It was only a matter of time. The epic The Lord of the Rings is being adapted into a 3 hour stage musical. Well… why not I guess. It worked out pretty damn well for The Lion King.
The hard working folks over at The Globe and Mail let us in on this little bit of news:
A much-anticipated musical based on The Lord of the Rings will have its world premiere in Toronto next year, the show’s producers announced Tuesday. Wallace had hoped to open the show in London in the fall, but no theater large enough to accommodate the technically complex production was available. The musical is now slated to open in London in autumn 2006.
The three-hour stage adaptation will feature book and lyrics by Shaun McKenna (Lautrec, Maddie) and Matthew Warchus (Tony nominated director of Art and True West), and music by A.R. Rahman (Bombay Dreams) and Finnish group Varttina with Christopher Nightingale. “We have not attempted to pull the novel towards the standard conventions of musical theater, but rather to expand those conventions so that they will accommodate Tolkien’s material,” he said.
And it’s opening in Toronto!! That’s only about a 435 minute drive from my place. Yay! I have to admit I’m a closet fan of the stage (although I don’t see nearly enough of it). It was also interesting to see that they’re adapting the production from the books instead of the movies. We’ll see if that really holds up.
I think it’s a dumb idea as well. It won’t work. It’ll just ruin.
I think this is terrible! They are going to totally ruin the story. Just think
would tolkien have done this?
oh the humanity!
I think this musical version is better
http://www.fellowshipthemusical.com
Don’t forget everyone, the books are FILLED with songs and lymerics and music and singing. True, I have a hard time picturing the counsel of Elrond breaking into a chourus… but still… you have to give it a chance.
I had a hard time picturing Les Mis as a musical (I saw the movie first)… and that turned out ok.
:)
I love the theatre, I love musical theatre, but this story has me a little skeptical.
I’m definitely interested in the developement of this and what the reviews will say.
If it makes to LA I’ll have to check it out.
Dumbest idea ever for a musical…It goes against the grain Tolkien’s novels…Unless of course they were just doing the Tom Bombadil section of the book which was cut from the films…
Anyways…Aren’t you in Hamilton John? That would be only about an hour outside downtown…But your figure is probably correct after considering traffic…
Oh, those nine nasty Nazgul
they’re coming down the street
don’t let ’em get my ring!
I can actually see this being good. The books had a lot of musical elements that PJ looked over(which I can understand). It’ll be interesting at least.