Just to pound home those last few nails into theater-as-an-artform’s coffin, the new big thing on Broadway is to take a movie, add some songs, and turn it into one big, soulless, obnoxious dance number. Rocky recently got the musical-adaptation treatment, produced by Sylvester Stallone himself, but before bringing it to the US, they apparently decided to do a test run in Hamburg, Germany, where it’s called “Rocky: Das Musical.” That’s right, German theater kids, singing songs about Sylvester Stallone. The surrealism is strong with this one.
Check it out:
It’s disappointing that “Eye of the Tiger” isn’t in German, but this is still pretty mind-blowing. The singing in German starts at about 3:30.
Here’s the trailer:
And here’s the big dramatic original music number:
Oh man, is there anything funnier than earnest musical theater? Other than earnest German musical theater about Rocky, that is? Thanks to Screencrush for making me aware of this.
And while we’re on the subject, did you know that Will Ferrell movie, Elf (great, by the way), is also a musical now? It’s called “Buddy the Elf.” This is probably the worst thing I’ve ever seen: