"Follies" on Film

[Kringas]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 3:43am

R&H honcho Ted Chapin, who revealed that he and Dreamgirls writer-director Bill Condon have been conferring for two years about a film of Stephen Sondheim's Follies and one of Condon's "way into the film" could be via Chapin's lovely memoirs as a go-fer for that show ("Everything Was Possible: The Birth of the Musical 'Follies'")

My "way into the film" would be that it's a musical, so that's why they're singin', but that's just me. I'm one of those silly relics the entertainment media would have you believe no longer exists - someone who simply accepts singing in a musical because, well, it's a musical.

At any rate, I wonder if this has a snowball's chance in hell of happening.




Playbill

Updated On: 12/16/06 at 03:43 AM

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 4:24am

I think it has a *Chance* However, it will most likely depend on Condon's sucess with "Dreamgirls" However, how would it be cast???

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 8:55am

With old people.

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 9:12am

I could be Dimitri Weismann

[ljay889]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 10:36am

They were talking about a film with MGM when the original production closed, and that obviously fell through.

So I think it could work. It's a little exciting though. BUT there is no way FOLLIES could attract a younger audience like Dreamgirls, Rent, Chicago, etc. Which it may need for success.

[Katurian2]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 10:45am

Yes, that's a very good point ljay. The "go-to" audience for films nowadays are males 18-35, and I don't think that a movie about elderly folks thinking back to the good-ol' days of their theatre would have much pull for them.

[Michael Bennett]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 10:46am

The "in" that Condon is talking about is the mention in Chapin's book of a proposed film of FOLLIES that started early development under Hal Prince in which the action of the piece is transferred from a theatre to a film studio that is being torn down (think MGM in the 70s). That proposed screenplay is on file at the Lincoln Center Library and I think its a fascinating idea, with the musical numbers and Loveland sequences being pastiches of movie musicals from the 20s-50s.

This would obviously be a very expensive movie with apparent limited appeal, though I'm sure *if* it were done - the draw would be the supposed enormous star roster that would be put together for the cast.

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 10:49am

It could be done by HBO utilizing one of the many closed & abandonded theaters that dot the city. They than have a very realistic set to start with

No major studio would touch it. Speaking of utilizing an existing set, HBO should take Nathan Lane over to Rome & use the set for ROME & do A Funny Thing.....

Another would be to use the set of Deadwood for Destry Rides Again, which should be revived on Broadway by the way

[BustopherPhantom]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 11:53am

My opinion:

I do think that FOLLIES should be made as a film... someday. But not now. Not when almost all of the movie musicals released in this "revival" have been about showbiz. We need a bit more color in our selection.

Might I suggest to you, Rob Marshall (although there's probably no chance you're reading this) that your next movie should be INTO THE WOODS or another Sondheim show? (since Marshall has already been thinking about another musical that isn't a remake like GYPSY).

[allofmylife]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 4:32pm

It would be one of the toughest sells in the history of Hollywood. Musicals are SO hard to get produced as it is. I just don't see any market for a song-and-dance show about people 50 years older than the target audience these days.

One can't undervalue how important getting Beyonce was to getting Dreamgirls pgreenlit.

[ljay889]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 5:00pm

If they did bring it to film, I would be very dissapointed if they changed it to a movie studio being torn down. I know that was the idea in the 70's, but it wouldn't be FOLLIES if it took place in a movie studio. It's GOT to be the Weismann theatre.

Though they won't be able to get names like Beyonce to sell a Follies film. I'm sure they would get names like Meryl Streep, etc. And for the young 4, I'm sure they could get some younger marketable stars.

I think it would be very intriguing to see Follies as a movie.

Updated On: 12/16/06 at 05:00 PM

[theaterkid1015]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 5:03pm

I think "Follies" would just work really well as a movie because they could do things to the stage that would just require a crew of thousands in a theatre. Just faster changes and everything. Granted, it's not as amazing as seeing it done in a theatre, but still.

And, they could get some marketable actors. Meryl Streep was mentioned and they could have Anne Hathaway do the younger version or people like that. With the right director and the right marketing, it could do very well.

EDIT: I think we should see how the "Sweeney" movie does first. That might be a good gauge of how the movie would do.

Updated On: 12/16/06 at 05:03 PM

[Katurian2]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 5:09pm

I respectfully disagree that "Sweeney" would be a good gauge. While it is written by Sondheim, "Sweeney Todd" has the ability to be marketed as a musical horror movie, and we all know how popular the slasher genre is today. Plus- Sweeney has Johnny Depp.

"Follies" will be in the style of old musicals with old stars, and old-sounding songs and numbers. Totally different audiences.

[theaterkid1015]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 5:12pm

Yeah, good point. They are two very different shows.

Oh, but on that now, if Tim Burton touches "Follies" with a 300-mile pole, I will go insane.

[SeanMartin]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 9:20pm

One of the reasons why the "MGM" version never gt anywhere was because the producers wanted to jettison over half the score and replace it with musical numbers from "classic" Hollywood musicals of the 30s and 40s. "Loveland" would not have survived in anywhere near the form we know it as now.

Would it sell today? Probably not. But dont think that a movie musical's success is dependet on its appeal to the teenage crowd (IDLEWILD, anyone?). CHICAGO didnt have much to appeal to that market segment either, and yet they made it work.

[B3TA07]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 9:38pm

Glenn Close
Meryl Streep
Victor Garber

Updated On: 12/16/06 at 09:38 PM

[allofmylife]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 10:20pm

Three fine actors.
Talented.
Couldn't open a 7/11 between them.
Nobody in Hollywood would even take the pitch.

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 10:20pm

Oh God...I can see it now:
Glen Close crooning out "Losing my Mind" in that awful voice
Meryl Streep being handed "I'm Still Here" (Which did she go away?)

Garber might actually work though.

[Kringas]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 10:51pm

Streep and Close are too old.

[Plum]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 10:52pm

Silly me. I thought the "in" was built into Follies. They're freaking follies performers at a reunion; how hard is it to justify some singing there?

Filming this, nevertheless, would take some phenomenal ingenuity, especially if it incorporates elements of the Prince/Bennett staging like the "ghosts" accompanying their older selves and the delusional "Loveland" sequence. At least a film could justify a hack-and-slash revision of the original book. It needs it.

Overall...points to Condon for ambition, but this isn't going to happen unless Dreamgirls is a smash, and maybe not even then. Condon does seem to be the only person capable of making competent musical movies nowadays, though, so if anyone does it I want it to be him.

[B3TA07]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 10:52pm

What's Follies about?

[ljay889]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 10:56pm

^ Are you serious?

You suggest performers for a show you know nothing about?

[B3TA07]

Posted: 12/16/06 at 11:00pm

No I know some about it just not everything. This is the one Sondheim wrote about fairy tale creatures coming together in the forest right?

[TheaterAddict7652]

Posted: 12/17/06 at 12:09am

No, you're mistaking it with "Into the Woods"

[allofmylife]

Posted: 12/17/06 at 12:12am

How, exactly, did you get to be a featured actor without knowing what Follies are about?

http://www.mtishows.com/show_plot.asp?ID=000037

"Whatever happened to classes?"

Updated On: 12/17/06 at 12:12 AM