Sting gets into 'New Groove'

LOS ANGELES -- If there were an Oscar handed out at next year's Academy Awards for most patient music artist involved in a Disney project, Sting would be the odds-on favorite.

The former Police frontman and successful solo artist went through the wringer in collaborating with the studio on its newest animated feature, "The Emperor's New Groove."

Despite its title, the film isn't a musical -- at least not in the vein of other animated features to come out of the Mouse House over the past decade. Characters don't break out into song. There's no love story or big production number as in almost every previous Disney animated classic since "Snow White."

That wasn't the plan when the 14-time Grammy winner signed on to the project roughly five years ago. He was commissioned to write songs to be sung by characters for an animated feature based on an ancient Inca legend that was to be titled "Kingdom of the Sun."

With his strong ties to South America -- particularly his efforts to help save Brazil's rainforest -- Sting seemed the right partner for the project.

For Sting, a father of six, the decision was a no-brainer.

"I think it was the attraction of working for Disney," says the pop star on a stopover in Los Angeles to promote the film and pick up his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. "I grew up watching 'The Jungle Book,' 'Pinocchio' and 'Sleeping Beauty,' and I thought, 'OK. If you're going to have a legacy, what better way to make it than to write for one of these films that people are going to watch in 30 years' time."

But, unlike his own projects, Sting had to please the director and the producers and, of course, The Mouse.

Over the course of about two years, Sting and his partner on the project, David Hartley, wrote and recorded more than a half dozen songs, including "One Day She'll Love Me," a ballad which Sting recorded with Shawn Colvin.

So how did he respond when the head of Disney's animation division called him one day two years ago to say that the studio was scrapping the musical plot line and wouldn't be needing any of those songs, thank you very much?

"Badly," Sting responds with a laugh. "How dare they? Being told to go back to the drawing board is something I'm not used to."

Ever the consummate professional, he recovered from the bombshell and agreed to write two new songs with Hartley, with whom he'd previously collaborated on a couple of tunes for the soundtrack to the Nicolas Cage drama "Leaving Las Vegas."

"Every time we went back to the drawing board, we did something better," he says of their work on the project, which evolved into an animated comedy about a self-centered young South American emperor who learns compassion when he is turned into a llama.

Sting's "My Funny Friend and Me," which plays during the film's closing credits, is a sentimental tune about the power of friendship. Some of the lyrics in the song coincidentally sum up Sting and Hartley's friendship throughout the ordeal: "If I had to do this all a second time/I won't complain or make a fuss."

Sting's other song in the film, "Perfect World," is a high-energy opening tune sung by Tom Jones. A couple of other tunes that didn't make it into the animated comedy are on the soundtrack, including the duet with Colvin and "Snuff Out The Lights (Yzma's Song)," sung by Eartha Kitt, who voices the villainess Yzma.

"It was a very hands-on thing because the animation was done after the songwriting," Sting says. "We felt we had a say in how the story went and how the characters were developing, so it wasn't like we were hired hands stuck on at the end. We were part of this process from the very beginning, so I took that very seriously. This is about being a journeyman, a craftsman, and doing the work. I was prepared to dish with everybody else."

Though his first foray into writing for an animated Disney feature was a trying experience, Sting says he hasn't ruled out doing it again sometime.

"I think we'll need twice as much money now," he says jokingly. "It would be nice to be asked to do it again as long as I worked with David."

Meantime, with his latest album, "Brand New Day," going seven times platinum, the 49-year-old rock star has a busy year planned, including an international tour that's scheduled through August. He is also slated to perform during halftime at the Super Bowl next month in Tampa, Fla., where he plans to sing an old hit and a new hit -- "Roxanne" and "Desert Rose."

Sting's wife, filmmaker Trudie Styler, is working on a documentary, tentatively titled "The Sweat Box," which records the arduous path of making "The Emperor's New Groove." It is expected to contain many of the songs originally created for the Disney project and is due out in theaters early next year.

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