Disney is recreating its hit franchise film High School Musical as it turns its attention to the millions of teenagers in the mainland market.

Word came just weeks after the California- based company said the central government has approved plans for a Shanghai theme park.

Disney High School Musical: China will be a co-production with Shanghai Media Group and Huayi Brothers Media. That will allow Disney to bypass China's annual quota of 20 films in which foreign studios can share profits.

The story of two friends who overcome odds to win an inter-school singing competition marks Disney's third co-produced film in China - after The Magic Gourd in 2007 and this year's Trail of the Panda - and its sixth international co- production.

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Featuring six newcomers, the film will be shot in Shanghai and is scheduled for a summer 2010 release.

High School Musical started out as a TV movie that launched in the United States in January 2006 but went on to become a big hit internationally, airing in more than 30 languages in some 100 countries and turning Zac Efron into a household name. Its sequel, also a TV movie, was also a success.

Disney then released the third installment in movie theaters in October 2008, with High School Musical 3: Senior Year, grossing US$250 million (HK$1.94 billion) worldwide.

Disney's choice of director for the Chinese version is unusual. For Chen Shizheng is better known as a stage director, mounting a 19-hour production of the classic opera piece The Peony Pavilion in 1999. His first feature film was the 2007 drama Dark Matter, the story of a troubled Chinese astrophysics student studying in the United States. It starred Liu Ye and Meryl Streep.

The deal also ups the credentials of one of China's leading nongovernment film studios. The project marks Huayi Brothers' second leading co-production with Hollywood in recent years. The company, which recently went public, made The Forbidden Kingdom, the first collaboration of Jackie Chan Kong-sang and Jet Li Lianjie.

ASSOCIATED PRESS