Cast _* Interesting Facts

Directed by: Frederik Du Chau
Written by: Vera Chapman (novel) & Kirk De Micco
Music by: Patrick Doyle, David Foster & Carole Bayer Sager

Released on: May 15, 1998
Running Time: 85 minutes

Budget: $40 million
U.S. Opening Weekend: $6.041 million over 3,107 screens
Box-Office: $23 in the U.S., $39 million worldwide
 
 

CAST
 

Kayley... Jessalyn Gilsig (acting) & Andrea Corr (singing)
Garrett... Cary Elwes (acting) & Bryan White (singing)
Ruber... Gary Oldman
Devon... Eric Idle
Cornwall... Don Rickles
Lady Juliana... Jane Seymour (acting) & Céline Dion (singing)
King Arthur... Pierce Brosnan (acting) & Steve Perry (singing)
Griffin... Bronson Pinchot
Bladebeak... Jaleel White
Sir Lionel... Gabriel Byrne
Merlin... John Gielgud
 
 

Director FREDERIK Du CHAU started drawing as a child, turning his creations into movies using his father's 8-millimeter camera. He attended film school in his native Belgium, where he studied both live-action filmmaking and animation. He soon began working as a director and animator on commercials and television series. He next worked in animation for Disney France, and then made a short animated film, The Mystery of the Land, that brought him to United States for the first time when it was selected for screening in the Animation Celebration.  Du Chau then spent time as an animator for independent animators Dale and Jane Baer at Baer Animation, where he worked on a number of Disney projects. He next co-directed (with Hoyt Yeatman of Dreamquest Images) a live-action, animated and CGI short for Sony Wonder, and directed the animation on The Land Before Time 3, a direct-to-video spinoff of the hit feature film.  Du Chau then spent a stint at Chuck Jones Productions, where he came to the attention of Warner Bros. just as the studio was forming its Feature Animation division. Once there, Du Chau worked in development and was soon attached to direct a story set in the South Pacific that he'd sold to Warner Bros.. When he was asked to direct "Quest for Camelot," he put that other project aside to give his full attention to his first theatrical animated feature-length film.

KIRK DE MICCO sold his spec script "A Day in November" to Warner Bros. and producer Arnold Kopelson for $1 million before signing to write "Quest for Camelot."

Multiple Grammy-winner DAVID FOSTER has won 12 Grammy Awards and has been nominated 37 times as a composer, producer, arranger and artist. Foster, a native of British Columbia, Canada, began his musical career as a keyboard performer, working with Chuck Berry, John Lennon, Barbra Streisand and Rod Stewart, among others, as well as with his own rock group, Skylark. He received his first Grammy Award for writing 1979's "After the Love Has Gone," performed by Earth, Wind & Fire. His second Grammy was awarded for his production of the cast album for "Dreamgirls," the Tony Award-winning Broadway play. It was followed by Foster's entry into film songwriting, which resulted in the hit songs "Love, Look What You've Done to Me" by Boz Scaggs for "Urban Cowboy" and Chicago's "Hard to Say I'm Sorry" for the film "Summer Lovers."  During the 1980s, Foster produced numerous platinum albums for Chicago, which earned him a Grammy Award as 1984's Producer of the Year, and additionally produced, arranged and composed award-winning music for superstars Barbra Streisand, Michael Bolton, Lionel Richie, Michael Jackson, Paul McCartney, Neil Diamond, Dionne Warwick, Kenny G, Manhattan Transfer, Olivia Newton-John and The Pointer Sisters, among many others. He composed numerous film scores, as well as songs for such movies as "Footloose," "Ghostbusters," "Pretty Woman" and "Three Men and a Baby."  More recently, Foster has produced, arranged and composed for a number of albums featuring performances by a wide variety of today's top recording artists, including Whitney Houston, Natalie Cole, Brian Wilson, Madonna, Michael Jackson, Toni Braxton, Rod Stewart, All 4 One, Michael Crawford, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, Bryan Adams, Celine Dion, Vanessa Williams, Wynonna and Peabo Bryson, earning 1994's Producer of the Year Grammy in the process.  He has also produced songs for the soundtracks of such films as "Made in America," "Sleepless in Seattle," "Beethoven 2," and the international platinum soundtrack to "The Bodyguard," and produced his own Christmas album, featuring many top artists.  In 1994, Foster joined Atlantic Records as Vice President and in 1995, established his own Atlantic-distributed label, 143 Records. In 1997, he was named Senior Vice President of the Warner Music Group.  Foster has previously collaborated as a producer and composer several times with Carole Bayer Sager, notably on the song "It's Falling in Love," performed by Michael Jackson, and on Sager's songs for the films "Beethoven 2" and "Forget Paris."

Academy Award-winner CAROLE BAYER SAGER's lyrics have earned her an Academy Award (plus seven nominations), a Grammy Award (and nine nominations), a Golden Globe Award (and seven nominations) and induction into the Songwriters' Hall of Fame. Her songwriting collaborations in the last four years have earned her back-to-back Grammy nominations, for "When You Love Someone" (from the film "Forget Paris"), "Look What Love Has Done" (from "Junior") and "The Day I Fall in Love" (from "Beethoven 2"). The latter two songs also received Oscar and Golden Globe nominations, and a remake of Sager's #1 hit, "On My Own," recorded by Reba McEntire, was nominated for a Grammy Award.  While still in her teens, Sager wrote her first #1 hit song, "A Groovy Kind of Love," which has been a hit three times in the past two decades.  "That's What Friends Are For," recorded by Dionne Warwick, Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight and Elton John, was the #1 song of 1986, earning a Grammy for Song of the Year and heightening public awareness of AIDS. Sager and her former writing partner/husband, Burt Bacharach, donated the song's publishing revenues, totalling two million dollars to date, to the American Foundation for AIDS Research. That same year, the success of the Grammy-nominated "On My Own" (recorded by Patti LaBelle and Michael McDonald) and "That's What Friends Are For" enabled Sager and Bacharach to top the music charts in three genres at once, a first for a songwriter/producer team.  Sager's song credits include "Arthur's Theme (The Best That You Can Do)," which earned her an Academy Award and a Golden Globe in 1984; the Golden Globe-nominated "They Don't Make Them Like They Used To"; and such popular hits as "When I Need You," "Midnight Blue," "It's My Turn," "Everything Old is New Again," "You and Me, We Wanted It All," "Heartlight," "I'd Rather Leave While I'm in Love," "Come in From the Rain" and "Don't Cry Out Loud."  Her songs have been recorded by artists as diverse as Barbra Streisand, the Doobie Brothers, Frank Sinatra, Bob Dylan, Michael Jackson, Natalie Cole, Carly Simon, Leo Sayer, Dionne Warwick, Phil Collins and even Sager herself, on her own internationally platinum LP.  Sager has written with a number of collaborators, including Melissa Manchester, Peter Allen and, most recently, Kenny "Babyface" Edmonds and Jon B. Her collaboration with Marvin Hamlisch resulted in two Oscar nominations, for "Looking Through the Eyes of Love," from the motion picture "Ice Castles," and "Nobody Does It Better," from "The Spy Who Loved Me." Sager's lyrics can also be heard in the Tony Award-winning musical "They're Playing Our Song," which she co-wrote with Marvin Hamlisch and Neil Simon.

Composer PATRICK DOYLE was educated at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, where he studied piano and singing. Following graduation, he worked as a piano teacher before writing his first score, for the musical comedy "Glasvegas," seen at the 1978 Edinburgh Festival. He then went on to a dual career in acting and composing for British television.   Doyle joined Kenneth Branagh's Renaissance Theatre Company in 1987 as actor, composer and musical director after he was commissioned to score a televised version of the company's successful stage production of Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night." Doyle composed his first film score for Branagh's acclaimed version of "Henry V." Further collaboration with Branagh produced scores for the features "Dead Again"(Golden Globe nominee), "Much Ado About Nothing," "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein" and "Hamlet" (Academy Award nominee). His other feature composing credits include "Donnie Brasco," "Mrs. Winterbourne," "Sense and Sensibility" (Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations), "A Little Princess," "Carlito's Way," "Indochine" and the forthcoming "Great Expectations," a modernization of the Dickens novel.
 

INTERESTING FACTS

Says producer Dalisa Cooper Cohen, "We've created intriguing, unconventional characters who prove that they, the unlikeliest of heroes, can win the day through intelligence, courage and humor. Kayley, our female lead, is a strong-willed, agile and principled young woman who's not afraid to plunge into a haunted forest or take a swing at a villain if the situation requires it. She wants to be a knight, something unheard of in her era, but she's not so single-minded that she's immune to the charms of a handsome young man who comes to her assistance, either.

"Garrett, her male counterpart, is someone who changes a great deal during the story. He's bright, talented and strong, but he's turned away from the world because of an accident that changed his life. Kayley, and her quest to find the lost sword Excalibur, are Garrett's first reasons in years to consider rejoining the kingdom of Camelot. The transformation in him is inspiring, touching and sometimes very funny."

Comments director Frederik Du Chau, "We also created a terrific villain in Ruber -someone who's genuinely evil- and completely nuts! Animation allows you to visually express so much emotion in your characters -Ruber is almost literally deformed by his own wickedness. And we were very fortunate to get Gary Oldman as the voice of Ruber -he brings tremendous drama and humor to the role."

This otherwise mediocre animated movie features one of the best soundtracks ever recorded.  The song "The Prayer", performed by Celine Dion, was nominated for an Academy Award in 1999.