A STAR IS BORN Heads For Broadway, Jackman In Tow

Hugh Jackman, who has trod the boards of Broadway before, is in talks to head back to Manhattan's Great White Way to headline a stage adaptation of the 1954 Warner Brothers movie musical A Star Is Born.

Jackman is lining up to play the role of Norman Maine, an alcoholic movie star whose career is on the decline. James Mason played the part in the original film opposite Judy Garland.

According to a report in the New York Post, the new stage version will feature all of the Harold Arlen-Ira Gershwin songs from the original film. Michael John La Chuisa, who scripted the play The Wild Party, is adapting the film’s Academy Award winning screenplay by Moss Hart and Dorothy Parker. He is also serving as the show’s musical supervisor. The producers hope to workshop the show later this year and then open on Broadway in 2009 or 2010.

Previously, Jackman won a Tony award in 2004 for starring in the musical The Boy From Oz. He is also lined up for a possible new film version of the musical Carousel.

HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 3: The Poster

This post is for all the parents of tween kids. Here's the first poster for next falls High School Musical 3: Senior Year.

If you have somehow managed to miss the insanely huge phenomenom that is High School Musical, you don't have kids, a television or both. Suffice it to say, the folks at Disney have struck a gold mine with two made-for-television pop music confections and an avalanche of merchandising tie-ins that would make George Lucas envious.

Interestingly, I believe this marks the first time that a made-for-television movie has spawned a theatrical sequel. Usually, it's the other way around. (Yes, Revenge Of The Nerds IV: Nerds In Love, I'm looking at you.) Of course, you also to have to remember that the first High School Musical was originally developed as a third Grease movie, so I guess there's a nice symetry in everything.

I don't know much about the plot of this new film beyond the fact that as graduation approaches, the series' main couple Troy (Zac Efron) and Gabriella (Vanessa Hudgens) face the possibility of being apart due to going to different colleges. And there presumably will be some singing and dancing. In a high school.

HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 3 Headed To The Big Screen

Recently, it seems that when a film franchise has run its course as a theatrical series, it can still find life, and profitability for its studio, as direct-to-video or made-for-tv fare. Yes, American Pie, I'm looking at you. Disney, however, is doing a reversal of this trend with their highly successful High School Musical made-for-tv movie franchise, announcing today that the third installment, High School Musical 3: Senior Year will be released theatrically next fall.

The movie comes in the wake of the impressive ratings, when 18 million viewers tuned into the Disney Channel for the second High School Musical's debut.

According to Variety, the film's story will focus on-

Seniors Troy (Zac Efron) and Gabriella (Vanessa Hudgens) facing the prospect of being separated from one another as they head off in different directions to college. Joined by the rest of the Wildcats, they stage an elaborate spring musical reflecting their experiences, hopes and fears about their future.

The franchise has already turned out to be phenomenially popular, with sales of the first two High School Musicals DVDs and soundtrack albums hitting into the millions.

Stars Efron and Hudgens will be joined by the rest of the regular High School Musical cast- Ashley Tisdale, Lucas Grabeel, Corbin Bleu and Monique Coleman. Peter Barsocchini and Kenny Ortega, the writer and director respectively of the previous High School Musicals, will return for part three as well.

High School Musical 3: Senior Year will bop its way into theaters on October 24.

No Hope For Landis's BAT BOY?

Some disappointing news for you fans of films adapted from off-Broadway musicals based on supermarket tabloid headlines. It appears that director John Landis's big screen adaptation of Bat Boy: The Musical that has been languishing in development may not be escaping into active production any time soon, if ever.

Speaking briefly with Landis after his press conference at the New York Film Festival yesterday for his new documentary Mr. Warmth: The Don Rickles Project, we asked him what was happening with the film.

"Bat Boy’s a tragedy," he replied, shaking his head. "I don’t think anyone will give us the money. I've been trying."

Bat Boy first appearaed on the cover of the Weekly World News in 1992, where his freakish features made that issue one of the highest selling issues in the tabloids history. Other stories about the half-man, half-bat creature soon followed. Soon Bat Boy had become such the cultural icon that Keythe Farley, Brian Flemming and Laurence O'Keefe collaborated on bringing the character to the stage in a production that debuted appropriately enough on Halloween, 1997.

Although Landis' more recent work has not fared well at the box office, I have to admit that I'm a bit surprised that he has been having difficulties securing financing for the film. His films Animal House (1978), The Blues Brothers (1980), An American Werewolf In London (1981), Trading Places (1983) and Coming To America (1988) are all still popular today. Batboy seems like a project that would be uniquely suited to the director's strengths and experiences. He has shown he can handle horror-tinged comedy with An American Werewolf In London, while The Blues Brothers and Blues Brothers 2000 (story problems notwithstanding) show that he is no stranger to staging cinematic musical numbers. His collaboration with Michael Jackson for the music video cum short film Thriller came at what was arguably the height of his career and helped put a stamp of legitimacy on what was being considered at the time as a fairly disposable pop medium.