Does everything need to be a Broadway musical? Oh, it does? Cool.
So, I don't know much about musicals, screen or stage. I'll say that right off the bat. The only musical I honestly liked (loved, actually) is the Clint Eastwood, Lee Marvin film
Paint Your Wagon. It's got a rep as a so-bad-it's-good type film but I love it 100 percent unironically. Lee Marvin plays a guy drunk the entire movie, Clint is Clint, and they take turns fighting, mining gold and sleeping with the stunning Jean Seberg. Plus, there's a bull vs. bear fight! The lobby card featuring a long underwear adorned Marvin floating down a river in a bathtub might be my favorite possession.
Anyway, to get back to my point... I might not know much about musicals, however, as most of you are already aware, I do know plenty about shooting my mouth off in a derisive, borderline unfair, debatably funny manner regarding things I'm only marginally familiar with. So, why not me then, for the position of guy who brings you a list of the...
Oddest Movies Soon to be (or Already) Made Into Musicals!Legally Blonde
This is the perfect
example of a lightweight piece of fluff-film that absolutely achieved its full potential, going as far as it ever needed to go, as a movie. Did it need to be simplified further and topped off with some new dance number? I mean
a dance number. Perhaps this falls under the "me not knowing the ins and outs of musicals" part, but, I don't know. Is anyone under 60 interested in this?
Grumpy Old MenReally? Did the story of two old men bickering and battling and eventually finding friendship (A grudging respect? Common ground, maybe?) need this treatment? Maybe they'll utilize a Jack Lemmon-like crash test dummy for the "Spy vs. Spy" antics, amp up the explosions and add falling pianos, but I doubt it. Is anyone under 70 interested in this?
Brokeback Mountain
Technically an
opera but that seemed close enough. I'm already dreading inevitable Brokeback jokes so I'll just keep it moving...
Spider-Man
The greatest super-hero of them all,
Spider-Man himself will be turned into a Broadway musical. This one sounds pretty good, actually. Especially if they turn up the web-slinging insanity. Loud music accompanying multiple bad-asses, bouncing and leaping around a stage, could be phenomenal. Pumpkin bombs! Audiences covered in webbing that looks and feels like silly string! Doc Ock!
What puts it in the odd category is the part where U2's Bono and The Edge will be writing music for the show. Huh? Shouldn't they be working on the U2 show? Are they Spidey fans? Musical fans? Do U2 fans want to see super-heroes on stage? I guess we'll see, it just seems so random. "Oh yeah, we're doing a
Star Wars musical and Sylvester Stallone is directing it." Okay.
First Wives Club
I recall clumsily recommending
this movie to my mother shortly after her divorce. That was probably the extent of my thoughtfulness. I think she liked it. I don't remember her saying it needed high notes delivered over people kicking in unison.
So, there you have it. I don't know, it just seems like this art form maybe deserves better than rehashed versions of mediocre movies from the '90s (and Spider-Man, the world's greatest super-hero). Why do I care? Don't I have better things to worry about? I don't know and, no. Somehow this trend is going to get out of hand and start to actually affect my life and, when it does, I'll have wished I'd done something to nip it in the bud earlier.
I'm not claiming to be an expert, just offering my picks for incredibly odd choices. To those of you out there with actual knowledge of musicals and why they work and don't, who feel like chiming in, please do so.
TheCoolerKing has said everything he'll ever need to say about musicals.(Written by: TheCoolerKing)