Yesterday somebody road apiece on Facebook about making a musical of to kill a Mockingbird. I tagged Bruce because he had an attempt to write a musical version of it. You wouldn't believe how many people have gone on and on and onabout writing a musical version of the show. Even though it was stated that Harper Lee would not allow a musical to be written Based on the novel.
To be exact, I didn't attempt to write a musical of To Kill a Mockingbird, I wrote a musical of To Kill a Mockingbird and it was slated to be done in Seattle with Don Murray playing Atticus. Harper Lee was very gracious about the adaptation and the songs, but simply did not want her book to ever be musicalized. It was that simple. But I do believe that her seeing the adaptation I did led to it being adapted for the stage as a straight play - I was very faithful to the book and did not musicalize anything that should not have been, including the entire courtroom scene.
This reminds me of when I was writing my Maurice Chevalier one-person play.
I contacted Fritz Lowe's agent or attorney (I don't recall which) to get permission to use a couple of songs from
GIGI in my play. He said that Lowe would not allow the songs to be performed in any production but
GIGI.
Then, he added:
"But call me in six months. Things might change."About four months later, Lowe passed away and, after a bit of negotiation, I was granted the rights.
Unfortunately, unlike with my Al Jolson play, my song licenses for
CHEVALIER are are still quite convoluted, so untangling them for anything but a major production is really not worth the effort. Too bad, because I'm rather proud of the book.
In any event, BK, you might keep this story in mind for future reference.
