Will we ever see Disney's Hunchback on Broadway?

[kurt.perry41]

The recording from the berlin production is one of my very favorite cast albums ever.

[CATSNYrevival]

Nope. Never.

[jv92]

The bigger question is, Will we ever not see a "Next Disney musical"-related thread on BWW every 12 hours in the near future?

[NewYorkPulse24]

I actually really think this ought to come to Broadway already!
Its such a strong piece!

I think Disney should drop Dumbo and work on getting this and Hercules up!

[CATSNYrevival]

^They did drop Dumbo. Well, they dropped the domain name so I would assume it's off the table now.

[rosscoe(au)]

It would be better than that hot mess that is the Lion King. We can only hope Disney will be Hunchback in at some stage. Or at least allow others to produce the show

[onedaymore]

They've been talking about it for years. Whether or not someone will actually do something about it is the question.

[finebydesign]

A lot of people don't know that show was a Michael Eisner "pet project." It's not very popular within the division and I can't imagine them mounting a Broadway production. There are some fascinating notes floating around concerning a scaled down version of the German show.

[My Oh My]

I hope not. At least not if they plan to do the kitschy, tacky, garish Beauty and the Beast treatment of non-adaptive animation to stage cartoony hot mess that pierce the eyeballs.

And let's not forget the creepy, talking head of Chip.

[Mister Matt]

It's amazing how often this topic comes up. If the German production were going to happen here, it would have happened already. Luckily, if Hunchback ever does open on Broadway, it most likely won't be the German staging. But I wouldn't get my hopes up. Like Pocahontas or Mulan, Hunchback wasn't a huge rousing success. Disney has treated it as second-tier since the initial home video release.

[JulesReverie]

I dream so of a Hunchback of Notre Dame musical starring Terrance Mann as Frollo, Micheal Arden as Quasi, and Josefina Scaglione as Esmeralda *sigh* (if I ever win the powerball I would make that happen)

[ChiChi]

@jv92 - "The bigger question is, Will we ever not see a "Next Disney musical"-related thread on BWW every 12 hours in the near future?"


This really was unncessarily rude.

[jv92]

No, it really wasn't. We had the TANGLED thread. We had the PRINCESS AND THE FROG thread. We had the RIP BEAUTY AND THE BEAST thread bumped last week after 5 years in the archives. I'm a little Disney-ed-out.

I did not say, "No! I hope it never comes! Boo! Hiss!" I did not say "Disney sucks!" I did not say "Off with the Mouse's head!" In fact, if anyone was "rude" (note quotes), it was My Oh My. (Though, My Oh My, I don't think you were rude at all. You make a good point.)

But now, since you're looking for "rude" I will be rude with a capital R:

Shove it.

[kurt.perry41]

well actually those threads were what reminded me.

[bwayphreak234]

I did not say "Off with the Mouse's head!"

jv92 - this made me laugh

[sephyr]

I need to see this on stage. And I need to hear Out There live. It's a fantastic song. Along with the rest of the songs from the soundtrack. I'd love to see what songs they would add to make it a full length on-stage musical :)

[kurt.perry41]

you can, there's a berlin recording which is splendid.

The additional music is brilliant

[ChiChi]

"I'm a little Disney-ed-out."

Then don't read the thread and allow people actually interested in the idea to enjoy the conversation.

[After Eight]

ChiChi, I applaud you.

I don't get all the Disney hate. I guess Disney committed the cardinal sin of revitalizing Broadway. And that can't be forgiven.

My Oh My must have a chip on his shoulder of some sort. I find the character of Chip to be delightful. Far more so than the likes of Joanne, Phyllis, and Fosca, to name but a few.

So by all means, let's have more Disney musicals on Broadway. And let one of them be Hunchback.

[JulesReverie]

And its hard NOT to see animated Disney movies as potential Broadway shows when they often cast Broadway vets to voice/sing for characters and get Broadway lyricists and composers to do their music (Starting with Jodi Benson, Howard Ashman, Alan Menken from Smile, to Tim Rice to Stephen Schwartz to Paige O'hara to Judy Kuhn to Lea Salonga etc)

[westcoast_wannabe]

Mister Matt why do you say luckily it most likely won't be the German staging? What was wrong with the German staging? I've seen some pictures of the sets and thought they were gorgeous, but I've never seen any clips from the show or heard the cast recording.

[g.d.e.l.g.i.]

A script for the English version has been floating around for a while...

(And the PM's start now.)

[ChiChi]

"And its hard NOT to see animated Disney movies as potential Broadway shows when they often cast Broadway vets to voice/sing for characters and get Broadway lyricists and composers to do their music"

I agree and on a prima facie level, they're musicals! Plain and simple. Why not give them a stage treatment

[Mister Matt]

Mister Matt why do you say luckily it most likely won't be the German staging? What was wrong with the German staging?

It was almost entirely projections on blocks rising out of the stage. The blocks would go up and down at different levels for different scenes, but it got boring very quickly. It only took a couple of scenes before you saw pretty much everything the show had to offer. Believe me, the promotional photos made it look far more stunning in close-up cropped shots than it did when you saw the full stage and watched the show in its entirety. What looks huge and impressive in the photos often was rather small and dark in the massive barn of a theatre. The only truly pretty set was the Notre Dame interior during Hilf den Verstoss'nen (God Hep the Outcasts). What was supposed to be this really advanced technological wonder really came off as cold, uninspired and repetitive.

Draussen (Out There) was staged with Quasimodo performing almost the entire song standing on his knees, for some unknown reason. And the little choreography in the show was unremarkable. Drunter-Drüber (Topsy-Turvy) was choreographed as a nod to a traditional German folk dance, so the reference was lost on me.

The costumes, especially for the gargoyles, were beautiful and the new music was gorgeous. But the only way anyone would truly enjoy the original staging was if they were a HUGE fan of projections, projections, projections. The first act finale was as embarrassing as the first act finale for the Broadway production of Jekyll and Hyde.

[ChiChi]

I have a video of that production and I can't see much in regard to the projections you mention. It was shot from a balcony I think so it really only focuses in on the actual performers. I like the voices in the production though. The costumes are quite dazzling.

I hesitate, but it seems that you (matt) think that just because a show may be limited on set design, all that is offered is seen in the first few minutes. The set is not all there is to a show and as you mentioned there is great costuming and makeup, so it hardly seems fair to say a production has little to offer after the first four minutes if you're only focusing on what the set offers.

[EricMontreal22]

Much if not all of the show is on youtube, for anyone who wants to see the staging. It did seem odd to get Lapine to do such a tech heavy show.