Susan Stroman: 'It's wonderful collaborating with Mel. There's no one else like him'

Susan Stroman, director of YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN, currently touring around the country, says she didn't think twice when Mel Brooks asked her to collaborate on YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN as a follow up to their hit, THE PRODUCERS. Stroman says, "I just wanted to work with Mel again."

She continues, "It's wonderful collaborating with Mel. There's no one else like him, this extraordinary creature who is funny all the time. We'd become good friends doing The Producers and that process had been fantastic. The chance to work with him again, on anything - that was just a no-brainer."

When asked what she felt were the pitfalls of YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN, causing its early closing on Broadway, Stroman says, "What happened in New York was we got a little sidetracked with producer problems, theater owner problems, the business side of this business that I don't think about a lot. That and the economy taking a huge hit when we opened may have shortened our life there."

However, she is more than satisfied with how the show ended up. "All I know is it's fantastic we're able to do a tour. The show seems more focused and, away from the politics side of New York theater, it's playing to great houses. The idea of making an audience laugh every night, there's nothing greater than that."

To read the full article from the Houston Chronicle, click here.

Young Frankenstein was named Best Broadway Musical 2008 by the Outer Critics Circle Award and won 5 Broadway.com Audience Awards, including Favorite New Broadway Musical. Clive Barnes of the New York Post called Young Frankenstein, "the Broadway musical at its dizziest, glitziest and funniest" while Pat Collins of MY 9 News declared Young Frankenstein "a monster hit." Jeffrey Lyons of WNBC TV said "this riotously funny musical will knock you clear across 42nd Street" and Roger Friedman of Fox News called it simply, "utter genius." Young Frankenstein played its pre-Broadway engagement at Seattle's Paramount Theatre August 7th - September 1st,2007.

Based on the Oscar-nominated smash hit 1974 film, Young Frankenstein is the wickedly inspired re-imagining of the Mary Shelley classic from the comic genius of Mel Brooks. When Frederick Frankenstein, an esteemed New York brain surgeon and professor, inherits a castle and laboratory in Transylvania from his grandfather, deranged genius Victor Von Frankenstein, he faces a dilemma. Does he continue to run from his family's tortured past or does he stay in Transylvania to carry on his grandfather's mad experiments reanimating the dead and, in the process, fall in love with his sexy lab assistant Inga? Unfolding in the forbidding Castle Frankenstein and the foggy moors of Transylvania Heights, the show's raucous score includes "The Transylvania Mania," "He Vas My Boyfriend" and the unforgettable treatment of Irving Berlin's "Puttin' On the Ritz."

Released in 1974 to unanimous critical acclaim, the film received two Academy Award nominations, including one for Mel Brooks and Gene Wilder's script, also nominated for a Writer's Guild of America Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. Young Frankenstein was also the recipient of the two highest honors accorded films of science fiction: winning The Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation and The Nebula Award, given by The Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, for Best Dramatic Writing. Since its release, the film has become part of the national consciousness: in 2000, it was selected as #13 on AFI's 100 Funniest American Movies of All Time and in 2003, Young Frankenstein was chosen for preservation
in the Library of Congress National Film Registry.

The production team includes three Tony Award winning designers of The Producers: three time Tony Award winning set designer Robin Wagner, five-time Tony Award winning costume designer William Ivey Long and Tony Award winning lighting designer Peter Kaczorowski. Jonathan Deans is the sound designer. Two other Producers alumni complete the music department: Tony-award winning orchestrator Doug Besterman and musical director Patrick Brady.

For further information, visit YoungFrankensteinTheMusical.com.

Photo Credit: Linda Lenzi