Lea Salonga feared this was going to be the longest 2.5 minutes of her life. Could she pull it off?

It was early 1992. Salonga, a young Broadway star, had been picked to sing as Princess Jasmine in “ A Whole New World ” for Disney’s upcoming “ Aladdin ” movie.

Stuck in a recording booth, she was lost without her smile or her body movements to convey her emotions to the audience, like she did on stage every night. All she had was her voice.

“We focused on really acting, really putting our emotional energy into the vocal performance. And that is far more difficult and challenging than I thought it would be,” Salonga said. “Our voices had to carry everything,

How Salonga ended up here was a whirlwind.

One Winter morning, the 20-year-old auditioned for “Aladdin” by singing “The

See Full Page