Boston was set to premier the stage musical adaptation of the 2012 male stripper film Magic Mike on Nov. 30, but it has apparently been cancelled due to “backstage drama.” Now we’re not sure whether we’ll ever get to pass off a night of gogo dancing as “sophisticated theatre.”
According to Deadline, the Emerson Colonial Theatre (where the show was set to premiere) released a statement saying, “The producers of Magic Mike The Musical have cancelled a Boston engagement, saying that they don’t feel the musical is ready for production.” One of the producers is Channing Tatum, the hunky lead from the first film, though he wasn’t going to perform in the musical.
The musical’s composer Tom Kitt, lyricist Brian Yorkey and book writer Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa all reportedly left the show last month over “creative differences.” The remaining cast and creative team were set to have a private workshop in New York, but even that was postponed and then cancelled.
Related: Straight guys keep covertly gushing about “Magic Mike” to Matt Bomer
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Although the show had Broadway ambitions, its fate now seems uncertain. The theatre has since begun refunding ticket sales.
We hope the show gets off the ground and into New York. Surely it’d do at least as well as Naked Boys Singing!, the nude all-male revue that has successfully run off-Broadway since 1999. If you’ve never seen that show, it has absolutely no plot, just 15 songs on topics like being gay, nude and circumcision. Its tunes include such titles as “Gratuitous Nudity,” “The Bliss of a Bris,” “Muscle Addiction” and “Nothin’ But the Radio On.”
Oh, in case you were wondering what we’re all missing, here’s the plot of the indefinitely delayed Magic Mike musical:
Set before both Magic Mike and its 2015 sequel Magic Mike XXL, [the stage production tells] “the story of college-student-turned-male-entertainer Mike Lane. Struggling to make ends meet, Mike takes a job dancing at an exclusive night club… and winds up loving every minute of it. But as he scrambles to hide his alter ego from his dad and girlfriend, he finds himself needing to make some difficult choices. Can Mike follow his dreams without losing more than his clothes?”
ShiningSex
Uh…because it’s stupid!
Libertas Belle
Naked Boys Singing! was a great show. You got to just laugh at the absurdity of it all. There were even some touching moments, so to speak. It was kind of a weird experience, where you were the one to feel weird for being dressed!
I was looking forward to the stage version of Magic Mike. Hopefully they get their act together!
SPEEDOSWIMMER
Channing Tatum makes me so wet and juicy…
Cam
Just a guess, some of the cast were dating each other and one of them slept with a different cast member?
Anybody else have a guess?
Miles
The cancellation could have been for a variety of reasons. I do think the material is better suited for a Las Vegas show. Even though the integrity of Broadway has dwindled over the years this project just seems to have very little going for it.