NAKED CITY: THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MUSICAL
With the Australian release of Baz Lurhmann’s The Great Gatsby scheduled for its local premiere next month we were rather hoping that the $100 million rehash would be a musical, given the director’s affection for song and dance and all the accompanying theatricality. These days just about anything, be it a book, a film, event or a collection of songs is up for grabs when it comes to musical adaptation. The latest manifestation is the current Sydney production of A Clockwork Orange, but the best is yet to materialise.
When it comes to movies the metamorphosis into an all singing, dancing version might appear to throw up some immediate hurdles, particularly when you are adapting the grand scale of Hollywood onto the relatively small performance stage. That didn’t stop Titanic (the musical) which opened on Broadway in 1997, in the same year as the release of James Cameron’s blockbuster, and went on to win five Tony awards. We’re not sure how the actual sinking was portrayed but the idea of buckets of water being thrown onto the Broadway audience certainly comes to mind.
Horror movies would seem an anathema when it comes to the relatively cheerful, upbeat vibe of most musicals but that didn’t stop a US production of the Texas Chainsaw Musical, based of course on Tobe Hooper’s often banned 1974 classic The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Unfortunately the musical version was more of a spoof and lacked all of the gothic terror that the original movie delivered.
Similarly a 2008 production of The Fly (the opera), loosely based on David Cronenberg’s 1986 movie failed to evoke any of the pathos of the original. There’s also something obviously ridiculous about a man in a fly suit, suspended from the ceiling, warbling his way through a mournful aria. It’s enough to have the audience calling for a giant fly swat.
Whilst there have been some successful adaptations of books and movies into musicals on the local scene, Priscilla Queen Of The Desert is one that springs to mind, overall we have relied on the imported product – road tested on the stages of London’s West End and New York’s Broadway. Surely now is the time for local producers and entrepreneurs to get adventurous and deliver some home-grown product that strikes a direct cultural nerve.
If John Jarratt can hold a song in a bucket, we would love to see a local production of Wolf Creek: The Musical, with even a guest spot for import Quentin Tarantino, provided he is butchered in the opening ten minutes. Picnic At Hanging Rock: The Musical might seem too much of a mouthful but Chopper, The Dish and even Kangaroo Jack have an immediate appeal and would throw open a treasure chest of songwriting opportunities.
If feature films are considered too difficult then why not the rich archive of classic Australian TV shows, many of them just screaming to be adapted for musical theatre. Channel Ten’s The Shire was a flop on the small screen, but given a funky musical score and a cast of A-list celebrities, could well become a reborn suburban sensation. The controversial Number 96 did get a big screen run but the musical version awaits and peppered with full frontal nudity it would be an instant hit. Finally SBS’s Housos, arguably the worst Australian TV show of all time, had even less success when it hit the big screen but transformed into an opera, even directed by Baz himself, could well earn full redemption. It worked for Jerry Springer: The Opera – why not for the multicultural marauders of Sunnyvale?
