Vivienne Medrano (‘Hazbin Hotel’) on the importance of original songs to each episode [Exclusive Video Interview]
Vivienne Medrano always knew that she wanted “Hazbin Hotel” to have multiple original songs in each episode. She originally mapped it out so there would be an opening number, a middle song and then a reprise of the middle song later in each episode. “It made a lot of sense to have more than one song per episode. It felt really nice with them too because it just felt like there could be one nearest the front, one nearest the back, almost like a full musical soundtrack,” she tells Gold Derby during our Meet the Experts: TV Animation panel (watch the exclusive video interview above).
“Hazbin Hotel” is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video. It centers on Charlie Morningstar (Erika Henningsen), the princess of Hell. When Hell starts getting overpopulated, Charlie wants to stop the annual purge of souls and help some of the condemned find redemption. This leads her to open up a rehabilitation center that will help bad souls to leave as redeemed souls and gain entrance to Heaven. The main cast includes Henningsen, Stephanie Beatriz, Tony nominee Alex Brightman, Emmy winner Keith David, Kimiko Glenn, Blake Roman and Amir Talai.
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Medrano’s relationship with composers Sam Haft and Andrew Underberg dates back to when she was working on her other show, “Helluva Boss.” “I was like, I need a K-pop sounding song and Sam was like, I have this amazing friend who’s really good at this specific style. Do you mind if I bring him in? I was like, absolutely, and they made this insanely banger song!” She knew that she had something really special with the two of them. “I think that they work really well with each other and have an enormous range between the two of them. When it came to jumping on ‘Hazbin,’ I already knew what they were capable of but they actually exceeded that even with how broad the soundtrack had to be.”
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