See, Leah is a theater director at the Spotlight Youth Theater, and every year her advanced drama class puts on a full-length play. So this year Leah decided - like you do - to adapt The Princess Bride for the stage, annnd....
AIEIEEE!!
SO PERKY. You know, like a nice MLT, when the mutton is nice and leeeean...
Ahem.
Ok, so, not only is just the SIGHT of this play putting me into paroxysms of joy, there's something even better about it: Leah cast the roles of Fezzik, Inigo, and Vizzini to three young ladies. WOOT! That's right, my friends, check out this band of merry women:
I want to join this Brute Squad.
And, seriously, do you KNOW how much I'd want to play Vizzini? DO YOU?! I think I've already got the screechy voice down, so really I just have to work on my victorious guffawing:
AHAHAHAHAHAAH... [slumping over]
Here's a few more shots for your geektastic viewing pleasure:
From his face, I'm assuming this is the part where Westley calls Prince Humperdink a warthog-faced buffoon. But that's just a guess. :)
Hey, Count Rugen, his name is Inigo Montoya. You killed his father. Prepare to die.
"...NOT WITH A THOUSAND SWORDS!"
(What? I'm not the only one hearing the dialogue in my head, right?)
Hope that made you grin as much as I did, guys! And thanks again to Leah, Sonce Landa Photography, and all of the Spotlight Theater actors for the offer, but I'm full up on peanuts right now.
This truly made my night!!
ReplyDeleteHow completely awesome! I want to travel to Wisconsin just to see this!
ReplyDeleteMy brother-in-law finally watched the movie the other day. He didn't love it... I told him that was "Inconceivable." Actually, knowing him, it didn't surprise me that much... I love him anyway.
They do plays all over the Chicago area as well as Wisconsin, turns out their HQ is near the suburb I used to live in!
DeleteI can't find where exactly this one was put on...
This was an Advanced Drama Class with Spotlight Youth Theater (www.spotlight.org). Leah S. directed this one in NW Cook County/Arlington Heights IL. But you are right, Spotlight is in 9 areas of Northern Illinois and 2 areas of Southern Wisconsin.
DeleteI was blessed to see the performance twice. (No, my child was not in this one). The adaptation was brilliant and the cast did an amazing job. The dialog held all the essence of the original and the actors took pains to pay homage to the original movie in their characterizations.
sjengelhardt
Wait a minute. Is this a kissing play?
ReplyDeleteI just startled the cats, I laughed so hard. Ha!
DeleteI just startled my co-workers at this to! Hilarity!!!
DeleteYou want to play Vizzini? As you wish!
ReplyDeleteawesome! my highschool did "the princess bride" my freshman year, and even though i didn't know the upperclassmen well enough to appreciate how perfect the casting etc was, it was an awesome show. =)
ReplyDeleteWhat highschoo did you attend? I am a highschool drama teacher looking for thescript.
DeletePsst...*Westley... (Sorry, it used to really bug me when people spelled my name wrong, lol.)
ReplyDeleteOOPS. Dangit, I think I always get that wrong, too! Anyway, thanks; I just fixed it. :)
DeleteEpic! This made my day :D
ReplyDelete~erin kristine
This idea is genius beyond genius.
ReplyDeleteI am loving all the clever puns, too. :)
(Which reminds me--you said you'd quote Princess Bride all night long at your 24 hour WDW get together--did you? :D)
The look on Fezzik's face in these pictures (and the sideburns) is great. She is killing it!
ReplyDeleteI go to an all-girls school, so I'm kinda used to all the characters in school plays either being gender bent female or actresses in drag. It's really fun to see my friends with 5-o'clock shadows drawn on, though.
ReplyDeleteThis is amazing! Major applause for Leah and her class!
ReplyDeleteThank you! We had such a blast putting this production together!
DeleteThanks everyone! We had such a blast putting this production on! The kids were all FANTASTIC! I loved being able to bring my favorite movie to life and even more, loved that all these kids also share such a love for The Princess Bride.
DeleteI'm dying to know how you did the cliffs of insanity scene!
DeleteLeah S. Where did you find the script for a stage adaptation? I would love to do this or have my seniors do an adaptation. Any tips? Candacebosma@yahoo.com
DeleteCoincidentally, "Jeopardy!" tonight had an appropriate clue. The category was Johnny Gilbert Goes to the Movies, where Johnny, the show's announcer, reads a classic line from a movie, and you have to identify it. Well, for $800, Johny said, "Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die." My wife and I were whooping and laughing so much at Johnny's deadpan, non-Spanish accented delivery that we had to rewatch it three times. That made my night, but this was a close second!
ReplyDeleteThe important question here is -- did any of the contestants get the question correct? :)
DeleteWell this is creepy lol My DM and close friend is also a drama teacher and she just had her kids do The Brothers Grimm Spectaculation. It was hilarious! The reason to why its creepy is because her name is Leia too, named after Princess Leia respectively. :P
ReplyDeleteI wish I was local to that group so I could go see it. LOVE!
ReplyDeleteAbout 5-6 years ago I saw a high school production of The Princess Bride and It. Was. Awesome!!! They did such a great job; had a professional fencer come in to trainer their (also female) Inigo. You could tell the kids watched the play because they were using the accents and mannerisms. Best high school performance I've ever been to and probably best I'll ever go to.
ReplyDeleteFantastic! This is one of the coolest things I've seen in a long while. Her students are totally lucky to have such a cool teacher. Thanks for sharing this and giving me a smile.
ReplyDeleteYAY!!! I love TPB, and this just makes it 10x better!!! I would so be in this play in a heartbeat! :D
ReplyDeleteThat is WONDERFUL. It's just... just... INCONCEIVABLY WONDERFUL. My day just improved a thousand percent. :-)
ReplyDeleteWow! I've always thought that this was a particularly theatrical movie and would translate well to the stage. I'm also really excited to see that this movie is still relevant to younger generations. I would LOVE to see a stage production sometime.
ReplyDeleteThis is seriously awesome.
that is just plain FABULOUS!
ReplyDeletePLEASE tell me there's a video of this somewhere...
ReplyDeleteSimply amazing I wish I was there to watch it .
ReplyDeleteThat I have not seen this before is absolutely, totally, and in all other ways inconceivable!
ReplyDeleteI've read the book and seen the movie hundreds of times, each.
I must see a stage adaptation!
Andrea
Oh, and also, I can totally picture John doing that!
ReplyDeleteDoes he ever start to leave, turn back and say, "Oh, just one more thing.."? Columbo, anyone?
Andrea
This is so epic, I can't even...
ReplyDeleteHahaha. Peanuts.
ReplyDeleteI'm a lifelong community theater geek. My friends and I (who are all naturally obsessed with The Princess Bride), have been dreaming of doing TPB on stage for years! I'm wondering how the school tackled the issue of royalties? My understanding is that unless something is in the public domain, you have to either pay royalties or have permission to adapt it. Maybe the rules are different for children's theater?
ReplyDeleteHI! I'm the one who did the show. I had a friend who did this same thing in High school. I contacted the director to see how he had tackled the royalty issue and how that worked. He said he had contacted a lawyer and the lawyer said that since he put his own script together (which is also what I did. I did a combination of things from the screenplay and from the book.), it was considered a derision and not an adaptation. Therefore, he said there were no royalty issues. The only problem would have come if we used the music from the movie. We did not do that. I used alternate music instead.
DeleteI put on a musical version of The Princess Bride in 1985, we had a great time. I was warned by a lawyer representing William Goldman that I was in danger of breaking the law. This was before the movie came out. I agreed with his suggestion (since music and script were already together) to go ahead and not try to copyright or get any publicity. I used a famous 3 word phrase as the title. The leading males learned to fence, we had a girl as Miracle Max, and Vizzini as well. Now that I know that I did not write an adaptation of the movie but a "derision?" of the book, I will be contacting my own publisher to publish the script and the music. Thanks Leah.
DeleteI am now in a snit because my theater group never did anything this brilliant. (It was a much more recent movie when I was a young woman, too.) I would've braved the dangers of the Fire Swamp and scaled the Cliffs of Insanity without a rope for the chance to play Inigo.
ReplyDeleteLooks amazing! So proud that the kids actually wanted to do it. TPB lives on! :)
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for posting this! Anybody want a peanut?
ReplyDeleteOHMYGOD THIS IS THE MOST AMAZING THING EVER!!!!!!!! I wish I had had a drama teacher like this when I was in high school!
ReplyDeleteSO MUCH AWESOME!!! and of course you're not the only one hearing the dialogue. The only thing cooler would be to get to see it in person. Thank you so much Jen and Leah!
ReplyDeleteI am so elated with this that I don't even know what to say!
ReplyDeleteSamantha
This is awesome.
ReplyDeleteI had a friend who could (and did) quote the entire movie. I still recall her *keeling over* and falling off of the bench in the student union. Glad to see the love of a classic continue!
Do you know I still meet people who have never seen The Princess Bride? Like ever? Inconceivable!
ReplyDeleteI am so interested in doing this show! Leah S.--are you open to sharing your version (derived as it is!). I teach at a middle school in Oregon and would hope to do this production in April. What do you think?
ReplyDeleteHi Leah - I am wondering if you would considering sharing your 'derision' - we are a Steiner school (Waldorf) in New Zealand and are looking for the perfect play and this is definitely it! If you were willing to share you would receive great accolades - although not a fortune, it would make a lot of people very happy (: It may be that we just use your version as base to work from anyway. If not that's fine too - can you let me know ?
ReplyDeleteyes, Are you willing to share your "derision" of the play for a small homeschool theater production for a small fee?
ReplyDeleteWe are also a small homeschool group and the kids really want to do this as our production. Anyone want to share a script? I am trying to piece one together, but no point in reinventing the wheel!
ReplyDeleteThanks-
How did you get the rights to it? I have searched all over the internet for a copy and was told that Goldman wasn't releasing the rights for a stage version.
ReplyDeleteI would love to have access to this script if this is something Leah shares or we purchase.
ReplyDeleteThis is exactly what my kids want to perform at our high school! Is there a copy of script available?
ReplyDelete