Nickolaw, Blumen-krantz and Jordan to Team with Mullally on KAREN: THE MUSICAL

As previously reported, the lovable Karen Walker will be walking her way into the Great White Way one stilettoed step at a time with the tentatively titled Karen: The Musical, a comedy inspired by Megan Mullally's Will & Grace character, Karen Walker.  

In an interview with the Los Angeles Times last week, Mullally revealed that significant progress has been made on the musical's development.  She has secured the rights from NBC and backing from Fox Theatricals. "The Drowsy Chaperone" director Casey Nickolaw is now attached, as is actor-composer Jeff Blumen-krantz, who will be composing the score.  Blumen-krantz and Mullally met in 1995 in the Broadway revival of "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying."  Leslie Jordan, Karen Walker's arch enemy on 'Beverley Leslie,' on "Will & Grace" is also slated to sign on.  The team is currently in the process of searching for a book writer.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Mullally is hoping for a try-out of the musical in L.A. before taking the show to Broadway and on tour.  To read the full report in the Los Angeles Times, click here.

In an interview with Metrosource in mid-September, Mullally said of the project: "I had this idea probably - gosh, what year is this? 2009 - I probably had this idea around 2005 and I was just like, "Oh, my God." And I just had it all in like a flash...It's basically Karen decides for a variety of hilarious reasons to do a Broadway show called "Karen: The Musical." That's the general premise of it right now...Two things that were never established on the show that the creators secretly always thought was that Karen was an ex-showgirl but she was also a bat who, at night, folds up her wings and sleeps upside-down hanging from the rafters and that she was, like, 250 years old. But yeah, I really want to do that show because the character can support that, but also because nobody ever does that. Actors usually want to distance themselves from their sitcom characters but I think it would be hilarious to just keep going with it in a new way...That character is just a real joy and there's just so much you can do with it comedically and especially if it's theater and there's no Standards & Practices to worry about...Just Karen saying you know, (Karen voice) "[Expletive] you!" to somebody is going to be funny just because you've never heard it before."

Mullally played the character of Karen Walker on NBC's "Will & Grace" for 8 seasons, receiving 2 Emmy Awards and 4 Screen Actors Guild Awards. She recently hosted a syndicated daytime talk show for NBC/Universal, "The Megan Mullally Show," and has appeared on Broadway in the Mel Brooks' musical Young Frankenstein and the revivals of How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying and Grease. She is currently starring in The Receptionist at the Odyssey Theatre in Los Angeles.

As a vocalist, her credits include performances at Lincoln Center, The Kennedy Center, The Seattle Symphony (with her band Supreme Music Program), and Los Angeles' Disney Concert Hall (soloist). She and her band, Supreme Music Program, recently released their third CD, Free Again!.