You may have taken a break from your schedule today between opening presents and sipping a few drinks to watch The Muppet Christmas Carol on Disney +, and if you had seen her at the theater or on VHS as a child, you must have remembered a song that was not present in the version currently in streaming. “When Love Is Gone”, a sequence previously included in some versions of the film, but removed from others at the request of a former Disney executive, but fortunately for purists, Muppet fans and, frankly, audiences everywhere, the Full music is scheduled to debut in a newly restored version of the Christmas classic.
Director Brian Henson (Jim’s son) revealed the news in a new interview with BBC Radio 2, where he revealed that both the master video and the camera’s original negative for the song had been lost for some time. However, in a Christmas miracle, the two were found while the team prepared to assemble the remastered version for 4K. Henseon revealed that he was asked to check the new copy of the film to make sure everything was okay, where he was told that they retrieved the sequence and put it back in the film.
“I was so excited. They really hid it … so I went down and they said, ‘But before we show you, we have something else we want to show you,'” revealed Henson. “And they put four rolls of Christmas Carol with When Love Is Gone. I thought, ‘No, you don’t!’ and they said, ‘Yes, we found it! We found him! ‘ I was so happy, I was so happy. “
He continued: “They are all ready with the full version again. I don’t know if they are going to release on Disney Plus in time for Christmas because they have all these processes, but it’s coming back, the full-length version is coming back.”
Henson explained that the reason the song was cut from the theatrical version was that executive producer Jeffrey Katzenberg (now famous for Quibi’s implosion) believed that the music was “emotionally sophisticated” and the kids in the audience wouldn’t like it. The director “reluctantly agreed”, making a deal to put him back on television and home media.
The inclusion of “When Love Is Gone”, however, was not in all versions of The Muppet Christmas Carol. VHS and Laserdisc copies included it, but when it came to DVDs, only the full-screen versions of the film featured the music and eventually ended up without DVDs or blu-rays including it in the main cut. “When Love Is Gone” can be found in many bonus feature sections for these releases, and can even be seen on Disney + in the Extras tab. It is not clear when the version of the film that includes the music in its runtime will be available for purchase or streaming, but as Cinema Mix theorizes that a release in 2022 seems likely, as it would mark the 30th anniversary of the film’s release.