Douglas Carter Beane to Direct Santino Fontana, Alice Ripley, and More in TO WONG FOO... Musical Workshop

According to the New York Post, a musical workshop of the cult-hit film, To Wong Foo...Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar! is headed into production in New York this week, directed by the film's author, Douglas Carter Beane.

According to the Post, the workshop will sport an all-star cast including, Tony Award- nominee Daniel Breaker, Tony Award-winner Alice Ripley, Ann Harada, Annie Golden, and Frozen's Santino Fontana as Vida Boheme, the role portrayed by the late Patrick Swayze in the film.

The score to the show is being written by Beane's husband, Lewis Finn.

Beane tells the Post, "The songs are very Americana by way of Aaron Copland. There's an opera vibe to it, and it's very open-hearted."

According to the report, Beane obtained the stage rights to the film in the early nineties, long before the boom of musical adaptations on Broadway.

According to Beane, the show's musical transformation is something of a homecoming for the story, which was originally intended for the stage.

"I was a struggling writer trying to break into the theater," he says. "I was working as a nanny in Brooklyn, and every time the family went on vacation, I'd write a play. I started working on 'To Wong Foo' but couldn't figure out how to put a car onstage. So I turned it into a screenplay instead."

Read the full story at The New York Post.