To purchase the DVD of LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE, click on the image above.
Playbill has news of a musical adaptation of the film Little Miss Sunshine. With a book by James Lapine and a score by William Finn, the initial run of the new show started yesterday in Florida with Craig Bierko, Dick Latessa, Sherie Rene Scott, Martin Moran and Andrew Rannells in the cast.
The film, which I loved, tells of the adventures of the Hoovers, a dysfunctional family who travels from Albuquerque to Southern California for a kid’s beauty pageant in a vintage yellow VW bus. Finn seems like a great match for the material and I hope something great comes out of this.
Musical Cyberspace 
No. I have never seen Little Miss Sunshine, but not another musical based on a movie.
YES!! I was waiting for this to happen, and honestly, I’m pumped! It may not become the next A Little Night Music, but it could turn out to be one damn good piece of theatre. Sherrie Rene Scott wasn’t my first choice, but I can definitely see it. Personally, I’d rather have Julia Murney at the climax of it’s creation, but I bet the chances are slim.
Julia Murney? Really? My primary exposure to her has been through her performance in Chess, which I found underwhelming due to her problems with pitch. I simply didn’t find her compelling at all unfortunately. I know a great deal of the love bestowed on Murney has to do with her performance in Wicked, but I must admit that her take on Florence turned me off her completely and I haven’t really bothered with listening to much else.
Now a real coup would be to see this show arrive on Broadway with Toni Collette in the role she created on film. Collette is a talent that we really need to see back on the musical theatre stage.
This could actually be really good. At least it is a good movie and is a good choice for musicalization, although like many I wish there were more original ideas. And that cast sounds like perfection, especially Sherie Rene Scott.
I’m unhappy to see yet another reverse movie musical, but I try to reserve judgment until the final product comes out.
Actually, I don’t think Finn is the best songwriter for that. Certainly the urbanity of his style would be fitting, but with a story like Little Miss Sunshine it would be easy for him to get sentimental and life-affirmative. The last thing we need is a dysfunctional family melodrama set to music. I’d much rather see Jason Robert Brown do this. He would be perfect!!!
Jason Robert Brown? The least compelling talent of his generation of musical theatre composers? You’ve got to be kidding me…
His style would be just about right for a story like Little Miss Sunshine. He wouldn’t sentimentalize the story and the pop sensibility would be perfect. And Will Finn is much much much less talented.
Jason Robert Brown’s his work is full of sentimental tendencies: for example, 13 is basically a nostalgic spin on High School Musical-type characters and The Last 5 Years is a completely sentimental look at his own autobiography and at marriage relationships, mostly made interesting by its atypical structure. As for his pop sensibility – well, that is basically what accounts for his overwhelming popularity. The style that he has developed for himself is all about filtering Sondheim-like motifs through the structural language of pop music, like a 21st century American version of Andrew Lloyd Webber, who was, at least, a great deal more adventurous in marrying musical theatre with popular music.
If Jason Robert Brown wrote the score, Olive’s dance would turn into a didactic, verbose, unoriginal ten minute song that sounds like that one from that other show of his.
This would be fun for a new song writing team, or maybe Frankel and Korie. Finn might be a little too character-y for the piece.