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Director Rob Marshall (Chicago, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides) is set to reteam with Disney on a feature film version of Stephen Sondheim’s fairy tale-themed musical Into the Woods.

Rob Marshall to Direct Steven Sondheim’s INTO THE WOODS for Disney; Gives Brief Update on PIRATES 5
http://collider.com/rob-marshall-into-t ... -5/136929/

YAAAAAAAAY/NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

Okay, someone making a movie of Into the Woods: Great!

It being Disney: Kinda good kinda bad. We can expect quality, but the point of Into the Woods was not to be like Disney! It is a dark, dark, humorous thing that...is rather un-Disney. But if Sondheim and James Lapine are approving and going to help with it, then maybe they think Disney can do it, is this what Sondheim meant when Stephen Colbert jokingly asked, "Now, all of these musicals that you wrote, they were originally Disney animations, correct?" and Sondheim responded with a laugh, "We would like them to be." And speaking of...

Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine being involved: GREAT!!!!

The director: Probably will be great because he directed Chicago...but he also did On Stranger Tides...

The fact they're doing this when so many fairy tale movies are being done: BAD!!!!!

The fact this might ruin my chance of doing an Into the Woods movie: Bad for ME!!!! I'm real sad about that!

And what the hell, Disney just made a Rapunzel movie...

This is AWESOME!!!!!!

OMG this is great! I just played Rapunzel's Prince in a production of this over the summer! I'm SUPER excited to see more about this!

Oh my goodness! I'm so excited, and I haven't even seen the whole thing or heard all the songs! Time to look up the cast album. Really, this is great news!

Lets not forget Rob Marshall destroyed NINE The musical. He basically threw out the original musical and retooled it with new songs. True the new songs are very catchy and memorable BUT they did not service the film at all. Best part of that film is the music whereas the plot and characters were destroyed by the new songs and simplification of story.

I didnt mind hearing he was directing this until I learned he wanted new songs from Sondheim in addition to changing the script for the screen. Absolutely unnecessary! The show has so many memorable songs that there is no need to add more (which we all know LIKE NINE will lead to original songs being removed).

I hope Sondheim tells him to go f**k himself for making such a disrespectful request. It was bad enough Burton cut so many songs from Sweeney Todd but this? I hope Disney knows what they're doing cause Into the Woods is a classic and I will only support this if the original content is not removed to make way for pointless new songs that feed Marshall's need for upbeat songs sung by woman baring little to no clothing.

This is really awesome news! I just hope it doesn't languish in development hell like the other proposed film adaptions.

Very, very, very excited!

I have to agree with the previous comments about Nine being destroyed when it was made into a movie. I absolutely loved Nine on stage, but the movie was the biggest disappointment of a movie I've ever seen. It was simply a terrible and unnecessary reworking of a fantastic stage property.

I also love Into the Woods, so I'm very trepedatious about what might happen to it when it becomes a movie. Why do movie makers feel the need to make such drastic changes to a well liked and successful existing property is beyond me.

Sorry, but Disney Duster is right. Into the Woods is kind of the anti-Disney take on fairy tales and is more suited for a company like, well anyone besides Disney. I also have reservations of Rob Marshall, as I despised his adaptation of NINE.

Into the Woods is also one of the shows that initiated my love of musicals, and I just don't think it will work as a film because of the way it is written. It will HAVE to be completely reconstructed to work on film, but like Sweeney Todd, it will merely serve as it's own entity and not a representation of the musical. Having said that, I did enjoy Sweeney, but I just don't trust Disney and Rob Marshall with this particular project.

double post

Disney Live On wrote:I didnt mind hearing he was directing this until I learned he wanted new songs from Sondheim in addition to changing the script for the screen. Absolutely unnecessary! The show has so many memorable songs that there is no need to add more (which we all know LIKE NINE will lead to original songs being removed).

I hope Sondheim tells him to go f**k himself for making such a disrespectful request. It was bad enough Burton cut so many songs from Sweeney Todd but this? I hope Disney knows what they're doing cause Into the Woods is a classic and I will only support this if the original content is not removed to make way for pointless new songs that feed Marshall's need for upbeat songs sung by woman baring little to no clothing.

You know Sondheim already wrote new songs for a proposed film version of "Into the Woods" in the 90s, right? Anyhow, if you read his books, he always says that he's fine with cutting / changing songs so long as they better serve the medium. This is why he likes "Sweeney" but hates "Forum."

Gotta admit, being a huge fan of fairytales (especially Red Riding Hood), I wanted to see Into the Woods for a long time. I finally saw the Bernadette Peters one this past summer. Overall, I have to say that I didn't LOVE it. Some things, sure, and I can't get too specific because I don't have a great memory and only watched it one time, but a lot of it was such a downer. I can enjoy dark fairytales, but the route they took with it I just didn't care for. Again, I would get more specific, but I don't recall well enough, I just remember feeling that way about it.

DancingCrab wrote:Sorry, but Disney Duster is right.

WHOOOO YAAAAAAY THANK YOU!!!! Yea I even read that Sondheim intended his song to sound "dry" unlike "the wet Walt Disney". Him approving of Disney doing this film would be a surprising turn... I liked Nine, but that wasn't as good as Chicago, and if I had seen the stage show maybe I would think it was even less good.

SpringHeelJack, do you mean that version of the film where Robin Williams and Vanessa Williams were supposed to star?

slave2moonlight wrote:a lot of it was such a downer. I can enjoy dark fairytales, but the route they took with it I just didn't care for.

A lot of Sondheim's style is that life is not very pleasant, but there is enough joy in it. Into the Woods is supposed to be a downer but shows there is hope in connecting to people. It is supposed to show Happily Ever After doesn't happen as ideally happy as we like to think, which is why it's pretty much THE OPPOSITE OF DISNEY.

Act 1 has the more Disney-ish fairytale vibe. It's Act 2 that's going to be the problem because that's when it takes all the fairytales on their heads and goes dark with them. And even though I've only seen this play in high school theater form, I could see this being adapted to something pretty dark in film (all the adultery, death, violence, etc). That's why I don't want Disney doing this. They already had their shot with the fairytale parody with Enchanted. But if a movie studio is going to do this musical in film form, do it as seriously as it was intended to. Otherwise it becomes the same unoriginal parody to fairytales. That I don't want again.

DancingCrab wrote:double post

If your post is the last in a thread you can delete it. Just click the next to Edit at the top right corner of the post.

Hogi Bear wrote:

DancingCrab wrote:double post

If your post is the last in a thread you can delete it. Just click the next to Edit at the top right corner of the post.

Thanks. I'll have to remember that next time.

toonaspie wrote:Act 1 has the more Disney-ish fairytale vibe. It's Act 2 that's going to be the problem because that's when it takes all the fairytales on their heads and goes dark with them. And even though I've only seen this play in high school theater form, I could see this being adapted to something pretty dark in film (all the adultery, death, violence, etc). That's why I don't want Disney doing this. They already had their shot with the fairytale parody with Enchanted. But if a movie studio is going to do this musical in film form, do it as seriously as it was intended to. Otherwise it becomes the same unoriginal parody to fairytales. That I don't want again.

Very well said. I agree with that, too. Except that also the first act does still have humor and darkness that are not quite Disney-ish either.

Here's the thing-- if this were an animated movie, fears of the movie being a castrated version of the musical would be valid, as would fears that the story wouldn't gel with common Disney structure.
However, it's a live-action film and the year is 2012. Disney's lent their name to Pirates of the Caribbean, a raunchy action-adventure film based on a classic Disney theme park attraction and to a live-action sequel of Alice in Wonderland, directed by Tim Burton himself. They've poked fun at themselves with Enchanted. They've also allowed their interpretations of characters to be retooled for a mystery/crime television series on ABC, Once Upon a Time.

Simply put, they're not going to screw up their chance to produce a movie that has the potential to be a blockbuster, and win Oscar gold.

I would like that. I love Into the Woods. I enjoy musicals.