What Neil Simon Plays Would Make Good Musicals?

My vote is BRIGHTON BEACH MEMOIRS.

Wonderful Depression Setting; (worked for FLORA, THE RED MENANCE), PLENTY OF EXCELLENT SUPPORTING ROLES and a ready-made tour de force performance for Angela Lansbury as Kate.

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The Gingerbread Lady- Think of Patti in the role!

Unfortunately, the great Mme. Lansbury said in an interview sometime ago that she's finished with the stage -- too demanding for her at her age (though I hold out hope that she could be coaxed into doing a concert or a very limited run in something).'

As for the question, I wonder how well his plays would adapt into musicals. Most feature two character scenes and a single set and probably wouldn't expand well. It strikes me that the ideas he's had that he thought lent themselves to musicalization, he's already turned into musicals -- Little Me, Promises Promises, They're Playing Our Song, Sweet Charity, The Goodbye Girl. I don't know -- how about his movie "The Out-of-Towners" (the original version, not the unfunny remake).

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Margo,

At the risk of repeating myself, BRIGHTON BEACH MEMOIRS is an ENSEMBLE piece that could be "opened up" beautifully like the film version did--scenes at beach, at older's soon office, at poolhall, etc.

Re: THE OUT-OF-TOWNERS--VERY funny, I agree, but humor is tied to a New York that just doesn't exist anymore.

That is why the film remake was about as funny as a triple bypass.

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The Odd Couple - expanded of course

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While my preference would be Brighton Beach Memoirs, I think that some claims could come from Laughter On The 23rd Floor. True, it was not a great success as a play but, it does contain an extensively neurotic central character and a whole raft of eccentric supporting characters. Also, it has a certain cache in terms of language. Remember the line, ' I'm going to miss speaking f___.' But, most of all it is about the early days of television- a concept that is not hard to sell.

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While we're on the subject of Neil Simon...I think I'd like to see a revival of They're Playing Our Song with Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker. A lot of money to be made there.

Hi Morosco,

Matthew Broderick as the uptight middle class Broadway Composer and Sarah Jessica Parker as the free-spirited ditzy pop lyricst?

Sorry, it's NOT developing in my camera! :)

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As for "The Gingerbread Lady", this was the musical that Neil Simon was trying to write, with Marvin Hamlisch, and it was not going anywhere. They decided to stop working on it but Simon remembered conversations that he had had during his working sessions with Hamlisch about his relationship with Carole Bayer Sager. A few months later Simon presented Hamlisch with a new script based on the relationship of a Composer and Lyricist and that musical became "They’re Playing Our Song".

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Marquise,

I see Marc Kudish & Sutton Faster in the musical version... you think it will play? :)

By the way, BAREFOOT IN THE PARK was Simon's semi-autobiographical portroyal of newlywed life with his wife, Joan.

After Joan passed away, he again used his life for art and wrote CHAPTER TWO, about a widower who recently lost his wife.

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Laughter on the 23rd Floor
I saw it last spring at a local college and it was hysterical!

Yes, I saw Robert Klein and Lucie Arnaz do the show on Broadway a number of years ago. I think it was around 1979.

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Brighton Beach Memoirs, DEFINITELY. It has great components for a musical. The characters want to sing (in my head at least). I'd love to see a puberty patter song thrown into the mix. Hahahaha.