“The Lion King builds on Disney’s success of reimagining its classics for a contemporary audience with films like Maleficent, Cinderella and The Jungle Book,” the company said on its website. “The upcoming Beauty and the Beast, starring Emma Watson as Belle, is already one of the most anticipated movies of 2017. Like Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King will include songs from the animated film.” 
 
 Walt Disney Co./Courtesy Everett Collection 
 
 Disney has chosen filmmaker Jon Favreau to oversee the project. The Lion King (1994) is one of the biggest animated films of all time with a lifetime global box office gross of $968.8 million, including $422.8 million domestically. Disney and Favreau are also in development on a sequel to The Jungle Book.
– You can feel the love tonight if you already own a copy of 1994's Lion King on DVD, but soon you'll be able to feel the love live-action style, too, Us reports. Disney announced Wednesday it's working on a do-over of the animated film, per a press release, which means Simba, Scar, and the rest of the gang on the savannah will join other Disney characters, like Cinderella and Maleficent, who've gotten a live-action makeover. "The Lion King builds on Disney's success of reimagining its classics for a contemporary audience," the company says. Songs from the cartoon version will be incorporated into the reboot, and helming the film will be Jon Favreau (the actor/director, not the speechwriter), who tweeted a short message Wednesday morning that simply said: "Excited for my next project," accompanied by emoji of a lion and a crown. There's no release date for either The Lion King or the sequel to The Jungle Book, which Favreau is also overseeing. (Relive that time a Lion King cast broke into song on a plane.)