We get to sing, dance, act, and then also put in puppetry. And I think that allows the show to have this freshness and newness because how you may move is going to be intricate – it’s also going to be different per artist. We don’t teach this show like a cookie cutter. We give the blueprint, but then we build the show with these artists.”

Having been with The Lion King for nearly 20 years, Stancil shares something he always cherishes: “The beautiful thing about The Lion King is that all artists and all dance is about storytelling. It’s the movement that we pull from Bolognese culture and African culture. It has so much intention. And now that I get to teach, I get to give that information to everyone. With something that I’ve been with for so long, most people would think like, ‘Oh, you must be tired of it,’ but I never am. I have so much joy being able to teach new artists and new generations.”

TICKETS AND DETAILS

Disney’s The Lion King, presented by the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, PNC Broadway in Pittsburgh Series opens on Wednesday, September 9 – Sunday, September 27, 2026 at the Benedum Center. Tickets and more information at: https://trustarts.org/production/105572/disneys-the-lion-king