Update: "Rocky: The Musical" Coming to Broadway Feb. 2014

[JamesG]

Rocky Being Adapted as a Musical
Jun 2, 2011
by Robyn Ross


From the Big Scrapple to the Big Apple? Rocky is being adapted into a stage musical.

Tony-winning songwriting duo Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty and writer Thomas Meehan are well along in their work on the 1976 Best Picture Oscar winner, according to The New York Times.




"It's been a long gestation period, but it's come to be a work that we're really proud of. There was some worry early on — could we really make a musical out of a boxing picture? Could you make Rocky sing and dance? But when we did the reading, people were very impressed, and we're going forward," Meehan said.






The project will be a relatively small production with about five principal characters and a plot similar to the first Rocky picture which tells the story of Philly fighter Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) who gets a shot at the heavyweight title.

"At first I thought, all the world needs is a Rocky musical," Meehan told the Times.

"But then I looked at the film. I thought it had beautiful construction and such high emotion, and it was a natural musical: There is a David and Goliath story, a Cinderella story, a love story between two outcasts. It's less about boxing than about finding self-respect and finding your soul mate."






Stallone, who wrote the original film too, owns the rights to the story and is a producing partner.

The production team hopes to mount the musical in Germany by fall 2012 and then Broadway by spring 2013.





Other movies that have recently gotten musical adaptations are Sister Act and Catch Me If You Can.

http://www.tvguide.com/News/Rocky-Ad...l-1033857.aspx

[robyrob]

come on now - this is getting ridiculous.

[catlover79]

Rocky the Musical???? Um, OK...

[robyrob]

i'm just going to hold out for "Apocalypse Now - The Musical"

[Marvo301]

I can see the advertising campaign now. Rocky will knock you out!

[catlover79]

Unless Apollo Creed knocks you out first.

[JamesG]

Sylvester Stallone, Klitschko Brothers to Produce Rocky Musical
11/21/2011
by Scott Roxborough


Apparently not bowed by the train wreck that was Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, Sylvester Stallone is teaming up with world champion boxing brothers Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko to make a musical version of his Oscar-winning boxing film Rocky.

Stallone and the Klitschkos, who will produce Rocky: The Musical together with Kevin King Templeton of Stallone’s Rouge Marble shingle, announced the project in Hamburg on Monday.



Stallone said in giving the pugilist classic the Andrew Lloyd Webber treatment he would be focusing on Rocky’s romantic side.

"At the end of the day, Rocky is a love story and he could never have reached the final bell without Adrian," said Stallone. "To see this story coming to life on a musical stage makes me proud. And it would make Rocky proud."







Broadway veteran Thomas Meehan (The Producers) will write the script to Rocky: the Musical.

Ragtime’s Tony-award winning lyricist Lynn Ahrens and composer Stephen Flaherty will re-team for the music, which will include songs from the Rocky films, among them “Eye of the Tiger,” “Gonna Fly Now” and “Take You Back.” Tony Award nominee Alex Timbers will direct.

In addition to co-producing, the Klitchko brothers will train the lead actor, who has not yet been cast.



Budgeted at $15 million, Rocky: The Musical will have its world debut, in German, in Hamburg November 2012. Stallone plans to then take an English version of the musical on the road to stages worldwide.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/new...itschko-264421

[Torgo]

Rocky is a go in Germany...isn't Germany also the country that embraced singing sensation David Hasselhoff?

[JamesG]

Rocky Musical Headed to Broadway
4/28/2013
by David Rooney


Rocky Balboa is poised to enter a whole new ring, when the musical adaptation of the Oscar-winning Sylvester Stallone vehicle comes to Broadway early next year.

The stage incarnation of Rocky brings together Tony Award-winning book writer Thomas Meehan (The Producers, Hairspray) with composer Stephen Flaherty and lyricist Lynn Ahrens, whose many collaborations include the musical Ragtime.

Directing the production is Alex Timbers, currently represented in New York with the David Byrne-Fatboy Slim musical Here Lies Love and the story-theater musical-play hybrid Peter and the Starcatcher.

Fight choreography is by Steven Hoggett (Once), with dance choreography by Kelly Devine (Rock of Ages).





“I couldn’t be more proud or more excited about this production and how my original story of Rocky Balboa has been brought to spectacular life onstage,” said Stallone, who penned the original screenplay of the beloved 1976 feature that spawned four sequels.

“The story of Rocky was very much like my life at the time – starting out with nothing, having to fight for roles and recognition. So I put those feelings into the body of a boxer and I had no idea there were so many millions of people that felt the same way.

Alex Timbers and the entire creative team have not only honored that original impulse, but have made his story as exciting, heart-breaking, and inspiring as it was when Rocky first went the distance onscreen.”





Rocky will begin previews in February at the Winter Garden Theatre, with an official opening in March. Exact dates and cast have not yet been announced.

One of Broadway's larger venues, with a seating capacity of close to 1,500, the Winter Garden has long been occupied by the ABBA musical Mamma Mia!, which moves to the smaller Broadhurst Theatre later this year.

Rocky received its world premiere last fall in Hamburg, Germany, where it played to rave reviews and packed houses.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/new...roadway-448026

[MacLeaper]

Interesting- it could be quite good. Just have to wait and see. I hope it lives up to Sylvester Stallone's classic "Rocky" movies.