"Winning a Tony this year is like winning Best Attendance in third grade: no one will care but the winner and their mom."
-Kad
"I have also met him in person, and I find him to be quite funny actually. Arrogant and often misinformed, but still funny."
-bjh2114 (on Michael Riedel)
Matthew Morrison is the obvious choice. I think Borle could surprise in this role, much the way that Benanti did in GYPSY.
"Winning a Tony this year is like winning Best Attendance in third grade: no one will care but the winner and their mom."
-Kad
"I have also met him in person, and I find him to be quite funny actually. Arrogant and often misinformed, but still funny."
-bjh2114 (on Michael Riedel)
I wish they would use Abagnale's book instead of the movie as the source material. All the daddy issues that Speilberg put in the film really bogged it down. Borle is interesting casting. I think he'll be great. It's Lane I really can't see.
And I don't think Benanti was a surprise, I expected it. Maybe it was a surprise for other people. But, that's another thread.
I just feel that Frank is supposed to be very cool and suave with a voice that can woo any girl within a five mile radius. Unless he works on it, Borle doesn't have that voice.
Maybe he'll prove me wrong. But workshop casting is hardly Broadway casting anyway.
"I love talking about nothing. It is the only thing I know anything about." - Oscar Wilde
Christian Borle? I honestly cannot see him in this.
Frank is supposed to be the sexy, suave, debonair type man, and while Christian may be able to do that in a loveable way, I just can't help but think that Matt Morrison, Richard Blake, Jonathan Groff, or any of the "cute" Broadway actors working right now can't do this role.
I don't know; maybe they're going to change it around a little bit. But I just can't see Christian as a Leo DiCaprio type.
As much as I love Borle, I think Matthew Morrison is still the best choice for the role. I could see Michael Arden in it though, that would be interesting. Richard Blake is too old for this part. I don't understand the obsession with putting him in roles too young for him. Link? Warner? I can see Glen Gulia as being a little older, so that's fine. But he does not seem young enough for those other roles, including Frank.
I don't think Matthew Morrison was available. Isn't he in LA doing a TV series?
Tonya Pinkins: Then we had a "Lot's Wife" last June that was my personal favorite. I'm still trying to get them to let me sing it at some performance where we get to sing an excerpt that's gone.
Tony Kushner: You can sing it at my funeral.
i love Nathan lane and christian borle but i not interested in seeing this musical at all. they need to start writing orginal musicals again and stop getting them from movies. Legally Blonde is one of the only ones i can think of is the best musical off based on a movie.
I have no doubt Lane will ace this role. But Borle is VERY interesting casting. I like it.
I also thought of Arden at first (he can still 'read' as very young on stage), but I think Borle will be up to the task. He's a talented guy, and the one of the very best things about LEGALLY BLONDE.
Documentary as opposed to Hollywood fiction movie, which was the implication I got from the other poster.
Piazza is based on a book turned into a movie prior to the musical.
Based on a book that also had a movie based on it. So not actually based on the movie. 'Myths And Hymns' was much more random, and 'Floyd Collins' was historical fact.
I am a Camera (Cabaret) and Chicago were films before they were Kander and Ebb hit.
But 'Curtains' wasn't, and afaik 'Kiss Of The Spider Woman' was based on the book rather than the film that was also made of it.
Films have been turned into stage musicals long before the resent "boom".
A fact of which I am fully aware and usually fight to remind people of (I'm agreeing with you on this point, not arguing ).
Adaptation is adaptation. Before movies, there were plays and novels. Movies are NO different. The problem is not movie adaptations, its certain things about that particlar adaptation genre you don't find elsewhere. Musicals that seem to come out of marketing meetings, shows that aren't an adaptation, but a rehash, etc.
I have several names, one is Julian2. I am also The Opps Girl. But cross me, and I become Bitch Dooku!
I can't wait for this! Nathan is getting a lot of work lately. Two movies, a TV show, and two new Broadway shows. I'm really happy for him.
I can see Borle in the role.
"I'm tellin' you, the only times I really feel the presence of God are when I'm having sex and during a great Broadway musical." - Nathan Lane - Jeffrey
McNally's books for musicals have always been great to me. Ragtime, A Man of No Importance. But I really dislike the casting of Borle. I guess I'm too used to listening to Morrison on the demo, but he sounds fantastic and, judging from Borle's Spamalot and Legally Blonde performances, much better for the role. EVERY piece of casting gets the benefit of the doubt from me, even Hugh Panaro in-well, anything.
Ugh, I'm really not excited about Nathan Lane starring in this musical. I hope Sara Gettelfinger and Rachelle Rak are still attached to this project, they were the reason I was excited about it (and Matthew Morrison, but now he is gone as well).
"Some people can thrive and bloom living life in a living room, that's perfect for some people of one hundred and five. But I at least gotta try, when I think of all the sights that I gotta see, all the places I gotta play, all the things that I gotta be at"