Hi theatre-goers
Sometimes films can make good stage plays/musicals or visa versa and sometimes they absolutely do not make a good transition.
For example :
Dirty Dancing – great film … good stage adaptation
Rock of Ages – hilarious stage production … dire film (and I LOVE Tom Cruise, so it’s very hard for me to criticise anything he does!)
Ghost – great film … good stage adaptation
Nine to Five – mediocre film… fabulous stage production
The Commitments – award winning film… stage adaptation? We await the World Premiere in October!
The Full Monty – grossed over $250 million … stage adaptation? So far UK tour reviews give it the thumbs up and it hits the West End in 2014.
Both the last two mentioned stage productions have “gone back to their roots” so audiences shouldn’t expect either film to be re-created verbatim on stage (as they did for Dirty Dancing) .
The Commitments author Roddy Doyle has written the script from his original novel and it’s taken him two years to get it to how he wants it to be. Flavour of the month, Jamie Lloyd, directs and rumours are that former Billy Elliot the Musical actor, Killian Donnelly (Tony), will take up the role of Deko (played by Andrew Strong in the 1991 film).
As for The Full Monty, the stage play has been written by Simon Beaufoy based on his original screenplay of the successful 1997 film. The Full Monty is currently touring the UK to packed out theatres and should not be confused with the previous short lived “Americanised” musical version which came (and very quickly went) to the West End in 2000.
All very exciting, don’t you think?
Happy Tuesday everyone
Sara
