Gatsby Musical Heading to Broadway

[woeisme3]

Posted: 4/28/21 at 5:41pm

https://www.broadway.com/buzz/200701/florence-welch-and-thomas-bartlett-to-score-broadway-bound-the-great-gatsby-musical/

The property itself doesnt really thrill me, but Im so interested to see a musical score by Florence. Shes a masterful songwriter.

[EDSOSLO858]

Posted: 4/28/21 at 5:47pm

Good to see Welch and her music will eventually make it to B'way... remember that "Shake It Out" was cut from Moulin Rouge! before coming to NY.

Updated On: 4/28/21 at 05:47 PM

[BrodyFosse123]

Posted: 4/28/21 at 6:51pm

Every new musical adaptation is “headed for Broadway.” WTF?!

[HogansHero]

Posted: 4/28/21 at 10:03pm

BrodyFosse123 said: "Every new musical adaptation is “headed for Broadway.” WTF?!"

Agreed. I love the book, i love Florence, but this is "heading to Broadway" only in the sense that it is not headed away from Broadway. I hope it works, but there is a great deal that has to happen starting with finding a way to develop something that can hold up against one of the greatest book of all time.  

[Sutton Ross]

Posted: 4/28/21 at 11:04pm

I love her, so at at least the music will be great. This has potential to be a big, colorful, wonderful production. Looking forward. 

[A Director]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 5:32am

HogansHero said: "BrodyFosse123 said: "Every new musical adaptation is “headed for Broadway.” WTF?!"

Agreed. I love the book, i love Florence, but this is "heading to Broadway" only in the sense that it is not headed away from Broadway. I hope it works, but there is a great deal that has to happen starting with finding a way to develop something that can hold up against one of the greatest book of all time."

The story works best as a book.

 

[darquegk]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 8:54am

Sure, every musical is “headed to Broadway.”

But, a major alternative and pop star writing a musical of the Great American Novel with a Pulitzer winning book writer is “headed to Broadway” in a very different way than the epic musical adaptation of “The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari” which I, a totally non-famous government employee, am writing and composing in my off hours just to pass the time.

[JennH]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 9:45am

I was expecting Houston/Levitt jokes, I'm disappointed y'all ;P I digress...

I think it bears mentioning that she wrote the credit/theme song for the 2013 film, and if it weren't for that connection we'd likely be wondering what makes her the right choice for this. I think that's the ONLY reason why I'm intrigued TBH, because that song is indeed pretty great. I wonder how much period type music will be used, if any, but I also can see this being a more abstract type of show all around. 

[HogansHero]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 10:01am

darquegk said: "Sure, every musical is “headed to Broadway.”

But, a major alternative and pop star writing a musical of the Great American Novel with a Pulitzer winning book writer is “headed to Broadway” in a very different way than the epic musical adaptation of “The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari” which I, a totally non-famous government employee, am writing and composing in my off hours just to pass the time."

I of course agree that this has a fast lane but not all shows with pedigrees work and while I hope I am wrong I am not confident that Majok has the skill set to make this happen, especially with a director who also is not known for making musicals. Could this work? Yes of course. Could this end up as Capeman? That's my worry, enhanced by the fact that if you don't capture the essence of Fitzgerald's words (and I don't see how you can) you will disappoint many. We shall see. As I say I would love for this to work. (Note that Gatz works because it was wed to the words of the novel.)

[JBroadway]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 10:14am

I'm not actually familiar with Welch's music, so I don't know if this is in line with her writing style, but I wonder if she could take the Great Comet approach: pull most of the lyrics straight from the source text, and write the music around it. 

[BroadwayNYC2]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 10:48am

I love Florence so I’m interested in this obviously, but I’m just of the mindset that the property is not meant to be adapted. It has never fully worked.

I also associate the property with Lana’s Young and Beautiful, so will be tough to scrub that from my mind if this ever comes to fruition.

[Owen22]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 11:43am

Add to the fact that there have already been many, many, many musical adaptations of this story that have never gone anywhere (I myself have seen two).  Now, this is the first to be written by a star pop writer so it will at least get the attention the others didn't...

[goodlead]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 11:51am

Have any of these adaptations gotten the rights to the property?  I doubt that it's in the public domain.

[JBroadway]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 12:01pm

goodlead said: "Have any of these adaptations gotten the rights to the property? I doubt that it's in the public domain."

 

It just went into public domain this year. 

[Owen22]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 12:08pm

goodlead said: "Have any of these adaptations gotten the rights to the property? I doubt that it's in the public domain."

That is a great question. I have seen these adaptation (and heard of others) all at professional theatre companies (the two I saw were in England-I also saw a third in England, though it was a not a musical, it was a sorta of fabulous interactive immersive production).

So, had the rights-givers just been letting anyone adapt the material until it became public domain?

[HogansHero]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 12:47pm

Owen22 said: "So, had the rights-givers just been letting anyone adapt the material until it became public domain?"

I don't know but I will make an educated guess. I am certain that the Public Theater did not let Gatz happen without a license to exploit the material being in place. Also, it is important to distinguish between performance rights and exploitation rights. The terms of the former tend to be more "standard." In both cases, there are two parts financially, an upfront amount to secure and hold the rights, and a percentage royalty amount. My guess is that the owners of the Gatsby rights were not making a big ask and so even modest efforts could reasonably be undertaken. (None of this suggests these productions you mention had or did not have rights to exploit the novel in the service of their plays.)

[aliceripleyofficial]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 4:23pm

I love Florence so much but Gatsby has proven time and time again that it's unadaptable... 

[darquegk]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 4:42pm

I'm not sure it's unadaptable: both movies are widely loved but usually in an "either-or" fashion: do you prefer the one that captures the style, or the spirit? The detached WASP elegance or the anhedonic rock star existence?

Kander and Ebb aren't a thing anymore, so the absolute superlative Gatsby show won't ever happen. But I'm hoping Welch has an amazing take, and I'm hoping somebody else has one to challenge her like the "Wild Party" debacle.

[Dollypop]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 7:13pm

As someone who taught the novel regularly and have seen three of its unhappy screen adaptations as well as Harbison's dreadful operatic version, I can say this novel only works on the printed page.

[gypsy101]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 7:32pm

BroadwayNYC2 said: "I love Florence so I’m interested in this obviously, but I’m just of the mindset that the property is not meant to be adapted. It has never fully worked.

I also associate the property with Lana’s Young and Beautiful, so will be tough to scrub that from my mind if this ever comes to fruition. "

you could just as easily associate it with Florence’s song Over the Love from the same film which is the song I think about so i’m very excited for this

[gypsy101]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 7:32pm

BroadwayNYC2 said: "I love Florence so I’m interested in this obviously, but I’m just of the mindset that the property is not meant to be adapted. It has never fully worked.

I also associate the property with Lana’s Young and Beautiful, so will be tough to scrub that from my mind if this ever comes to fruition. "

you could just as easily associate it with Florence’s song Over the Love from the same film which is the song I think about so i’m very excited for this

[BroadwayNYC2]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 7:40pm

“You could just as easily associate it with Florence’s song Over the Love from the same film which is the song I think about so i’m very excited for this“

Except one was a massive hit, nominated for a Grammy and the other didn’t make it off the soundtrack.

[VintageSnarker]

Posted: 4/29/21 at 8:36pm

I love her music but I didn't really get this until I read the comments about Great Comet and The Wild Party. I'm a little more curious now about what this will look like. 

I'm hoping the number of women on the creative team means the show will figure out something to do with Daisy (and to a lesser extent Jordan). 

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 5/2/21 at 12:23am

"The Copyright Days Are Over"

[NameGreg]

Posted: 5/2/21 at 12:31am

Honestly I’m not sure if Gatsby is the kind of story that can really benefit from this. My main problem with the recent film was that it felt like it was style over substance. While that doesn’t inherently happen with musicals, it still happens a lot with all the flashy music. Ironically enough, the problem of the previous film adaptation was that it had no style and was just pretty boring.