Beauty and the Beast...

[Lou Mongello]

A visitor named Marie sent me an email and asked me an interesting question (to which I honestly do not know the answer):

How long was the castle and the beast under the spell in Beauty and the Beast?

Does anyone know this for sure?

Thanks!!

[crashbunny]

this is from the beginning of the movie:

The rose she had offered was truly an
enchanted rose, which would bloom until his twenty-first
year. If he could learn to love another, and earn her love in
return by the time the last petal fell, then the spell would
be broken. If not, he would be doomed to remain a beast for
all time. As the years passed, he fell into despair, and lost
all hope, for who could ever learn to love a beast?


does that answer it?

[tiggerguy]

How I take the question is, how old was the Prince when the spell was cast.
seeing that Snow White and all the other "hero's" of stories seem young, I would guess around 16

[Xharryb]

I've pondered this exact same question myself. That opening bit about the enchantment tells you how old beast will be when the last petal falls, but it does not give you any clue how old he is when the spell is initially cast. The disrepair that the castle falls into seems like it should have taken a good number of years to happen. So I would guess that he would have to have been 16 or younger when he became the beast (16 would allow for approx. 4 or 5 years of "disrepair" before Belle came along). Are there any other clues anywhere that would confirm or deny his exact age?

[Lou Mongello]

OK... Don't ask me why I thought of this in the shower this morning but...

I think I have the answer... and it was right in front of our eyes the entire time!!! Just ask Lumiere!!!

"Ten years we've been rusting,
Needing so much more than dusting,
Needing exercise
A chance to use our skills...
Most days we just lay around the castle
Flabby, fat and lazy
You walked in and oops-a-daisy!"

(Lou breaks into song once again... much to the dismay of fellow members... "It's a guest, it's a guest... sake's alive well I'll be blessed...")

[Xharryb]

so he was 11 when he was transformed into the beast?! he looks older than 11 in the depictions at the beginning of the film (and why would an 11 year old be the master of the entire castle? where are the parents?).

[Lou Mongello]

Child prodigy?
Young king (like Tut?)
Bad parenting?

What the heck is a kid like that worried about love and roses and stuff? When I was 11 I was playing with rocks and sticks and didn't even know what a girl was.

Plus, with parents that could afford a castle, ahh.. forget it.

[dzneynut]

It's a fairytale! You're allowed to take liberties with the storyline when you're talking about enchanted castles, wooden boys, fairy godmothers, and glass slippers. If you can believe all of those things, then the age of a character is a minor thing. As long as it ends with "and they lived happily ever after!", that's all that matters.

[tiggerguy]

You're allowed to take liberties with the storyline

Much like soap operas do Example : On Friday a story ends with a kid being an infant, and the following MOnday the kid has aged 10 years.

[springer9]

From a Disney insider (ie CM) the Beast was actually 17 years old when the spell was cast on him from the Beautiful Enchantress. In regards to the "10 years we've been rusting" line from Lumier's song Be Our Guest , that referes to quite a few years before the spell was actually cast. The story plot goes that the Beast's parents died when he was very yong and the castle servants like Lumier, Clogsworth, Ms. Potts, and the others raised the young prince.

And here is a good question for you. Does anyone out there know the real name of the Beast (i.e. his first and or last name)? He has one just like every other Disney character. Any guesses?!?

[Lou Mongello]

Sol? Cosmo? Don Corleone?

[dzneynut]

From Disney's own website: http://psc.disney.go.com/guestservices/8735.html
Q: What is Beast's real name in "Beauty and the Beast"?

A: "Beast" or "Prince" is the only name for the character in our version of "Beauty and the Beast." He is never referred to by name in the film.

The D Show Trivia game calls him Prince Adam.

[springer9]

From Disney's own website: http://psc.disney.go.com/guestservices/8735.html
Q: What is Beast's real name in "Beauty and the Beast"?

A: "Beast" or "Prince" is the only name for the character in our version of "Beauty and the Beast." He is never referred to by name in the film.

The D Show Trivia game calls him Prince Adam.

The reply from disney does say one thing: in the film. he does have a real name and here it is.

If you ever are in a Disney Store that has the set of "princess dolls" that has both beast and belle on it, you will find that on the back of the box, he is not listed as beast but instead as prince christophe canz (Chirstopher Five in English).