Monty Python's Spamalot (1 Viewer)

[Jake Lipson]

Fox just greenlit a film adaptation of Monty Python's Spamalot with Casey Nicholaw, who choreographed the Broadway production, now directing.

http://deadline.com/2018/05/spamalo...an-girls-casey-nicholaw-eric-idle-1202382256/

Since Spamalot was a musical adaptation of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, a film adaptation of it is basically a remake of that movie, with songs.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

So basically the same as The Producers remake.

I saw this show when it went "on tour" to Boston in the mid-2000s and, like the musical of The Producers, I was incredibly disappointed. It seemed like a bunch of actors play-acting one of my favorite movies, and I'm not sure how it was any more artistically valid than my friends and I quoting entire portions of the film to each other back in high school. Like the musical version of The Producers, Spamalot takes a nearly perfect film and replaces some of the funniest comic bits with songs that are just nowhere near as entertaining as the non-musical portions that they're replacing.

As much as I love Monty Python, and I'm sorry to sound so negative, but this strikes me as a creatively bankrupt endeavor.

 

[Jake Lipson]

athis strikes me as a creatively bankrupt endeavor.

I saw the tour as well and liked it a lot more than you did. Therefore, I wouldn't go straight to "creatively bankrupt," although I understand why you are saying that. But I would certainly agree with "creatively questionable."

What's interesting to me is how this will even work, because the show has updated the narrative of Holy Grail in order to add theatrical references which make it specific to a theatre environment. (For example, the Knights Who Say Ni! require that Arthur produce a Broadway musical, which prompts the musical number "You Won't Succeed on Broadway If You Don't Have Any Jews.")

Spoiler

Also, the Grail is found in the auditorium under an audience member's seat.

Things like this will fundamentally not work in a film. Of course, you could take them out...but if you take theme out, you basically have Monty Python and the Holy Grail as it exists now, only with songs.

I've always thought that if they wanted to do a movie of this, it would have been better to tape the Broadway production, which could then keep all of the theatrical references and be accepted as a document of the theatrical experience. But that's not what they're dong -- indeed, the Broadway production is now closed, so they couldn't film that even if they wanted to -- and transitioning this back to film proper is going to be extremely challenging.

Casey Nicholaw is an interesting choice to direct. Besides choreographing the Broadway production, he has now become a sensational Broadway director, with his including Aladdin, The Book of Mormon and the just-opened Mean Girls. However, he doesn't have film experience. The films of The Producers musical (directed by Susan Stroman) and Mamma Mia! (directed by Phyllida Lloyd) were both filmed by the same directors who previously directed their Broadway productions, and who did not have prior film directing experience. This did not result in the best possible movies, because they weren't really reconceived for film. The Producers took the vast majority of its cast from Broadway, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it's like no one told them that they didn't have to ply to the back of the house anymore. Mamma Mia! isn't nearly as bad in this regard, probably because the majority of its cast are primarily film actors, but the pacing is awful, especially in sequences that aren't musical numbers, and there's lots of incidences where it feels like Ms. Lloyd just doesn't know where to put the camera.

Nicholaw's only previous film directing credit is one television episode of Smash, which aired back in 2013. He hasn't directed a movie before at all.

So -- while I love and respect his work as a theater director -- I'm not sure that hiring a theater director is necessarily the right move here. We'll see. I loved the show, so I'm certainly invested in this being good. But I'm really skeptical.

Also: this is Fox putting this into development. That mans that by the time there's anything to show for this, more than likely it will be Disney putting it out. I don't mean this to suggest that Fox shouldn't be developing until the merger is finalized, because they absolutely should -- but, it's still worth mentioning, because we still don't really know what Disney is planning to do with their new acquisition.

 

[Hollywoodaholic]

I agree in wishing they had just preserved one of the Broadway performances with the ideal cast (Hank Azaria, Tim Curry) on tape or film as the best document of this show.

I took my family on a pilgrimage to see this on Broadway in 2007 and it was a fantastic experience. The film... probably won't be so much, but I'll certainly want to check it out and give it the benefit of the doubt.

 

[Jake Lipson]

The film... probably won't be so much, but I'll certainly want to check it out and give it the benefit of the doubt.

For me, it comes down to the fact that so much of the humor in the show is specific to it being a show and a theatrical event.

The theatrical jokes were a great way to bring the movie into a stage environment, but by the nature of the film medium being not that, those jokes and references won't work in the context of a movie.

If you remove that, then you basically have Monty Python and the Holy Grail over again, and that movie already exists. So what's the point of this?

 

[Malcolm R]

So basically the same as The Producers remake.

It worked for Hairspray.

 

[Jake Lipson]

It worked for Hairspray.

Yes, but Hairspray reinvented itself (again) for the screen and was directed by a filmmaker with screen experience, Adam Shankman, who honored the show but wasn't slavish to it. The hiring of Nicholaw, who was involved in the original staging as choreographer and does not have film experience suggests that this will be trickier to pull off. Also, Hairspray's jokes weren't especially theatrical-referential, so it translated well back to film.

We'll see how this goes. I'm certainly hoping it will be good.

 

[Sam Posten]

Hank Azaria or gtfo. He was great on Broadway

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

It worked for Hairspray.

But the John Waters original Hairspray with Rikki Lake wasn't a musical, despite the dance numbers. While it admittedly only meets the very loosest definition of a musical, Monty Python and the Holy Grail already did have characters breaking into song to express their feelings.

 

[Jake Lipson]

Tiffany Haddish has been offered the role of the Lady of the Lake:

https://www.broadwayworld.com/artic...l-in-the-Film-Adaptation-of-SPAMALOT-20180926

I thought she was hilarious in Girl's Trip. But, can she belt like Sara Ramirez?