Film Rights to WICKED Author's Re-Interpretation of 'Alice in Wonderland' Up for Grabs

While rumors continue to abound about a big screen adaptation of Wicked, the hit Broadway musical based on Gregory Maguire's best selling book, The Hollywood Reporter today revealed that the rights to another of Maguire's novels 'After Alice', is up for grabs.

According to the site, rival studios will have the opportunity to land the re-interpretation of the Lewis Carroll classic beginning October 27th. The book is described as "a fairy-tale remix about the people Alice LEFT BEHIND and the friend who follows her down the rabbit hole."

Amazon's official description of the novel follows:

From the multi-million-copy bestselling author of Wicked comes a magical new twist on Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, published to coincide with the 150th anniversary of Lewis's Carroll's beloved classic.

When Alice toppled down the rabbit-hole 150 years ago, she found a Wonderland as rife with inconsistent rules and abrasive egos as the world she left behind. But what of that world? How did 1860s Oxford react to Alice's disappearance?

In this brilliant work of fiction, Gregory Maguire turns his dazzling imagination to the question of underworlds, undergrounds, underpinnings-and understandings old and new, offering an inventive spin on Carroll's enduring tale. Ada, a friend of Alice's mentioned briefly in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, is off to visit her friend, but arrives a moment too late-and tumbles down the rabbit-hole herself.

Ada brings to Wonderland her own imperfect apprehension of cause and effect as she embarks on an odyssey to find Alice and see her safely home from this surreal world below the world. If Eurydice can ever be returned to the arms of Orpheus, or Lazarus can be raised from the tomb, perhaps Alice can be returned to life. Either way, everything that happens next is "After Alice."

The Broadway musical Wicked features music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and a book by Winnie Holzman. It is based on the 1995 Gregory Maguire novel Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, an alternative telling of the witches from the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz and L. Frank Baum's classic 1900 story The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Wicked premiered on Broadway at the Gershwin Theatre in October 2003. Its original stars included Idina Menzel as Elphaba, Kristin Chenoweth as Glinda, and Joel Grey as the Wizard. The original Broadway production won three Tony Awards and six Drama Desk Awards while its cast album received a Grammy Award. It celebrated its tenth anniversary on Broadway on October 30, 2013, and played for over 4,785 performances, making Wicked the 11th longest-running Broadway show in history.

Image courtesy of Amazon