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Author Topic:   Broadway to Hollywood -- Hollywood to Broadway
indiedan
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posted December 30, 2005 02:49 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for indiedan   Click Here to Email indiedan     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
"Don't Leave, Mary Poppins!"


In a reported production move that seems on its face as implausible as flying with the aid of an umbrella, Steven Spielberg is planning to bring back Mary Poppins to the screen, using the cast from the current stage hit in London, the London Daily Mail reported today (Friday), citing Richard Eyre, who directed the show and is bringing it to Broadway in the fall. The West End Poppins uses much of the same script and virtually all of the music as the movie and was co-produced by Thomas Schumacher, president of Disney Theatrical Productions and British stage impresario Cameron Macintosh. "I would hope to use as much of the West End cast as possible and keep Mary English rather than have the role go to a big American star name," Eyre told the newspaper. Laura-Michelle Kelly performed the title role on stage that was originally played by Julie Andrews in the 1964 Disney movie. She received lavish praise from theater critics -- as well as from Andrews herself, when she attended the theatrical production last March.

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indiedan
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posted February 27, 2006 08:06 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for indiedan   Click Here to Email indiedan     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
The Wedding Crashers will become a Broadway musical... in 2007.

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NEWSFLASH
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posted March 27, 2006 12:56 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for NEWSFLASH   Click Here to Email NEWSFLASH     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Audience Complains About 'Tarzan' Theater Staging

Walt Disney Co. watcher Jim Hill has suggested that the company may have a serious -- and unsolvable -- problem with the Broadway production of Tarzan, which opened for preview performances on Friday. Hill says that most of the aerial production tricks in which characters swing out over the audience and perform above the stage cannot be seen by audience members seated in the orchestra section below the balcony. Although holders of tickets in that section had the words "obstructed view" stamped on their tickets, Hill writes on his website, jimhillmedia.com, "Several angry audience members confronted the general manager of the Richard Rodgers Theatre in the lobby, insisting that they had paid good money for seats that would only allow them to see a third of Tarzan's first act. Which meant that the deliberately vague term 'obstructed view' didn't even come close to describing how truly awful these seats were."

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NEWSFLASH
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posted April 11, 2006 02:06 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for NEWSFLASH   Click Here to Email NEWSFLASH     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Disney's Theatrical Unit Gets 'Nemo' for a Song

Disney's marriage to Pixar took a new turn Monday when the company announced that it would be turning Finding Nemo into a musical. Unlike The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, Tarzan and the upcoming The Little Mermaid, Nemo will not be finding a home on Broadway. According to the company, Finding Nemo -- The Musical will be presented at Disney's Animal Kingdom in Orlando, FL, will last only a half hour, and will feature puppets and live performers. "It is the first time in theme-park history that we have taken an animated film that is not a musical and turned it into a musical," Anne Hamburger, executive director of Disney Creative Entertainment, told the Orlando Sentinel. "Nemo is the next generation of theatrical entertainment for the company. It will encompass a lot of visual spectaculars and will be a very popular show." The music is being written by Avenue Q composer Bobby Lopez and his wife, Kristen Anderson-Lopez, who wrote the book, music and lyrics for the a cappella musical Along the Way.

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indiedan
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posted April 24, 2006 09:32 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for indiedan   Click Here to Email indiedan     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Hollywood battle on Broadway: Tarzan vs vampire

By Claudia Parsons

NEW YORK, April 24 (Reuters) - The lines are drawn for a classic Broadway musical showdown -- Disney, Tarzan and Phil Collins on one side, Warner Brothers, the vampire Lestat and Elton John on the other.

The reigning champion of Broadway with long-running hits such as "The Lion King" and "Beauty and the Beast," Disney's latest mega-musical about the jungle man Tarzan is one of the most expensive shows ever mounted.

Rival Hollywood studio Warner Bros. is challenging Disney with its first foray into musicals, "Lestat," which opens on Tuesday and is based on Anne Rice's vampire novels and featuring songs by Elton John and his writing partner, Bernie Taupin.

Walt Disney Co. <DIS.N> and Warner, part of Time Warner Inc. <TWX.N>, both refused to discuss their budgets. But with "Lestat" reported to be costing some $10 million to $12 million and "Tarzan" said to have a budget of $15 million to $20 million, both are among the most expensive shows on the block.

After dismal reviews at a San Francisco run at the end of last year, "Lestat" is fighting an uphill battle.

The show grossed $4.3 million in its pre-Broadway run but The San Francisco Chronicle called it "didactic, disjointed, oddly miscast, confusingly designed and floundering in an almost unrelenting saccharine score by Elton John."

Taupin said 65 percent to 70 percent of the show had been changed and producer Gregg Maday told Sunday's New York Times he was still trying new versions of the first 20 minutes in previews.

"We may have limped onto Broadway as the underdogs, but underdogs bite back occasionally," Taupin told Newsday.

"Lestat" needs to overcome the curse that has dogged previous vampire musicals on Broadway, such as "Dance of the Vampires," which lasted just a month in 2003, and "Dracula, the Musical," which survived only five months in 2004.

Then the challenge is to make a coherent show out of Rice's "The Vampire Chronicles" which The New York Times described as "highly detailed, graphically violent and narratively complex, full of morally ambiguous, pansexual characters."

TARZAN UNDER WRAPS

"Tarzan," based on the 1999 animated film and the classic Edgar Rice Burroughs novel, should be a safer bet for Disney in a business where family shows often prevail.

The music by Phil Collins will be familiar to many from the movie.

But with no out-of-town trial run and with producers doing their best to keep critics away until just days before the May 10 opening night, "Tarzan" remains an unknown quantity.

Argentine Pichon Baldinu, creator of the successful aerial acrobatic troupe De La Guarda, was brought in to train the cast to use harnesses and bungee cords to climb walls, swing, run and jump around the set.

The cast has no big-name stars. The lead is being played by Josh Strickland, whose main claim to fame is a stint as a competitor on "American Idol" in 2003.

Previews of "Tarzan" have been completely sold out while "Lestat" has been playing to around 80 percent capacity.

A hit musical can gross around $1 million a week on Broadway, which can be multiplied many times if it tours and spawns other productions around the world.

William Wolf, president of the Drama Desk critics group, said both shows could prove highly marketable -- "Tarzan" as a family show, "Lestat" due to Rice's popularity. She has sold more than 50 million books.

"Anne Rice has a big following ... and there's not too much around for families," he said. "Sometimes these shows can be critic-proof."

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HollywoodProducer
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posted May 01, 2006 09:42 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for HollywoodProducer   Click Here to Email HollywoodProducer     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
'Lestat': Bringing Anne Rice's World to the Stage With Elton John's Help (NYT complete)

WITH the opening of "Lestat," his Broadway debut, only a few days away, the producer Gregg Maday has problems. Not simply the niggling technical glitches that plague every production of this size — reportedly more than $12 million — but huge, scary, potentially fatal problems, the kind that might have sent a lesser person swan diving from the mezzanine by now.

"Listen, I know the first 20 minutes still doesn't work," he told a reporter just before the curtain rose at a recent Saturday night preview, tugging playfully on his white goatee. The creative team, including the director Robert Jess Roth (formerly of "Beauty and the Beast"), had spent the day before laboriously reworking those same 20 minutes, radically altering lighting, sound and set; mere hours ago, Mr. Maday had sounded as though everything was on track. "By Monday," he now said, "it'll be totally different. Don't you love this process?"

A more pressing question might be, Why is this man smiling? Why isn't he throwing tantrums and hurling invective? After all, it was he who persuaded his employer, Warner Brothers, to mount this adaptation of the novels of Anne Rice, with a score by Elton John and lyrics by Bernie Taupin. In so doing he ushered the company into the risky business of adapting its properties for the stage. (The company bought the rights when it made the 1994 film "Interview With a Vampire," with Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt.) He also opened it to what may be unfavorable comparisons with Disney, which has had unqualified success with shows like "Beauty and the Beast," "The Lion King" and "Aida." Mr. Maday has also set himself up for tough comparisons personally. By persuading Warner to let him control "Lestat" without the help of a veteran Broadway producer, he is bound to be measured against Thomas Schumacher, Disney's dapper in-house theatrical impresario, the only other corporate producer to go it alone. But Warner, unlike Disney, has no theatrical division in place, no long history in live action born of years in the theme park business, just Mr. Maday, hanging out there for all to see.

"There a lot resting on him," said Mark Kaufman, executive vice president of production for music and theater at New Line Cinema, who produced "Hairspray" and the forthcoming "Wedding Singer" with Margo Lion. "I might find it pretty scary if it were just me out there."

All this might be less daunting if "Lestat" had the crowd-pleasing gimmicks common to virtually all mass-market musicals today. But it has no falling chandelier, whirring helicopter or swinging vines. "We purposefully decided to avoid production theatrics like that," Mr. Maday said. "And now we know we have to deliver on the basic merits."

That has not proved easy thus far. "Lestat" has gotten some of the worst press in recent memory, including universally awful reviews during a January tryout in San Francisco. Elton John's songs were called "unrelentingly saccharine," "banal" and "virtually undistinguishable," and the show's book cursory and jumbled. While audiences familiar with Ms. Rice's work were most likely prepared for the fact that the story contains no heterosexual love angle, critics complained that even the homoerotic tension had been neutered, leaving little oomph of any kind.

"The whole thing was ordinary, to say the least," said Sir Elton, in a telephone interview, "soulless and bland." He thought Mr. Maday might fold the production. "But instead of throwing up his hands," Sir Elton said, "he was a rock."

Since moving the operation to New York in February, Mr. Maday and the creative team have engaged in a thorough overhaul. Jonathan Butterell, the choreographer of "The Light in the Piazza," was hired to lend a fresh creative eye, Sir Elton wrote two new songs and Linda Woolverton ("Aida"), who wrote the book, stripped away many of the plot points that audiences found confusing. The passionate undertones of Ms. Rice's novels have been restored, some sly humor added and the elaborate exposition originally projected on large scrims throughout the play excised.

Originally expected to open April 13 with previews beginning March 11, the play was pushed back a couple of weeks. Mr. Maday estimates that 75 percent of the production has been changed since San Francisco. "We've made it better since we came to New York, without a doubt," he said. "The question will be, Is it good enough?"

Mr. Maday is no newcomer to such high-wire acts, especially ones that require a deft hand with corporate boundaries and high-priced talent. He has been an executive at Warner for nearly two decades, a fairly astonishing tenure in Hollywood. Before that he spent nearly nine years at CBS, where as head of comedy and drama development he shepherded shows like "Murphy Brown" and the critically acclaimed but short-lived "Frank's Place."

"They know what I'm capable of," he said of his employers. "It might have been different if they had hired me just to do this; the relationship between us would have been less secure. Because of the situation, I didn't see this as just a way to advance my career. I love the theater, and for me, getting to do this is a way to go back to something that I never got out of my blood."

Tom Fontana, the creator of the HBO series "Oz" and "The Bedford Diaries," now on WB, went to a Roman Catholic school in Buffalo with Mr. Maday. He traces the producer's grace under pressure to their Jesuit education. "They taught us that if you can remain calm in the eye of the storm, you can make almost anything work," he said. "Gregg has always been like that. I've never seen him panic."

Beatific demeanor notwithstanding, Mr. Maday concedes that he is feeling the screws. "It would ludicrous to deny that there's pressure on me," he said, lounging in the empty orchestra section, looking hip in a corduroy suit and sneakers. "But at some point you just have to have faith that you'll come up with the answer, or at least an answer. You remind yourself that you've put together a lot of challenging projects in the past, and there are a lot of phenomenally talented people working with you. You have to be strong."

It's hardly a mystery why Warner has invested heavily Broadway. Ever since Disney entered the fray with "Beauty and the Beast," the lure of turning a movie property into a stage show has been a holy grail for entertainment conglomerates. In addition to New Line, which, like Warner, is a division of the media giant Time Warner, MGM has gotten into the game through licensing, as it did with "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels."

What attracts them is not the bottom line of the show itself — $1 million a week, a good haul for a musical, would be an embarrassment for a film — but its potential ripple effect. Even a semi-successful show can restore an old movie's luster in the DVD market and give rise to a slew of video games, road companies, toys, T-shirts and collectibles. "It's a way to make it all three-dimensional," said Mr. Kaufman, who saw "Hairspray" morph from a low-budget John Waters film to a Broadway musical and to a big-budget movie. "When it works, it can be magic."

BUT only with the right property. "The balance," said the Broadway producer Emanuel Azenberg, "is that you achieve the right equilibrium between money and art. That's harder to do when you're a corporation because there are other reasons you make choices. When you have a corporation behind you, you gain money and that's great, but you lose something."

What led Mr. Maday and Warner to choose "Lestat," by all measures challenging source material, is a case in point. He had been working on an adaptation of "Batman" (Warner owns the right to all the DC Comics) but in 2003 Mr. Roth approached him about "Lestat." Sir Elton, Mr. Taupin and Ms. Woolverton had already signed on. Ms. Rice was gung-ho, too. They had even brainstormed the show in a three-day session in Las Vegas, which Sir Elton refers to fondly as "vampire boot camp."

"They came to us and said, 'Hey you guys own this already, so obviously you should do it,' " Mr. Maday recalled. Like everyone else, he knew the weak history of vampire shows on Broadway — the $12 million "Dance of the Vampires" closed after only a month in 2003, and "Dracula, the Musical" ran for a mere five months a year later. But, he recalled: "You say to yourself, hmmm. Anne Rice has sold 60 million copies of these books. Elton John is a legend, and he's already done two shows. And then you say yes." The clincher was that, as Mr. Taupin's first musical, it could be advertised as the first show by Sir Elton and his longtime collaborator. Sir Elton wrote the songs in less than two weeks.

But there was still the problem of the source material. Ms. Rice's books are highly detailed, graphically violent and narratively complex, full of morally ambiguous, pansexual characters. Making that work in a mainstream Broadway context has been among Mr. Maday's greatest challenges. "I realized that we had to find a way to be deeply true to the source material without being shackled by it," he said. "That balance didn't come easily."

Or quickly. Sir Elton saw the show a couple of weeks ago and said he was knocked out by the changes. "They were able to do exactly what they needed to," he said, "and that is bring humanity to it, make it a serious work." But Mr. Maday concedes that it will be hard to overcome the negative buzz.

"There's no way to fly under the radar in this day and age," he said, "no way to retool without everyone watching and judging. You need to perform in front of preview audiences to know where to take it. But then the bloggers come and post their comments. In one way it's great to have the immediate feedback, but it's also frustrating."

So far, he said, group sales have "not been where we want them to be," but he said he believed the show would catch on with the 18-to-35 demographic that "Spamalot" has tapped.

Traditionally financed shows are judged by how quickly they earn back their original investment, but Warner's top brass will assess this experiment based on a strange brew of critical reception, revenue, long-term marketing possibilities and what they view as necessary investment in the learning curve of a new industry. "We know how we're going to judge it, but I'm not going to talk about it," Barry M. Meyer, the company's chairman and chief executive officer, said coyly. But he insisted that whatever the final tally, Warner would pursue other theater ventures, through one financing model or another.

Already, he said, he has learned an important lesson: "Mounting a Broadway play is much harder than it looks, especially something like 'Lestat,' which is wildly ambitious. You're fixing it, changing it all the time. That's been hard for us because it's not what we're accustomed to, but it also appeals to us tremendously."

Mr. Maday is hesitant to speak of the future, but with a little prodding, he will confess he has a Broadway wish list. He hasn't given up on "Batman," and the company also owns partial rights to "Harry Potter" and "Charlie and Chocolate Factory," both of which he says he thinks would make great stage adaptations. Before he plunged into "Lestat," he had developed an interpretative dance version of "Casablanca," another Warner title; it had its debut in China last year, and he hopes to bring it to the United States.

But for now such plans are mere dream sequences; he has a play to fix. That 20-minute opening has to be locked down before the critics start streaming in. "Tomorrow night we're going to try it on a blank stage, real stripped down, 'Arte Povera' style, you know?" he said, his voice tinged with hope. "It could be great. It could be the answer we've been looking for."

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NEWSFLASH SUMMER INTERN
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posted May 11, 2006 11:04 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for NEWSFLASH SUMMER INTERN   Click Here to Email NEWSFLASH SUMMER INTERN     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Disney's 'Tarzan' Swings From Screen to Stage


The Walt Disney Co.'s stage adaptation of its animated Tarzan movie has opened to mixed notices on Broadway. Michael Kuchwara of the Associated Press describes the production as "emotionally and musically lightweight -- almost as skimpy as Tarzan's leather loincloth." Josh Strickland, in the title role, "is bland, boyish and bulk-free -- the Ape Man by way of Abercrombie & Fitch," Kuchwara adds. "Almost everybody and everything swings in Tarzan. Which is odd, since the show itself, to borrow from Duke Ellington's famous credo, definitely ain't got that swing," writes Ben Brantley in the New York Times. Brantley further notes that in the DVD extras that come with the animated film version, several members of the creative team commented that it required animation to capture the "animal artistry" that creator Edgar Rice Burroughs originally imagined in writing. "Which goes to prove, employees of Disney, that you should be very careful what you say when a camera is running," Brantley adds. Likewise, Clive Barnes observes in the New York Post: "The show was wrecked from the onset by its concept. Perhaps the Disney people will realize that not every one of their cartoons contains the kernel of a great Broadway show." Several critics do applaud the set designs and lighting by director Bob Crowley. But not Howard Kissel in the New York Daily News, who writes: "Musicals have become increasingly amusement park rides, focusing on scenic thrills rather than solid storytelling. Tarzan wouldn't make the grade as a ride at Disney World. On Broadway, it seems merely a tourist trap." On the other hand, Elysa Gardner in USA Today praises the show's "uncynical warmth and charm" and adds: "From Bob Crowley's lush, fanciful scenic and costume design to its intricate uses of animation and projected images, Tarzan offers plenty of the flash considered catnip for tourists and casual fans."

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N F S I 2
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posted July 06, 2006 11:42 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for N F S I 2   Click Here to Email N F S I 2     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Disney's Movie-to-Musical 'Tarzan' Fizzling on Broadway


The Walt Disney company, whose animated films Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King metamorphosed to successful stage shows on Broadway, may be about to experience its first "mega-flop" as ticket sales slow for Tarzan, the New York Post reported Wednesday. One veteran Broadway producer, who was not identified, told the newspaper, "Tarzan is not going to close today or tomorrow because the advance is big. ... But right now they're taking out more money than they're taking in, and if that doesn't change, I don't care how big the advance is, they're going to blow through it sooner or later." David Schrader, managing director of Disney Theatrical, told the newspaper that the company plans to launch a major ad campaign in August. "August is one of the highest-selling ticket months," Shrader told the Post. "People take more time to read and see what's going on, and we're going to take advantage of that."

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NEWSFLASH
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posted August 14, 2006 09:35 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for NEWSFLASH   Click Here to Email NEWSFLASH     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Theatergoers Snub Streep and Kline


Fans who got a sneak preview of Meryl Streep and Kevin Kline's new play were left so unimpressed by the performance, some walked out after just 20 minutes. The Hollywood stars appeared in Bertolt Brecht play Mother Courage And Her Children earlier this week at New York City's Delacorte Theater. But despite many audience-members lining for hours to see the show, some became bored by the production's heavy content. The New York Post reports around 100 members of the 1,892-strong audience left early, with one theatergoer quoted as saying, "Meryl is brilliant, but the play itself is boring, tortuous - it needs judicious cutting. A number of people left after 20 minutes. Many didn't return after intermission and then, three hours in, during a long song by Kevin Kline, they were pouring out." The show's publicist Arlee Kriv insists no cuts will be made to the play: "The show is what it is - a long show." Kline took over the role of The Cook from Christopher Walken, who dropped out last month.

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posted September 18, 2006 09:01 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for NEWSFLASH   Click Here to Email NEWSFLASH     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Stiller and Waters Return for 'Hairspray'


Former Seinfeld star Jerry Stiller has been added to the cast of movie remake Hairspray alongside director John Waters, who created the cult film. Stiller played Wilbur Turnblad in the original 1988 film, but will be recast as Mr. Pinky in the remake, which stars Christopher Walken and John Travolta as Turnblad parents Wilbur and Edna. Waters, who directed the original will also have a cameo in the film. Adam Shankman is directing the remake. Currently filming in Toronto, Canada, Hairspray is set to be released next summer.

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posted October 09, 2006 03:52 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for NEWSFLASH   Click Here to Email NEWSFLASH     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
'Priscilla' Moves From Film to Stage


A musical stage version of the classic Australian drag-queen film, The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, has premiered in Sydney with a budget three times larger than the film's. In an interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corp., director Simon Phillips remarked, "It's a great responsibility to something that's such a treasure in the Australian film iconography to find a vivid and exciting and joyful way of putting it on stage." More than 400 costumes are used during the performance. In his review, Bryce Hallet of the Sydney Morning Herald wrote that, while the musical needs further development, Phillips's "bold, exuberant and colorful production celebrates the film's spirit of defiance." But Deborah Jones in The Australian commented that an important element of the movie was lost by the need to pack 25 songs into the story. "What's lost -- not completely, but in large measure," she writes, "is the complex texture of characters and relatiionships that give the film its heart and soften and accommodate its crude edges."

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Carter Reunites with Burton and Depp for Musical


Helena Bonham Carter will re-team Tim Burton and Johnny Depp in the big screen adaptation of Sweeney Todd. Carter, Burton's longtime off-screen partner, has starring roles in Burton-directed films such as Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Big Fish and Planet Of The Apes. Carter and Depp starred in Charlie And The Chocolate Factory together and both voiced characters in Burton's animated film Corpse Bride. She will play the devious Mrs. Lovett in the new film, a role originated onstage by Angela Lansbury, who is a murderess who dispenses of her victims' bodies in meat pies and becomes the girlfriend and accomplice of the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, played by Depp. In most stage productions of the musical, Mrs. Lovett has been nearly a decade older than the Demon Barber and is usually someone in her fifties, but Carter and Depp are both in their early forties. Media reports has British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen joining the cast as rival barber Signor Adolfo Pirelli, but the studio would not confirm whether he'll be part of the film. Shooting begins early next year for a late 2007 release.

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'Dreamgirls' Fulfills Oscar Dreams

By Roger Friedman

It is with great relief that I can report the following: My enthusiasm for Bill Condon’s film version of the musical “Dreamgirls,” which we saw a portion of last May at the Cannes Film Festival, was well-founded.

Last night, at the very first screening of the film, the invited audience cheered, laughed and applauded throughout the show. It’s not a leap to say that “Dreamgirls” will be a huge hit, an Oscar nominee and the de facto winner of the Golden Globe for Best Comedy or Musical.

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More importantly: “Dreamgirls” will bring Eddie Murphy his first nomination ever for a phenomenal performance as a soul singer who combines the personalities of Wilson Pickett, James Brown and Marvin Gaye.

And the movie introduces a megawatt talent in the form of Jennifer Hudson, a singer who lost out to Fantasia on “American Idol” and now will likely be giving acceptance speeches for months to come.

For months I’ve been telling you that "Dreamgirls" was the film to beat at the next Academy Awards, and several other pundits have followed in suit. So yes, it is very satisfying to report that Condon has made a wildly entertaining, exciting and moving film that should draw all kinds of audiences when it’s released next month.

But the highlight of the endeavor is Hudson, playing the part of Effie White, which Jennifer Holliday made famous on Broadway. That’s not just because Effie gets to sing the two best songs in the show.

But you can’t change the fact that when Hudson launches into “And I’m Telling You I’m Not Going,” all hope is lost for any actor who wants to come close to her in this movie or any other this year. The song is sensational, the presentation is dynamic, but the performer is simply stellar, bar none.

Ironically, I’m not sure that Hudson even has a recording contract to this day. She didn’t have one when we met her at Cannes, and I’m told she’s still on her own.

Considering the poor state of the record industry, this news is appalling. Hudson has the potential to be Whitney, Mariah, Natalie and a dozen others all rolled into one.

This is not to say that "Dreamgirls" is perfect. It’s not. In fact, the film is a tad too long and suffers from strange production infelicities that perhaps will be rectified before its official release.

There are a few problems with the sound, especially in the synching, that can be distracting. And maybe it was the print we saw, but I thought the colors could have been sharper. There was a dullness to some of the lighting.

If you don’t know the story of "Dreamgirls," here it is: A group of girls from Detroit called the Dreamettes — played by Hudson, Beyonce Knowles and Anika Noni Rose and modeled on the Supremes — are taken under the wing of a Berry Gordy-type rising record mogul, played by Jamie Foxx.

Like the Supremes, they start out singing background vocals for a local star. The Supremes did it for Marvin Gaye; the Dreamettes harmonize behind James Earley (Murphy).

Effie (Hudson) is the talented lead singer of the group. But Foxx switches her with Deena (Beyonce), who is the stand in for Diana Ross in this roman-a-clef retelling of the Motown fable.

Eventually, Effie is pushed aside entirely, which is what happened to the Supremes’ Florence Ballard, who died in poverty and sickness in real life. Deena goes on to make movies and become an international superstar.

To say that "Dreamgirls" is the Motown story only limits it. It’s the story of all show business, and encompasses many facets of the classic R&B and pop worlds.

There are numerous stories in rock history of bands firing members and replacing them, of one member becoming a huge star while the others languished in obscurity. In that sense, the lessons learned from "Dreamgirls" are universal.

"Dreamgirls" also boasts a wonderfully talented cast. In addition to Hudson, Murphy, Beyonce and Foxx, there is nice work from Danny Glover, Sharon Leal, Hinton Battle, Keith Robinson and original Broadway cast member Loretta Devine as a sultry singer.

For now, though, the important thing is that "Dreamgirls" finally has been seen, and it lives up to all expectations. Paramount should be pleased. Put it right at the head of a list of best films of the year so far including “Bobby,” “The Departed,” “Little Miss Sunshine,” “World Trade Center,” “The Last King of Scotland,” “United 93,” “Babel” and a few that are still to be seen.

There’s another, too, called “The Pursuit of Happyness,” which I will tell you about tomorrow.

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posted December 13, 2006 01:04 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for NEWSFLASH WINTER INTERN   Click Here to Email NEWSFLASH WINTER INTERN     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
N.Y. Producers To Shut Down 'High Fidelity' After 10 Days


High Fidelity , the 2000 movie based on Nick Hornby's best seller, may have become a modest success in theaters when it was released and a cult favorite in its afterlife on DVD, but it has flopped as a Broadway musical. Producers of the $10-million production (about half the cost of the movie), said Tuesday that they will shut down the musical on Sunday, Dec. 17, just ten days after it opened to generally poor reviews and poor advance sales.

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posted January 12, 2007 09:05 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for NEWSFLASH WINTER INTERN   Click Here to Email NEWSFLASH WINTER INTERN     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Streep To Star in Film Version of 'Mamma Mia!'

Academy Award winner Meryl Streep is putting her vocal talents to the test in the Hollywood adaptation of ABBA musical Mamma Mia! The Devil Wears Prada star, 57, is set to play Donna, whose daughter Sophie is due to be married when she embarks on a journey to discover the identity of her father. It will be Streep's first musical. The film's producer, Judy Craymer, says, "(Streep) was always at the top of our wish list. She encapsulates the spirit and energy and has the powerhouse qualities that character requires." The movie features ABBA songwriters Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson as executive producers, while the picture will be produced by Tom Hanks' production company Playtone. Mamma Mia! will begin shooting later this year in London and Greece, and reports suggest the film's release will coincide with the musical's 10th anniversary in 2009.

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