And why not? Mel Brooks’ “Young Frankenstein” made the leap. So did Monty Python’s “Spamalot,” based on the 1975 flick “Monty Python and the Holy Grail.” And what about “Shrek” and “Elf” and “Billy Elliot” and “Sister Act” and on and on?
Skeptical? You’re probably not alone. But it bodes well that “Groundhog Day’s” melodic metamorphosis is being presided over by the Tony-winning composer/director duo of Tim Minchin and Matthew Warchus (“Matilda the Musical”). The 1993 film’s co-writer Danny Rubin, who penned the screenplay with Chicago’s own Harold Ramis, reportedly is on board, too. (No word on whether Ramis himself has any involvement. It seems highly unlikely that the philosophical comedy’s famously elusive star Bill Murray — of the Wilmette Murrays — will have anything to do with it, either.)
“We’ll be doing the first workshop in the spring,’ Warchus told the Daily Mail. (Thanks to Splitsider.com for the heads-up.) “Tim and Danny have been working on it for a while.
“I’ll decide where it should go — London or New York — once I see what kind of show it is. We won’t know until we run it through at a workshop.”
