When it was reported nine years ago that Disney was pursuing a live-action remake of Snow White, hopes were high that the film would be a sweeping success.

The 1937 original showed the world that feature-length animated films could be just as touching and entertaining as those filmed on sets – and established the Disney Princess template since replicated and imitated countless times.

Plans for the film were revealed in late 2016 after live-action reimaginings Maleficent, The Jungle Book and Cinderella proved themselves box office smash hits – and a crack team of top writers and producers were assembled to guide it to success.

But along the way, something has gone wrong: the film shot to number one in the charts, but made a distinctly sleepy $87.3million in its first weekend – one of the worst openings for a direct remake of a Disney animated film to date.

What happened to this $270million should-be smash-hit? The opposing views of its two leading ladies – and a rift that appears to have opened on social media since filming wrapped – might have something to do with it.

Rachel Zegler and Gal Gadot were cast as Snow White and the Evil Queen through 2021 – and the warning signs should have been there from the start that the pair’s opinions on Israel and Palestine may lead to tensions.

Israeli model-turned-actress Gadot, 39, is a former Israel Defence Forces instructor who has criticised world leaders for their initial response to the October 7 attacks.

In a speech earlier this month, she claimed pro-Palestine activists were ‘not condemning Hamas, but celebrating, justifying and cheering on a massacre of Jews’, and told a Variety interview: ‘I’m an indigenous person of Israel.’

Rachel Zegler as Snow White in the new live-action remake. The film has been dimly received by critics and failed to light up the box office

Gal Gadot as the Evil Queen in the Snow White live-action remake. 

The pair pictured at the Los Angeles premiere alongside (left-right) producer Marc Platt and Mark Webb, songwriters Benj Pasek and Justin Paul and producer Jared LeBoff

Zegler, 21, on the other hand, is hardly bashful in her support for Palestine, having tweeted ‘it will always be free Palestine’ in May 2021. 

She then tweeted it again last August – directly after the release of the teaser trailer for the fairytale flashback – and found herself in the dock after executives panicked.

‘Thank you for the love and for 120m views on our trailer in just 24 hours,’ she wrote on August 13. ‘And always remember, free Palestine.’

That tweet sent Disney executives into a frenzy and led to a spike in death threats aimed at the Israeli star, prompting Disney to give her private security, Variety reported.

Snow White producer Marc Platt was so concerned, he flew from Los Angeles to New York to speak to Zegler in person about her social media presence.

The New York Times reported last week that Platt had to remind her how much was at stake with the movie and her career before asking her to ‘post heedfully’.

One insider told Variety: ‘She didn’t understand the repercussions of her actions as far as what that meant for the film, for Gal, for anyone.’

Platt went home happy he had gotten her on side – but months later she took to Instagram following the US election to slate Trump supporters, whom she hoped would ‘never know peace’. 

In an arguably dopey move likely to upset the 49.8 per cent of Americans who voted for him – and likely a huge chunk of Snow White’s potential audience – she wrote: ‘F*** Donald Trump.’ 

After further pleading by the producer, Zegler reportedly agreed to allow a social media professional to vet her posts across the web in the run up to release. She also apologised for the Trump posts.

Rachel Zegler sent Disney executives into a panic when she tweeted ‘free Palestine’ a day after the first trailer for Snow White was released

Gal Gadot has expressed support for Israel for years – and stepped up her vocal activism following the October 7 attacks (pictured: a post she made a day after the attacks)

Rachel Zegler reportedly agreed to allow her social media posts to be vetted before they were published. Her recent pictures from the Snow White set (pictured) do not feature Gadot

Jonah Platt, son of producer Marc Platt, fumed on social media about her Palestine posts

Platt (pictured), who presents a podcast called Being Jewish with Jonah Platt, fumed of Zegler: ‘Her actions clearly hurt the film’s box office’

Rachel Zegler seen reading between takes on the set of Snow White in this image posted to her Instagram

Her recent social media activity has included a video of her sitting in a largely empty theatre watching the film and pictures of her time on set, which feature many cast and crew – but no sign of her Israeli co-star. 

She also tweaked her bio on Instagram to read ‘fearless, fair, brave, and true’, the name of one of the remake’s new songs. As of today, it read’s ‘lenny’s mom’, after her dog, Lenny.

Platt’s nepo baby son Jonah later fumed about the episode in an grumpy Instagram comment.

‘Yeah, my dad… had to leave his family to to fly across the country to reprimand his 20 year old employee for dragging her personal politics into the middle of (the film launch),’ he said.

‘This is called adult responsibility and accountability. And her actions clearly hurt the film’s box office. Free speech does not mean you’re allowed to say whatever you want in your private employment without repercussions.

‘Narcissism is not something to be coddled or encouraged.’

Jonah, who hosts a podcast called Being Jewish with Jonah Platt, deleted the comment after it came in for widespread online mockery. Other users also asked whether Gadot’s expression of support for Israel would be given the same scrutiny.

‘Show me anything related to Snow White that Gal randomly made about Israel,’ he said. 

In an interview with Variety this month to promote Snow White, Gadot said she began posting more on social media about Israel after the October 7 attacks in 2023 – which came after the film’s primary shooting schedule wrapped.

She used her Instagram to call for the return of hostages abducted from kibbutzim near the Gaza border. 

And in what appeared to be an attempt to build bridges days into the conflict, she said on Instagram post the killing of both ‘innocent Palestinians (and) innocent Israelis is horrific’ – only to delete it after facing backlash from an Israeli TV presenter. 

Rachel Zegler as Snow White in a scene from the live-action remake – which re-casts the dwarves as CGI creatures

The film is a remake of the 1937 classic, which was Walt Disney Studios’ first feature-length animation

Supporters of Rachel Zegler claim she has been made into a ‘scapegoat’ for the film’s failure to set the box office alight because of her pro-Palestine stance

Gal Gadot’s Instagram posts are littered with pro-Palestine comments – and are often limited to prevent spam

Gadot’s Hollywood Walk of Fame unveiling ceremony was also picketed by pro-Palestine activists last week (pictured)

Some carried signs accusing either the film, Disney or Gadot herself of supporting ‘genocide’

She told Variety: ‘I was shocked by the amount of hate, by the amount of how much people think they know when they actually have no idea, and also by how the media is not fair many times. So I had to speak up.’ 

There has never been a suggestion that the pair clashed on set. Sources told Variety there was no ‘bad blood’ and they ‘got along well’ during filming.

But between filming wrapping up and the movie’s release came October 7 – and with it a rise in anti-Israel sentiment amid allegations of war crimes committed against the 2.2million people living in the Gaza Strip as the IDF struck back at Hamas.

Their stances on the Israel-Palestine debate have split opinion among fans of both performers – who may each be boycotting the film over the other’s views.

Gadot’s Instagram posts are littered with Palestine-themed GIFs and comments while Zegler’s X mentions are full of pro-Israel supporters calling her ‘ignorant’ and ‘antisemitic’ while telling her they will not see the film.

Pro-Palestine activists also picketed Gadot’s Hollywood Walk of Fame star-unveiling ceremony earlier this month in Los Angeles. Some waved placards depicting Gadot as the Evil Queen in the film, captioned ‘Snow White supports genocide’.

And Instagram social commentary personality Matt Bernstein, known by his handle @mattxiv, claimed in a post on Wednesday that Zegler had been made into a ‘scapegoat’ for the film’s failure to set the box office alight.

And tongues were set wagging after the pair appeared to have been kept apart at the Snow White premiere, two weeks after they jointly presented an award at the Oscars in what one body language expert suggested was a muted, tense presentation.

Judi James told the Irish Star: ‘These two women effectively came out on stage separately.’

Following the Academy Awards, Zegler reportedly referred to Gadot as a ‘professional pageant queen’ in response to an Instagram comment – a comment that appeared to suggest her career was built on looks rather than aptitude.

Zegler and Gadot appeared tense together on stage at the Oscars earlier this month as they presented an award – but have not appeared as a duo on the press tour for Snow White

Zegler stepped out at a remote castle in Segrovia, north-west of Madrid, to perform at a muted Spanish premiere event. Gal Gadot was not in attendance

Rachel Zegler and Gal Gadot pictured at the Los Angeles Snow White premiere on March 15

The pair filmed Snow White throughout 2022, during which time they reportedly got on – and later returned for reshoots in the summer last year (Gadot pictured in the film)

Rachel Zegler went to see the film with friends – but the theatre they sat in appeared to be largely empty 

The duo did not give joint interviews during the film’s pre-release press junkets. Gadot did not attend a secret Spanish premiere event held at a castle that inspired the original animated film.

And the film’s all-singing, all-dancing Los Angeles premiere featured no red carpet interviews. Zegler reportedly sat two rows in front of Gadot with her family during the film.

There may be other factors at play when it comes to the film’s meagre opening weekend, which lagged behind that of the equally dimly received Lion King prequel Mufasa in December. 

It has been dogged with controversy since the very start despite a crack team including writer Erin Cressida Wilson (The Girl on the Train), director Marc Webb (The Amazing Spider-Man) and the songwriters behind The Greatest Showman.

Some of its misfortune was bad luck – from COVID-19 delaying filming by two years to a fire at London’s Pinewood Studios damaging part of the set. 

Strikes also disrupted re-shoots, and Gadot’s complications during pregnancy also meant they had to be rescheduled.

Nevertheless, Zegler’s casting as a Latina actress – for a character described in the original Grimm fairytale as ‘skin as white as snow, lips as red as the rose, and hair as black as ebony’ – proved controversial.

Extraordinarily, she lashed out at those who decried her casting as ‘losers obsessed with maintaining the bloodline purity of a cartoon princess’, adding: ‘Yes I am snow white no I am not bleaching my skin for the role’.

Equally, the film itself underwent extensive doctoring after focus groups reportedly gave muted reactions to early test screenings. Reshoots were completed last summer, two years after filming initially wrapped. 

Zegler also criticised the 1937 original in the run up to its release, calling it ‘weird’ that the Prince character – written out of the modern remake in favour of a Robin Hood-esque thief – ‘literally stalks’ Snow White.

Yet she backtracked on this in an interview this month, telling Allure: ‘Snow White is on her own mission and she falls in love along the way, which is really awesome.’

Zegler courted controversy after previously revealing she refused to sing the beloved song Some Day My Prince Will Come from the 1937 classic

The film also ditches the Prince of the original for Jonathan (Andrew Burnap, pictured), the leader of a Robin Hood-esque gang of bandits

Peter Dinklage, who has dwarfism, previously criticised the decision to revisit Snow White in the first place as ‘f****** backwards’. Disney later said it would take a ‘different approach’ to the dwarfs in the remake

But the use of CGI dwarfs has equally been criticised by other actors with the condition, including John Ferguson (above)

The film has been tweaked to make Snow White a stronger feminist figure who dreams of becoming a leader – and it is for this reason she poses a threat to Gadot’s Evil Queen in the remake plot. 

The film’s dwarf characters also attracted criticism – from those who wanted them retained, and those who wanted them gone.

Actor Peter Dinklage, who has dwarfism, also criticised the presence of the septet – scrubbed from the title of the remake – as ‘f****** backwards’. 

Disney later said it would take a ‘different approach’ to dwarfs in the film – since revealed to be CGI recreations of the animated characters with distended features.

But this was met with a mixed critical reception upon release – and the move was blasted by other actors with dwarfism who said they were being denied work.

Analysts have also suggested that audiences are tired of unimaginative live-action remakes of Disney films, which have been a staple of the studio’s release calendar since 2010’s Alice In Wonderland.

The film was met with a muted reception: a 42 per cent positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on film critic reviews. 

Audiences are kinder, giving it an overall rating of 74 per cent based on over 1,000 ‘verified’ reviews from people who bought tickets.

(IMDb’s rating, which is not verified, is a much lower 1.6/10 from 163,000 people. It notes: ‘Our rating mechanism has detected unusual voting activity on this title.’)

There is, possibly, another, simpler reason for why Snow White looks set to be a fairytale flop: when it was finally signed off nine years ago, and as its actors were cast, the world was a very different place.

Around then, companies were pursuing diversity initiatives left and right; the Israel-Palestine problem had not boiled over into another violent, devastating war; people were slowly grasped the concept of a first Trump presidency on Twitter.

Now DEI is a toxic buzzword that spells death for any companies brave enough to use it; outright support for Israel or Palestine is professionally toxic; and the mentions of Snow White’s stars on X spill over with aggressive, derogatory bile.

It may simply be the case that Snow White no longer reflects the world it was conceived in.

As reasons for the film to fail, it’s certainly not the fairest of them all – but it might just be the only one Disney executives can cling to as they watch it sink.