"Let us celebrate the most ingenious idea Hollywood has had yet: the movie based on a musical based on a movie."

The Producers: The Movie Musical

directed by Susan Stroman (Contact [the musical])
screenplay by Mel Brooks (Dracula: Dead and Loving It) & Thomas Meehan (Annie)
based on their play

produced by Mel Brooks (Dracula: Dead and Loving It) and Jonathan Sanger (The Elephant Man)

starring Nathan Lane (The Birdcage), Matthew Broderick (Inspector Gadget), Uma Thurman (Paycheck), Will Ferrell (Elf), Roger Bart (The Stepford Wives), Gary Beach (Defending Your Life), Jon Lovitz (Little Nicky), Andrea Martin (My Big Fat Greek Wedding)

lowdown:  Based on the Tony Award winning play, itself based on a movie, about two producers who attempt the worst play ever, and end up with a big hit.

low expectation: 
      
con:  starts a new trend, along with Hairspray: The Musical, of the remake by way of...
con:  Nathan Lane is more irritating than a mosquito
con:  between this and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Gene Wilder is getting shafted

follow-up:

website:

synopsis/press release:
     Two-time Tony winners Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick return to their iconic roles as Max Bialystock and Leo Bloom, a scheming theatrical producer and his neurotic accountant, who hit upon the perfect plan to make a fortuneion Broadway. Theorizing that many Broadway producers get rich by raising outside capital to finance expensive shows and walk away with huge fees even if the show flops, Bialystock and Bloom set out to find the perfect material to burn their backers and get rich. And what better to ensure a closing notice on opening night than a "musical romp" celebrating the life and high times of modern history's most reviled figure: "Springtime for Hitler." But the producers find out the hard way that one man's bad taste is another's breakthrough in art, and their show is hailed as a toast-of-the-town sensation.

Joining Lane and Broderick in the film are Thurman as Ulla, the Swedish secretary-islash-receptionist and would-be showgirl, and Ferrell as Franz Liebkind, a neo-Nazi playwright and pigeon fancier responsible for conceiving the "worst play ever written."

Also reprising their celebrated supporting roles from Broadway are Tony winners Gary Beach and Roger Bart as theatrical director Roger DeBris and his common-law assistant Carmen Ghia.

Expectation Key


there's no possible way I will ever see this

I might eventually see this but I'm not really expecting much

anticipating the release of this one but I'm sure to be left unsatisfied

such high expectation of this film only leaves room for disappointment