New Sondheim interview (Follies film, new project, etc) — Page 2

As much as I'd love Williams in the role... Pfeiffer has been and will continue to be my first choice for Phyllis. PARTICULARLY after her delectable and incandescent turn as Velma in HAIRSPRAY.

And Clooney remains my number one Ben, RDJ my number one Buddy.

Meryl for Carlotta? I'd take a Sally OR a Phyllis from her as well, but I'd LOVE her take on Carlotta.

Sally will, indeed, remain the hardest role to cast. I think Lisa Kudrow has everything but the singing ability (and star power?) necessary for the role.

P

"I loved Sweeney, but I know that I'm the minority."

Maybe a minority here but Burton's Sweeney Todd was immensely successful critically, as mentioned. Sondheim said in an interview he approved of all the cuts, and was happy with the final product. (He said in a telephone interview he thinks it's one of the few musical movies that adapted it appropriately for the medium). Sondheim wanted "Sweeney" to be a horror movie and that's exactly what he got. I think Sweeney is Burton's best film and absolutely proves he is has still 'got in'.

"Burton should stay away from WOODS. We know Burton doesn't like chorus singing on film. Woods is very much an ensemble musical, and the chorus numbers are essential to the piece.
"

Well, it's a bit more complicated than that. In an interview Sondheim said that Burton and Logan (the screenwriter) didn't want 'chorus' of random people singing on the street. But he was willing to take an ensemble of all the named characters for the ballad – they did a rehearsal of the Ballad but they (I assume Burton etc..) thought it just stopped the story/show, asking you to 'attend the tale' when you can just 'attend it'.

So I think that a Burton ITW movie would still have ensemble numbers, as they are necessary.

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Steve addresses the chorus issue in today's interview linked elsewhere. I had never heard that THIS was how the chorus was intended on being used:

A: "Tim Burton and John Logan (the screenwriter) didn't want a singing chorus in the film, so we'd rehearsed a version with the principals singing the ballad. But when it came time to film, they felt it would hold up the story. And I said, ‘Fine.' A film requires a different pace and didn't need the ‘attend the tale' — just the tale itself. It was: What will work as a film?"

I wonder who the "principals" are he is referencing? The victims as the singers of the Ballad, or the actual principal characters themselves?

P

That's true, PRS, I have the screenplay too... lest we forget that the MAIN reason the Ballad wasn't filmed was because of that month-long drama with Johnny's daughter almost dying from the rusty nail and all that which axed a few weeks from the shooting schedule, I mean Christopher Lee was even outfitted as the Lead Ghost... in film, so much changes on a day-to-day basis I'm wondering if maybe there was a directorial conceit to how the ballads were to be achieved that is more complex than the screenplay (which, even the one on the official site, is dated months before filming even began).

And I still can't believe there are no deleted scenes NOR a commentary by Burton OR Steve on the DVD! Time for a Deluxe Special Edition! Though since the Blu-Ray was gipped out of any bonus content, I guess we'll have to content ourselves with the stuffed-to-the-gills Special Edition for the next few years.

P

Add me to the minority of theater fans who like Tim Burton's Sweeney, and I think it's one his better movies. No, it wasn't a box office smash like Hairsray or Mamma Mia, but the vast majority of the critics did like it, as it has an 85% on Rotten Tomatoes and earned Johnny Depp his third Oscar nomination. In my opinion, most of the cuts made for the movie worked well. I think the only thing I would have liked to have seen is the Judge's Johanna put in.

And I agree that, while I would never want to see the movie cast on stage, I would also not want to see any of the Broadway casts (including Cerveris and LuPone) in the film either. The Broadway casts worked well on Broadway and the film cast worked well in the film.

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Hey, Marshall still has KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN to do before anything else, as far as I'm concerned... love him or hate him that's the ideal project for him, and he choreographed it on Bway (for the most part)...

... but I don't think he's the WORST choice for FOLLIES, though his penchant for cuts makes me leery...

I say as long as Sondheim is as involved with FOLLIES as he was with SWEENEY - or more - I will be happy with whatever the result (unless it's a huge disaster, and even then...)

P

"Bobby projects the musical numbers onto a stage like Roxie does in Chicago"

So Bobby is gay after all?

I think the Rob Marshall backlash has more to do with the fact that he's stated several times that he doesn't believe movie musicals today can be done with people singing 'in real life' (as in directly to each other), instead all the songs must be 'justified', as to make the singing more believable to the audience.

That concept may work for Nine and it certainly worked well for Chicago, but it's not the only way a movie musical can be done. And how many other musical adaptations could be done this way? I haven't seen Follies so I can't comment on it, but surely Les Miserables and Miss Saigon couldn't be done using his concept. At least not without some massive cuts to the score.

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Updated On: 10/24/09 at 12:28 PM

I thought that Sweeney Todd was a good example where randomly busting out to sing did work, but that's just me. I guess perhaps because it immediately starts with singing might help this (no awkwardness waiting for that 'moment')

(See other examples, e.g. Dreamgirls, it has been awkward because I felt through the first 1/2 of the movie they were avoiding people singing then randomly they show some random singing on the street).

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~ marshall lost me as well. he doesn't trust movie audiences or the material. he feels he has to resort to gimmicks to justify the musical aspects of the story instead of just letting it be.

let a musical *be* a musical. two of the biggest box office hits of this decade were full out musicals without having to resort to these kind of gimmicks: mamma mia and hairspray.

Updated On: 10/24/09 at 08:20 PM

I think out of the recent boom of movie musicals in the the 2000s, Burton's Sweeney Todd is second only to possibly Chicago. I loved his vision of Todd, and I think Helena Bonham Carter's performance is stunning (even if her singing is weak).

Because Rob Marshall feels that way about movie musicals I get the sense that he's staying away from the projects where he couldn't find a concept to justify the musical sequences.

The songs in Sweeney worked because Burton had already created a hyper-reality. Having people singing in that world was fine because it was already so far removed from real life, which I would also say about Luhrman's world in Moulin Rouge. But remember that for all the successes, there are an equal number of things that should have been sure fire hits where people are just bursting into song, The Producers, Rent, Phantom, that just didn't ignite the box office the way the studios thought they would.