Have you ever considered taking an old, familiar Public Domain story and updating it by placing it in a modern setting? Not only can this be a lot of fun but if you do a good job, it could lead to a lot of interesting opportunities.

A few weeks ago, I decided to take a road trip with my children. It was a last minute thing, so I had very little time to prepare. We basically just threw clothes in suitcases, grabbed some entertainment for the drive, and hit the road!

I usually use windshield time to catchup on listening to MP3′s of audio interviews I’m interested in, marketing related stuff, basically business stuff. This time, I decided I wanted to get away from that stuff for a while, so I was looking for pure entertainment.

Naturally, I grabbed a pile of music CD’s but as I was digging through a stack of “stuff”, I found an audio book called “Beastly” that a friend of mine had sent me a while ago. It was an unabridged version, almost 7 hours of narration ~ perfect!

I honestly didn’t know a thing about it or what it was about but somehow I found that appealing, a total surprise would be nice for a change. Besides, my friend said it was great so that was good enough for me. I threw it in my bag and we started on our big adventure.

A few hundred miles down the road, I remembered the audio book I had found and popped it in the CD player and began listening.

As I got into the story I began to realize that “Beastly” is essentially a modern-day retelling of the classic Public Domain French fairy tale, “Beauty & The Beast” (La Belle et la Bête).

Of course, that added a whole new layer of interest for me especially as I began to realize how well the story had been adapted…

The Origins of a Public Domain Fairy Tale…

When most people think of “Beauty & The Beast” they probably envision the 1991 Disney Animated Film by the same name…and deservedly so. The Disney film was a masterful retelling of the classic tale (with a ton of embellishments of course) and it’s probably single-handedly responsible for story’s current popularity worldwide.

But let’s roll this story back ~ waaaayyyyy back…

In the first published version of the original story (published in 1740, “La jeune américaine, et les contes marins”, Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve) the “Beast” was actually a handsome and rich young Prince transformed into a hideous beast after refusing to let an evil fairy into his castle to take shelter from a raging storm. In retrospect, he probably should have just let her in (I’m just sayin’!).

But then he wouldn’t have met Belle, the “Beauty” in our story. Another abridged version of this story was published in 1756 by Jeanne-Marie Le Prince de Beaumont (see here.)

The basic plot of the original story goes like this…

1. Belle’s father was a merchant. Returning home from a long trip, Belle’s father got lost in the forest (Note to self: avoid forests) and stumbles over a strange, old castle (Further Note to self: avoid strange, old castles). Upon entering the castle uninvited, he finds a table with fresh food and drink which he ravenously helps himself to.
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2. After his meal, as he is leaving the castle he passes a rose garden. Remembering his promise to bring Belle the gift of a rose home from his trip, the merchant stops in the garden and picks the loveliest of all the roses. As he  turns to leave with rose in hand, the dark, menacing shape of the Beast steps between him and the castle gates.
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3. The Beast, enraged by the merchant’s theft of his most prize possession (he apparently had a thing for roses),  informs the merchant that he shall remain a prisoner in the Beast’s castle…forever. The merchant, not particularly  interested in shacking up with a monster for eternity, begs and pleads telling the beast that he only picked the rose  to please his daughter Belle (who also just so happens to be young and beautiful).
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4. The Beast is intrigued by the thought of this “Belle” especially since the last few blind dates he went out on didn’t turn out so well. So, the Beast tells the merchant (to paraphrase), “Ok, get your scruffy butt out of here but you better send your daughter back here to live with me forever instead or I will hunt you down and use your head  as my new bowling ball”.
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5. The merchant agrees (what a spineless lump) and returns home, Belle learns the truth of what had happened, and then she willingly ventures to the Beast’s castle to honor her father’s promise to the Beast even though she knew it meant being the Beast’s prisoner forever.
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6. Much time passes and Belle grows fond of the Beast but becomes homesick. The Beast, having fallen deeply in  love with Belle, agrees to let her return home to see her family for one week.
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7. Belle returns home and stuff happens, she breaks her promise to return to the Beast within a week, and the Beast, believing himself deserted, begins to die of a broken heart. When Belle finally does return to him, she finds the Beast in the rose garden half-dead. She weeps, proclaims her love for the Beast, and when her tears fall on the him, the evil fairy’s spell is broken and the Beast is magically transformed back into his human, princely self.

True love wins the day and they lived Happily…Ever…After (and presumably tax-free).

How to Adapt an Old Public Domain Fairy Tale Into a Modern Day Masterpiece…

Now let’s fast-forward the story to today and see how this classic story was adapted for the modern world in “Beastly”…

In “Beastly”, the “Beast” is a sixteen-year-old-boy named Kyle Kingsbury living in modern-day New York City. Kyle had everything – good looks, money, popularity, and a rich father.

Kyle’s big problem was that he didn’t believe in inner beauty, he only judged people on looks and social status. Basically to Kyle, if a person isn’t rich or good looking, then they didn’t exist. Kyle is the “Prince” in our new version of a very old story.

In “Beastly”, Kyle plays a cruel trick on a classmate, a girl that he considered to be ugly and lowly. Turns out the girl is actually a witch and she places a spell on Kyle to teach him a lesson. The witch transforms Kyle into an animal ~ fangs, claws, fur from head to toe, the whole works. He literally becomes a “Beast”.

In this version of the story, Kyle is told that he must find true love to break the spell within two years or he would remain a beast forever. This proved a challenge of course for two reasons ~ 1. He had to find someone that would truly love him for who he is on the inside despite his outer grotesque appearance, 2. He had to truly love someone besides himself for a change (a totally new concept for him.) To break the spell, true love had to be proven with a kiss.

Here’s the basic plot of “Beastly”…

Notice how the plot parallels the original “Beauty & The Beast” story and enhances it by adding additional modern elements (WARNING: Spoiler Alert).

1. After his transformation into a beast Kyle’s father, a rich Manhattan news anchor, locks Kyle away in a five story Brooklyn brownstone in an attempt to keep him hidden from the world. Kyle’s father, being just as concieted and materialistic as Kyle, doesn’t want anyone finding out his son is a monster because he’s afraid his son’s “condition” will ruin his image, career, and social standing. The brownstone becomes the “castle” in our story, a place of refuge for the Beast and yet his prison at the same time. Kyle’s only company in the brownstone is Will, his blind tutor, and Magda, his housekeeper.
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2. A year passes and after having time to reflect on the shallowness of his previous life and how it led to his current situation, Kyle has become a different person. He’s no longer the shallow, materlialistic boy he used to be. He learns to value his relationship with Will and Magda and learns much from them in terms of how to treat people and earn friendship. To reflect his feelings of being a new, changed person, he changes his name to Adrian. He also finds pursuits that bring him great joy and beauty such as building a green room and growing a massive all-year-round rose garden. Every day he tends to his roses and they become his most prized possessions, much like the Beast’s rose garden in the original story.
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3. One night a burglar breaks into the brownstone by coming in through the greenhouse. The Beast captures this robber in his rose garden and he’s furious with the robber for damaging his roses. Thinking he’s going to be torn apart by a monster, the robber begs and pleads with the Beast and ultimately offers the Beast his sixteen-year-old daughter Lindy in exchange for his life. The Beast is appalled by the thought of this low-life druggie actually valuing his own daughter’s life so little that he would actually give her up to keep his own miserable life. But time was running out for the Beast. The two years were almost up. If he ever wanted to break the spell he would have to find true love soon. Could this Lindy be the one? In desperation the Beast agreed to the terms set forth by the robber. He would let the robber go and Lindy would be delivered to the Beast within one week.
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4. Like Belle in the original tale, Lindy’s love for her father (even though he was such a low-life), binds her to keep her father’s promise and she goes to live with the Beast, presumably as his prisoner. When Lindy arrives at the Beast’s “castle” (the Brooklyn brownstone), she finds that a lovely room has been prepared for her, no expense was spared. In this room, she finds everything she could ever need, new fine clothes, and tons of books (she loves to read). She has Magda to cook for her and Will to tutor her but still she couldn’t help but feel that she was prisoner in this place…and the Beast was her captor.
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5. Skip ahead ~ time passes and eventually Lindy and Adrian become good friends (just like the Beast and Belle). They spend everyday together, talking and enjoying the rose garden, reading and discussing books. Adrian finds himself falling in love with Lindy but he’s not sure that the feelings are reciprocated. Afterall, how could they be? How could Lindy love a hideous beast?
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6. Lindy grows homesick and concerned for her father since she was the only one that had ever looked after him. One day, through the use of a magic mirror, Adrian allows Lindy to see her father. The mirror reveals that he is very sick and close to death. Adrian tells Lindy to go to her father, take care of him. Lindy leaves with the promise to return as soon as she can.
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7. With months passing and no sign of Lindy’s return, Adrian falls into depression convinced that his love will never return and that the full two years will pass with no hope of breaking the spell. But…I don’t want to spoil the ending too much so I’ll just round this out by briefly explaining that…
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8. Shortly before midnight on the last night of the second year, Adrian learns (through the use of the magic mirror) that Lindy is in trouble. He sees her in the mirror being drug into a building by menacing looking man. Fearing for her life, he leaves his castle and rushes across town to find her. Following her screams, Adrian eventually finds her, fights off her assailant and is shot in the process. As he lay dying with Lindy kneeling over him crying, she explains that she has been trying to return to him for months but couldn’t find her way back to his brownstone. Finally, she decided that this night she would begin searching and wouldn’t stop until she finally found him. In the process, she ran into this other unsavory character. She tells Adrian that she loves him and they kiss. The spell is broken and Adrian is transformed back into his old self.

And once again, Beauty and the Beast live happily ever after (at least until the sequel).

You Can Borrow Ideas, Concepts, Plots, and Even Whole Characters Freely and Adapt Them Into New Works of Creativity…

Now, obviously I left out a lot of the intricate details, sub-plotlines, and character developments that make “Beastly” such an excellent story but you see what has taken place here…

The author took an old, familiar fairy tale and updated it to place it in a more modern setting, injected new personalities into it, and crafted new story elements thereby creating an all new story based on classic themes (not to mention a profitable new franchise).

This is powerful ~ you can do this with almost any classic story especially stories that deal with the human condition, stories that involve emotional themes still very much relevant today (love, hate, revenge, grief, friendship, success, failure, etc.).

I once had a writing mentor (way before I knew about the Public Domain), that expressed to me a very interesting concept although I’m not sure I appreciated it much at the time…

She said that anytime I was stuck for ideas when writing (“writer’s block” I suppose), I could break out of the slump by simply taking an old story and examining the basic elements of it. She said I could figure out what made the story work and adapt those elements into something new.

Even just simply keeping the themes but changing the environment of the characters would change the dimensions of the story completely.

To take this to an extreme, she showed me that you can take any old story and simply change things up to create a whole new story.

For instance, take an old book, maybe a sweeping action-adventure like “Treasure Island” and change up the basic elements…

• sailing ships become space ships
• oceans become outer space
• islands / countries become planets
• travellers by land and sea become space travelers

And suddenly, you have an entirely different story. You now have a science-fiction action-adventure!

In fact, Disney did this exact thing with an animated adventure entitled, “Treasure Planet”.

Alex Flinn, the author of “Beastly” has discovered a nice little niche for herself doing this…and she does it well.

In 2009, she released another book entitled, “A Kiss In Time” which is essentially a modern-day retelling of the classic fairy tale, “Sleeping Beauty”. I’ve also heard that she’s currently working on a new novel entitled, “Cloaked” which combines elements of several fairy tales.

No one creates anything in a vaccuum. Anyone that creates anything is inspired by something or someone else. Why not use old Public Domain stories as your inspiration?

Always keep your eyes open…

The Public Domain Is Massive and It’s Literally All Around You…

Even many of the toys your children play with, the books they read, and the movies they watch are based on Public Domain elements.

Just out of curiosity, I spent a little time digging through some of the DVD’s that my children brought with them on the trip. I smiled as I realized that while I was listening to “Beastly”, much of what they were watching was inspired by the Public Domain as well…

• Disney’s “Oliver & Company” (1988), loosely based on Dicken’s second novel “Oliver Twist” (1838).
• Dreamworks’ “Shrek” 1 – 3 (2001-2007), chock full of characters inspired by Public Domain fairy tales – Puss-In-Boots (1697), Pinnochio (1883), the Gingerbread Man (1875), Sleeping Beauty (1697), Rapunzel (1812), Peter Pan and Captain Hook (1911), and a slew of others, too many to name here!
• Warner Brother’s “Quest For Camelot” (1998), which places new characters in the Public Domain realm of King Arthur’s Camelot on a mission to recover Arthur’s lengendary sword Excalibur.
• Dreamworks’ “Sinbad: Legend of Seven Seas” (2003) which tells an all new tale of adventure on the high seas with the Public Domain’s favorite island-hopping, ship-wrecking, treasure-hunting bad boy, Sinbad (who has his roots buried deeply in Middle Eastern folklore, made popular in the west by Sir Richard Burton’s 1885 translation of The Book of One Thousand and One Nights).

I’ve found a ton of examples like this back home in our collection of DVD’s.

As time goes on and you become more aware of the Public Domain, you’ll spot traces of Public Domain material and it’s limitless myriad of uses all over the place.

Make notes of these instances and they’ll serve you well…

The Public Domain exists for a reason – to spur the creative juices of artists of all kinds (including you!) and to provide a broad, rich pool of material to pull from in the creation of entirely new works thus ensuring that human knowledge is forever preserved and passed down to future generations.

This is the way it should be. The Public Domain is yours, my friend. Use these hidden treasures well and treat them with the respect they deserve.

Go nuts, create something incredible!

One more observation to consider…

Adapting Your Products Into a Wide Variety of Mediums Has a Lot of Power as Well…

After finishing listening to the audio version of “Beastly” and enjoying it so much, I decided to buy the novel. My oldest daughter has since listened to the audio version and read the novel as well and enjoyed both very much.

Then I discovered that a film adaptation of the novel is being released on March 18th, 2011 so you know we’ll be going to see that. Then, months from the film’s release, I’m sure I’ll come home one day and find a “Beastly” DVD playing in my living room.

Would you have imagined that an old Public Domain fairy tale written hundreds of years ago would have remanifested itself into our lives in so many different ways? It blows the mind. That’s four different products that we’ll consume that are all just variations of the same retelling of a centuries old fairy tale!

So, Here’s My Question For You…

Could you do something similar?

Could you take a much loved Public Domain story and adapt it into a new offering?

Could you take an obscure, forgotten Public Domain story that hasn’t had the chance to be loved yet and spin it off into something new and exciting?

And what’s more, could you take the results of your work and create something that touches people lives so powerfully that other companies are clamoring at the opportunity to help you adapt it into a wide variety of different mediums?

Consider this a challenge!

P.S. – Here’s the official trailer for the film adaptation of “Beastly” due for release in the U.S. on March 18th, 2011. I’m not particularly happy with who they cast to play Lindy or how they represent the Beast but I’ll reserve judgement until I actually see the film…

About The Author:

Logan Andrew is an online entrepreneur, information publisher, and author that has been using Public Domain material to create profitable products and businesses since 2001. He is also co-author of "The Public Domain Treasure Hunter's Survival Kit" available here. For more info Logan, click here.

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