Xanadu and The 39 Steps
THEATER A current trend on Broadway is to turn movies into theater productions. This more likely is meant to fill seats from familiarity than taking a chance on an original idea. But some can succeed by using a familiar film as its basis when its creative forces burst through that fourth wall and think outside the box. Mel Brooks stuck gold when he turned his film The Producers into a smash hit musical though is less successful with the current critical failure of Young Frankenstein. (Actually it's really going for the hard sell with the title The New Mel Brooks Musical Young Frankenstein and isn't reporting its weekly box office grosses. And the NY Times reported that “Disney’s The Little Mermaid which also received some scathing reviews, is holding up fairly well…") But two film-to-stage shows currently playing that hit a bull's eye are the musical Xanadu and the comedy Alfred Hitchcock's The 39 Steps.
The movie Xanadu is notoriously regarded as bad but the new Tony-nominated stage musical is a 90-minute laugh fest. Set in Venice Beach, CA in 1980, a Greek muse, Kira (Tony nominee Kerry Butler) descends from Mt Olympus to inspire sidewalk artist, Sonny (Cheyenne Jackson), and help him open the first roller disco. With its tongue planted firmly in cheek, Xanadu flaunts the styles of the day (like short denim cut-offs, leg warmers, and roller skates), ups the camp quotient and has Butler using an exaggerated Australian accent that pokes fun at her movie counterpart, Olivia Newton-John.
The pop-rock music incorporates the song "Suddenly" from the film plus Newton-John's singles "Magic" and "Have You Never Been Mellow?" Scenery chewers Mary Testa and Jackie Hoffman (as Medusa and Aphrodite respectively) perform duets on Electric Light Orchestra's "Evil Woman" and "Strange Magic" with cackles so unforgettable you'll be cracking up for weeks. Though the set seems scaled-down for a Broadway production it only puts more focus on a cast that appears to relish every fun-loving onstage moment.
Alfred Hitchcock's 1935 thriller The 39 Steps gets a makeover that would most likely humor the master of suspense by turning it into a comedy. Four actors imaginatively take on what seems to be 100 different roles and sometimes change characters in the blink of an eye. This spoof maintains the plot of an international spy ring out to kill Richard Hannay (Charles Edwards), and playfully keeps stage show "mentalist" Mr. Memory, but heightens the drama to turn it on its end.
The quick costume changes and voice alterations right in front of you are amazing to watch and at some point become almost invisible from the fluidity and ease of the actors. The suspense here is to see how the cast will handle the next illusion. The sparse set can take on multiple locations as when it morphs from the interior of a speeding train to its roof with the use of a few trunks. And how often do you see shadow puppets pop up in a production? (Be sure to look for Sir Alfred!) Edwards stated in a Playbill interview that he doesn't mimic the film's lead, Robert Donat, but rather respectfully "conjure(s) up the spirit of the movie… and that style of acting". With a dozen or so references to other Hitchcock films this 2007 Olivier award-winning import easily deserved its Tony nomination for Best Play.
As these two shows prove, no matter how successful or poorly executed the source movie material, spoofing it is a fresher approach when appealing to today's sensibilities rather than literal translation. And live theater may just be the best medium to view them.
The movie Xanadu is notoriously regarded as bad but the new Tony-nominated stage musical is a 90-minute laugh fest. Set in Venice Beach, CA in 1980, a Greek muse, Kira (Tony nominee Kerry Butler) descends from Mt Olympus to inspire sidewalk artist, Sonny (Cheyenne Jackson), and help him open the first roller disco. With its tongue planted firmly in cheek, Xanadu flaunts the styles of the day (like short denim cut-offs, leg warmers, and roller skates), ups the camp quotient and has Butler using an exaggerated Australian accent that pokes fun at her movie counterpart, Olivia Newton-John.The pop-rock music incorporates the song "Suddenly" from the film plus Newton-John's singles "Magic" and "Have You Never Been Mellow?" Scenery chewers Mary Testa and Jackie Hoffman (as Medusa and Aphrodite respectively) perform duets on Electric Light Orchestra's "Evil Woman" and "Strange Magic" with cackles so unforgettable you'll be cracking up for weeks. Though the set seems scaled-down for a Broadway production it only puts more focus on a cast that appears to relish every fun-loving onstage moment.
Alfred Hitchcock's 1935 thriller The 39 Steps gets a makeover that would most likely humor the master of suspense by turning it into a comedy. Four actors imaginatively take on what seems to be 100 different roles and sometimes change characters in the blink of an eye. This spoof maintains the plot of an international spy ring out to kill Richard Hannay (Charles Edwards), and playfully keeps stage show "mentalist" Mr. Memory, but heightens the drama to turn it on its end.
The quick costume changes and voice alterations right in front of you are amazing to watch and at some point become almost invisible from the fluidity and ease of the actors. The suspense here is to see how the cast will handle the next illusion. The sparse set can take on multiple locations as when it morphs from the interior of a speeding train to its roof with the use of a few trunks. And how often do you see shadow puppets pop up in a production? (Be sure to look for Sir Alfred!) Edwards stated in a Playbill interview that he doesn't mimic the film's lead, Robert Donat, but rather respectfully "conjure(s) up the spirit of the movie… and that style of acting". With a dozen or so references to other Hitchcock films this 2007 Olivier award-winning import easily deserved its Tony nomination for Best Play.
As these two shows prove, no matter how successful or poorly executed the source movie material, spoofing it is a fresher approach when appealing to today's sensibilities rather than literal translation. And live theater may just be the best medium to view them.
