UPDATE: It seems that today is the day of decision, as the NY Times and Post report. Today a meeting is being held to decide the future of the show. Fingers crossed!
John Horn in the LA Times finally has a fully researched–he’s even read the script– story on the sprawling mess that is the Spider-Man musical. The death of a key player, scheduling conflicts, inexperienced producers — you name it. It’s a rogue gallery of woes. The show has a total budget of $52 million and would need $1 million a week just to keep running. The biggest problem with the troubled production — originally slated to open next February but rehearsals haven’t even begun and a lack of funds seems to have stopped all progress — was its incredible ambitions, which would have made it the most spectacular musical ever staged:
The opening bridge scene is followed closely by the arrival of a giant web woven by Arachne, a temptress who is the musical’s central invention. “A giant loom is revealed — seven actors swing on vertical silks to form a tapestry,” the stage directions read. At another point, Spider-Man is so busy battling bank robbers and muggers that he multiplies into five different crime-fighting superheroes. One of the duplicate spiders swings over the audience, landing on the balcony.
Yet some folks remain hopeful that it will get additional funding, among them show composer Bono:
“For me it’s this wonderful thing of escaping from the first-person songwriting, to disappear into these outside characters, it’s just been a thrill of a ride,” Bono said. “You spend so much time digging up diamonds in your own music; it’s a treat to dig in somebody’s else’s dirt. To work on these songs was like a playpen.”
According to the piece in addition to previously confirmed Evan Rachel Wood as MJ and Alan Cumming as Green Goblin, Spider-Man would be played, as much speculated by Reeve Carney, who has a role in director Julie Taymor’s upcoming TEMPEST movie. Carney has a musical background, but is other wise little known. However, his Twitter page makes everything much clearer:
Hello! I am in a band called CARNEY and I love John Cena.
Works for us.
Yeah, when I was in New York last week- I walked past the theater where it’s supposed to open and saw all the banners.
They’re actually going through with this?
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Coat