Jan. 13, 2022
“A seven-foot frame! Rats along his back!” a curly-haired teenager draped in a cloak lip-syncs for the camera.
“I associate him with the sound of falling sand,” a busy mom nods appreciatively, bopping along with a vacuum as she embarks on a kitchen dance break.
“I’m sorry, mi vida, go on!” a pair of sisters screech, perilously off-key.
“We Don’t Talk About Bruno” from “Encanto” is a surprise chart topper and TikTok darling. Here’s how Disney created its biggest smash since “Let It Go.”
“Encanto” cautioned against talking about Bruno, but a whole lot of people are obsessed with a song about him.
Since that animated Disney film opened in theaters in November and arrived on Disney+ on Christmas Eve, its playful song “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” has steadily grown into an international hit. Unlike most Disney breakouts, “Bruno” is not a wistful hero’s solo or a third-act power ballad. It’s a Broadway-style ensemble track that revels in gossip about a middle-age man.
Yet the song recently topped the Spotify, Apple Music and iTunes charts in the United States, reached No. 1 on the global YouTube music videos chart and currently sits at No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100 — the first original song from a Disney animated film to rank that high since the “Frozen” anthem “Let It Go” in 2014. Other “Encanto” tracks, like “Surface Pressure” and “The Family Madrigal,” are also rising. And this week, the film’s soundtrack bumped Adele’s “30” from the top spot on the Billboard 200.
Read the rest of the New York Times article here.