April 15, 2010

Dances with Wolves the musical?

Exclusive:  Dances With Wolves, the Musical, Is on the Horizon

By Kenneth JonesA Broadway-aimed musical is being developed from the novel "Dances With Wolves," which tells the culture-clash story of a Civil War-era U.S. Army lieutenant who bonds with the native Sioux nation as white people push into the American Dakota frontier.

Matt Murphy, a producer on Broadway's Memphis, Impressionism and Thurgood, told Playbill.com that he has acquired the stage rights to Michael Blake's 1986 book, which is better known as an Academy Award-winning 1990 film that starred Kevin Costner (it won Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay, among other Oscars). Murphy is putting together a writing team to adapt the novel into a musical for the Broadway stage. He expects the score to have music inspired by folk, Appalachian, Civil War and Native American music.
And:"It's a beautiful story set within a spectacular setting so that you get lush visuals along with a gorgeous romance along with something of cultural significance," Murphy told Playbill.com. "I have never seen Native Americans on stage, I've never seen this story on stage."

Murphy said he was attracted to the story's "collision of two different cultures" and its exploration of "how different and how similar people are."
And:Murphy said that he's seeking an experienced musical-theatre writing team for the libretto and music and lyrics. Novelist and Oscar-winning screenwriter Blake is not expected to pen the libretto.

The project's composer will be teamed with a Native American musical expert to lend authenticity to the score, in the same way South African artists worked with Elton John on the score for The Lion King.

Murphy said he wants to properly represent "the ritual and ceremony of Native Americans," and added that he will also be seeking native people for the cast.

"Our goal is to honor the legacy of Native American culture," Murphy said.
Comment:  It's a little scary to hear Murphy say he's never seen a Native on stage. Does that mean he has no idea about all the Native writers, actors, and directors working in the theater? Except for his Native adviser, how white will this production be?

I've posted about perhaps 50-100 Native plays since I started this blog. Perhaps 5-10 of them were musicals. I'd say Murphy should know the field better before he ventures into it.

For more on the subject, see Dances with Wolves Opened Film Floodgate and Native Plays and Other Stage Shows.

3 comments:

Dances with Fools said...

Oh great, here we go again. The film was enough of a pain to see, why do they continue this exhaustive storyline of the lone whiteman being the open-minded and civil link between two worlds? Why don't they do a remake of F-Troop or a BIA satire on just how incompetent and corrupt a tribal administration can be? Lord knows they are out there! We have the Navajo's that are inflicting environmental poisons on their own people while the "elite" tribal officials live in Phoenix or somewhere away from the power plants, in exchange for "jobs"; or we have the former dictatorship of Dick Wilson that ruined and scarred his own people and we have the gaming industry in Indian country. There are tons of potential stories out there tribes are dealing with today instead of this repeated story of the lone whiteman out to "discover" that Indian people actually have real feelings and adopt other races. Besides, isn't the book based on southern tribes? Was not Kickingbird really Kiowa and Ten Bears a Comanche? Why is it always about the Sioux, Cheyenne or Apache? There are hundreds of tribes with stories, why does American culture live in a bubble? Maybe they can use Outkasts song, "Hey Ya" for a theme song and hire the Mardi Gras Indians as extras!

Stands With A Beer said...

Dances with Fools said...
Oh great, here we go again. The film was enough of a pain to see, why do they continue this exhaustive storyline of the lone whiteman being the open-minded and civil link between two worlds? Why don't they do a remake of F-Troop or a BIA satire on just how incompetent and corrupt a tribal administration can be? Lord knows they are out there! We have the Navajo's that are inflicting environmental poisons on their own people while the "elite" tribal officials live in Phoenix or somewhere away from the power plants, in exchange for "jobs"; or we have the former dictatorship of Dick Wilson that ruined and scarred his own people and we have the gaming industry in Indian country. There are tons of potential stories out there tribes are dealing with today instead of this repeated story of the lone whiteman out to "discover" that Indian people actually have real feelings and adopt other races. Besides, isn't the book based on southern tribes? Was not Kickingbird really Kiowa and Ten Bears a Comanche? Why is it always about the Sioux, Cheyenne or Apache? There are hundreds of tribes with stories, why does American culture live in a bubble? Maybe they can use Outkasts song, "Hey Ya" for a theme song and hire the Mardi Gras Indians as extras!

1:17 PM

dmarks said...

Makes Puppets with Socks said: "the lone whiteman being the open-minded and civil link between two worlds?"

I wonder if you even saw the movie? The Dunbar character did not link the worlds. He stepped from one into the other. And he did so in a humble fashion. Not to teach them "superior white man ways", nor to fulfill a prophecy of an outsider coming to the tribe to take it over and lead it to a new glorious era ("Avatar").