Everyone chastises TV for slavishly copying successful shows. But Broadway does the same thing.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST becomes a hit. SHREK follows. And Disney is adapting every animated film except SONG OF THE SOUTH.
BEAUTIFUL was a hit about rock performer Carole King, so Broadway mounts shows about Cher and now Tina Turner. Can the Lulu musical be far behind?
The current trend is adapting movies into musicals. MEAN GIRLS, WAITRESS, BEETLEJUICE, HONEYMOON IN VEGAS, TOOTSIE, PRETTY WOMAN, GROUNDHOG DAY, AN AMERICAN IN PARIS, NEWSIES, MARY POPPINS, DIRTY ROTTON SCOUNDRELS, THOROUGHLY MODERN MILLY, SUNSET BLVD., ONCE, THE FULL MONTY, BILLY ELLIOTT, HAIRSPRAY — just to name a few.
I think it’s time to merge both TV and Broadway. FRIENDS, THE MUSICAL. Start writing the songs.
Obviously FRASIER needs to be a musical
ReplyDeleteSo I guess you haven't been to Vegas in the last year-plus, as "Friends-The Musical" has been playing on Fremont St. for a while. Granted, it's a parody, not an adaptation like those other Broadway shows, but it exists, though it will be closing at the end of the year since the theater they're using is being demolished.
ReplyDelete"Pivot! Pivot! All we need to do is Pivot! Pivot!" I see it with choreography.
ReplyDeleteS*M*A*S*H*
ReplyDeleteI'd go see Cheers the musical, or Mary Tyler Moore, the musical
ReplyDeleteAct I closes with a sing-along version of Smelly Cat.
ReplyDeleteThe Addams family went from a comic panel to a television show to a Broadway musical.
ReplyDeleteThis is really not something new -
ReplyDeletePromises, Promises - based on The Apartment
Sugar - based on Some Like It Hot
La Cage Aux Folles
Mame based on Auntie Mame
My Favorite Year
The Producers
Even better, let's do "Cheers: the Musical."
ReplyDelete(Don't worry, "The Kelly Song" will be included.)
I think Stephen Sondheim said something along the lines that after Hamilton, we'd see historical and rap musicals. Miranda based that on a biography written by Ron Chernow, whose next subject is Grant.
ReplyDelete"I will not throw away my ... Scotch."
Just saw The Irishman over a two day marathon. We were watching it and after 2 hours we paused only to find we were only half way through.
ReplyDeleteWas it Billy Wilder who said that movies are real life with the boring parts taken out? Well Martin Scorsese now makes movies with all the boring parts left in. I swear there was a scene of paint drying. Towards the end when the DeNiro character was buying his coffin I imagined we would have a long scene of him dead in the coffin. Or maybe instead of The End it would be a link to a web cam of his grave site. The never ending movie.
Please somebody introduce Marty to an editor.
You missed the obvious, Ken: CHEERS: THE MUSICAL. The opening number "Where Everybody Knows Your Name" is already written. Sam's rousing ditty "Magnificent Pagan Beast", Diane's touching lament "Overqualified" and Cliff's showstopper "It's A Little Known Fact" practically write themselves. And the rough plot arc encompasses seasons 1 to 5, ending with the big wedding number "I Do, Adieu"...
ReplyDeleteIf it's a hit, the sequel CHEERS 2 covers the Rebecca years.
(JOEY enters, dressed in several layers of clothing):
ReplyDelete(Uptempo)
Hel-lo,
I'm Chand-ler,
Could I BE wear-ing an-y more clothes?
May-be,
I could be,
If I was-n't go-ing
COM-MAN-DO!
CHANDLER: Eeeeyyyuuugh!
"I think it’s time to merge both TV and Broadway. FRIENDS, THE MUSICAL. Start writing the songs."
ReplyDeleteComedy writing team Bob and Tobly McSmith already have a thriving bunch of unofficial parody musicals based on various pop culture source material, including television shows like FRIENDS and THE OFFICE among others.
This trend goes back at least to the 1970s, with "Applause" (ALL ABOUT EVE) and "A Little Night Music" (SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT). And I read about a 1950s musical version of GRAND HOTEL with Paul Muni (!) as Kringelein.
ReplyDeleteSadly, Shelley Morrison has died at 83. She was so good as Rosario on WILL & GRACE that her character, originally a one-episode, stayed around for the whole series. Friday question: Have you ever written a character who changed your original idea because the actor brought so much to the role?
"My Mother the Car"-The Musical. Now THAT'S a show I would fly to NY to see!
ReplyDeleteDon't forget the various versions of "Twentieth Century": Broadway play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, then an early screwball gem with John Barrymore and Carole Lombard, then the stage musical "On The Twentieth Century" with Madeline Kahn in the Lombard role as Lily Garland (revived a few years back with little giant Kristin Chenoweth as Lily), though that hasn't yet been adapted into a big-screen version.
ReplyDeleteAs you probably know, Jackie Gleason took a "Trip to Europe" Honeymooners story arc that he'd done on in his show in the 1950s and re-made them as splashy, hour-long musicals for his variety show in the late '60s. These were my introduction to Gleason, and I loved them when I was a kid. But I watched some of them on DVD a few years ago, and I'd say they don't hold up nearly as well as "The Classic 39" or "The Lost Episodes." On that basis, forgive me for not wanting to see "Friends: The Musical." (Although maybe you could use that format to revive "Big Wave Dave's."
ReplyDeleteThe Spongebob Squarepants musical is coming to Nickelodeon later this month. Reportedly it's better than one might reasonably expect.
ReplyDelete"She Loves Me" was based on "Little Shop Around the Corner". An excellent revival was broadcast on PBS "Great Performances" and is still available to stream on Amazon. "Great Performances" has run several stage musicals in the past few years, mostly big revivals.
In the early days of network TV a Broadway show could be easily presented as a broadcast event; in the early days of cable lots of shows were recorded to fill a need for exclusive content. It continues on and off, occasionally with those live network things but mostly with PBS presenting shows that didn't quite get a movie deal. Somewhere out there are recordings of "Bullshot Crummond" (the stage version), Leonard Nimoy as "Sherlock Holmes" (a revival of a vintage play), Donny Osmond in George M. Cohan's "Little Johnny Jones" and many more.
I had tried to send this previously to one of Ken's "Lincoln" blogs, but for some reason it didn't go through. But, coincidently it's very appropriate today.
ReplyDeleteWhen does ABE get his lavish, Broadway musical? Following the precedent of "Hamilton" first, you shake up the casting. You make the President a little, Asian guy.
The the music should also be nontraditional. How about zydeco. General Grant could be Rosie O'Donnell. And to further rattle the cage get a black guy, maybe Jamie Fox to play Jefferson Davis and a white guy, say David Spade to be Frederick Douglass.
I can hear the critics now: "What the hell was that?!"
Of course there's always "'Deep Throat' the Musical." Although, it's rather difficult to sing with a c*%k in your mouth.
M.B.
Don't forget Rocky. Because if ever a movie needed singing, it was this one.
ReplyDeleteFriends the Musical already has music. It's the whole theme song on endless loop.
ReplyDeleteP.
Tootsie?!
ReplyDeleteTOOTSIE?!!
This is my number-one favorite movie of all time and someone feels the need to translate it into Vaudeville? Do. Not. Approve.
Tootsie the Musical is BRILLIANT. Easily the funniest Broadway show I've seen. It has echoes of the movie but tells a slightly different story. See it first then feel to disapprove if you must, but don't hate it on general principles.
DeleteI suppose it depends on what they do with it. Lion King the movie was fine. Lion King the Bway musical was extraordinary.
ReplyDeleteThe most obvious tv show that could be made into a musical is The Partridge Family.
ReplyDeleteJohn Alexander Hall
Just say, "The Musical” after anything:
ReplyDeleteCremation: "The Musical”
The Bald & The Beautiful: "The Musical”
Root Canal: "The Musical”
Measles: "The Musical”
Schizophrenia:” "The Musical”
Anything works. Have fun!
In further movie-to-musical news (albeit a movie that originated with a book,) one based on THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA is looking to get to Broadway in 2021.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I don't quite have it in me to get too worked up about Broadway shows based on movies or TV shows. Broadway musicals have been based on proven source material from other media for forever. It's just that nowadays, the popular mediums providing source material include things like TV shows and movies and musicians with beloved song catalogs along with novels and plays that've traditionally been mined and sources.
Hell, even a John Waters became a musical, though I wish it had been Pink Flamingos rather than Hairspray. We would then have been able to see John Travolta eating poodle excrements.
ReplyDeleteReally, Ken? You sneer at movies turned into Broadway musicals? The man who wrote a tv show based on a movie based on a book?
ReplyDeleteI was talking to a friend of mine a couple days ago about what a stage adaptation of The Magic School Bus might look like. She was of the opinion that the required special effects would not be feasible on a stage. I was of the opinion that CHALLENGE ACCEPTED.
ReplyDeleteIt's not that uncommon to re-tell a story in another medium. It never was and it never will be. So, just because a musical is based on a successful movie, that doesn't mean that it's bad. Or good. But some are better than their original material - Billy Elliott or Heathers come to mind - and some are as good, but different, like Groundhog Day, which deliberately cuts ties with Bill Murray's style, but adds the Tim Minchin magic.
ReplyDeleteI'm here late, but literally 0 of Rogers and Hammerstein's shows were not based on some existing story. Of the top ten Broadway musicals, the only non-adaptations are Book of Mormon and Cats -- I'm letting Cats in even it is, in theory, based on some poetry. My Fair Lady, once the most successful Broadway show, is rather famously based on a play. And so on. (From the top 30 longest-running list, add A Chorus Line, Avenue Q, and Oh Calcutta.)
ReplyDelete(This applies to some extent to movies as well: in the classic year of 1939, 7 of 10 "Best Production" nominees were adaptations, including the two best-remembered films of the year, Gone With The Wind and The Wizard of Oz.)