It's quite possible that a movie of "She Loves Me" with Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke would be my favorite thing ever. What a bummer that it never happened!
"Wasn't Disney going to do HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME for ABC?"
Yes, they were! I remember it even being in Alan Menken's bio for the LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS revival.
SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE was offered to be made into a movie. James Lapine said in the audio commentary on the dvd, that he was offered to either make it into a movie or just film the production. After spending years on the show, getting it to Broadway, he said he was "so sick of it" and didn't want to spend another two years developing it on film. He wanted to move on to other projects, so he went with just filming it. He did say though, that he regrets his decision.
I would love a movie version of Elton John's AIDA and a live action movie of Disney's HUNCHBACK.
Let's hope they both happen sometime.
"TO LOVE ANOTHER PERSON IS TO SEE THE FACE OF GOD"- LES MISERABLES---
"THERE'S A SPECIAL KIND OF PEOPLE KNOWN AS SHOW PEOPLE... WE'RE BORN EVERY NIGHT AT HALF HOUR CALL!"--- CURTAINS
Years ago there was a lot of talk about Steven Spielberg's animated Cats on screen. Like so many of the other aborted stage-to-screen attempts mentioned on this thread, the topic was raised often enough to raise people's hopes and then forgotten for some period of time. This mention in a 1991 Entertainment Weekly article happened during one of the lulls: https://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,315865,00.html
I remember being worried that the production would resemble a classic Disney cartoon, but I had hopes when I saw drawings such as these: https://one1more2time3.wordpress.com/tag/amblimation/ Click the link and search for the word "blitz".
According to IMDb's page for High School Musical (and info about working titles), Grease 3 evolved into HSM. Then again, the info is user-submitted, so make of that what you will.
"There is no problem so big that it cannot be run away from."
~ Charles M. Schulz
A couple years ago there was also all that talk about a South Pacific movie remake. I specifically remember them saying it would be "darker" than the original piece and of course all the hypothetical casting fun that came with it :)
I remember being worried that the production would resemble a classic Disney cartoon, but I had hopes when I saw drawings such as these
Those drawings are intriguing, but I wonder why it focused on images of the destruction of WWII. I can only assume they were attempting to add a "dark" or "edgy" layer just for the sake of doing something different.
"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
Those drawings are intriguing, but I wonder why it focused on images of the destruction of WWII. I can only assume they were attempting to add a "dark" or "edgy" layer just for the sake of doing something different.
Or perhaps for the sake of doing something interesting? Cats without a different angle could be a dreary night at the movie house. (I can't make it through the filmed theatrical version without copious amounts of alcohol, although the orchestra is amazing.) Then again, the dark/edgy layer you described could lose one potential market (kids) while not necessarily appealing to the older demographic. I can't fault the decision to drop the project, but I would have liked to see the finished product.
Reba's AGYG actually was supposed to be filmed for television like Peter Pan or Into the Woods. Reba wanted it to have a bigger budget and be a film (likely to get a soundtrack) and they wouldn't do it, so she said no to filming it for TV.
I can't help thinking that Cats imagery is *somehow* inspired by Eliot's more mature work--certainly it resembles more the London I would picture from The Waste Lands than anything in Old Possum's, but I can't really place how it would fit.
Amblination did some pretty weird (and IMHO not so successful) films once Spielberg broke up with Don Bluth after Land Before Time (Bluth himself did some weird films after too--from All Dogs Go To Heaven to Rock a Doodle but that's another subject)--films like We're Back awkwardly squeeze some weird dark imagery into what's very much a kid's movie--I wonder who would have directed this. (although I admit I do have a soft spot for Balto). Apparently Cats, which was in development for ages, fell apart when Spielberg closed Amblimation and folded it into Dreamworks Animation, but I have no idea why they didn't bring the project with them. I admit that the idea of an animated Cats does kinda intrigue me--it could be awful, but it could be an excuse for some wonderfully weird psychedelic animation. I remember reading somewhere they were trying to give it more of a story, though...
PROMISES, PROMISES with Streisand?! I read somewhere that it was actually going to star Neil Diamond and Lucie Arnaz. But as far as these things go who knows anymore.
I would like to add one to this list: IN THE HEIGHTS
I remember reading somewhere that Liza went as far as to actually record a few tracks from Evita and when she heard them she ordered them destroyed- now this is probably the stuff of legend and rumor of course, but there is a part of me that could actually see it happening.
I think anytime a movie musical comes out and is somewhat successful, and the same with a big hit on Broadway, there is a flood of people in Hollywood that instantly want to bring a whole bunch of shows to the big screen- then they get into early development on these projects and realize what hard work it is getting something that worked on the stage to work on screen. I'm sure if Rock of Ages and Les Miz do well in theaters this year we are going to get a brand new list of musicals announced for the big screen, and then in a couple of years from now someone will start a thread here saying "whatever happened to the planned movie version of..."