Let Miley Cyrus Do A 'Mandy' Musical Like She Wants

One of the first Broadway shows I ever Bartended was Shrek: The Musical. It holds a special place in my heart, as I worked there right out of school, a formidable time in my life. I think it’s good, but I understand that being taken with a grain of salt. Shrek The Musical works because it tries to be more than the movie, finding reasons to exist on stage that drive home its themes and genuinely create a musical that’s fun for the whole family. Broadway folks f***ing despised its very existence.

Broadway theatergoers can be an openly picky bunch. They are never hesitant to tell you what they love or hate. Reasons for either can vary, but I remember the hatred toward Shrek, specifically because it was an adaptation of a Dreamworks movie. To be fair, the company that Spielberg built pulled out all the stops. Big stars attended the premiere, and Broadway’s heaviest hitters filled out its cast. Still, Broadway people treated it like some invading force, even though they’d already happily lapped up the same from Disney.

Yes, Disney wasn’t exactly welcomed with open arms, depending on who you talked to. The term “Disneyfication Of Broadway” is often said with disdain. Rudy Giuliani brought the company onto 42nd Street when the area was less than desirable and changed it around. It is now significantly safer than it ever was (no matter what Jesse Waters tells your Uncle), but has admittedly lost any semblance of a personality (and that’s not just because most of the porn theaters are gone). Still, Disney’s shows were welcome.

Adaptations of movies like Beauty & The Beast and The Lion King were massive hits with audiences and critics. While the shows make necessary changes to make them Broadway-ready, they still feel beat-for-beat like their source material. There is little in the way of expanding on themes or enhancing what already exists. One-for-one movie adaptations are all the rage on the Great White Way now. None have the longevity of The Lion King, and few offer anything different. Broadway-goers flock to something they once passionately derided.

If musical adaptations of musicals are going to be the norm, let’s at least get weird with it. American Psycho had its time on Broadway, and while that may sound like an instant no-go, they were inventive and strange and let their freak flag fly. There is room for Broadway musicals that want to shake up the status quo, even if they are participating in it. So, when I heard that Miley Cyrus wanted to adapt Panos Cosmatos’ Mandy as a stage musical, I thought, “Sure, why not?”

I was not a fan of Mandy. It was mean and brutal in a way I have no desire to witness. The central plot revolves around fridging a female character, a trope that deserves to be retired. Yes, Cage gives a reliably bananas performance and there is beautifully haunting imagery, but the movie left me feeling numb. However, what if we took the same movie, added some experimental pop songs, and had Miley Cyrus play Cage’s character? Because that’s what the Hannah Montana star wanted.

“I wanted to play Nicolas Cage,” Cyrus recently told Harper’s Bazaar. “I love that it’s a romance revenge story. Romance and revenge—those are some of the greatest tragedies. I forever and always will be interested in those.” Fair enough! Gender-bending the lead could alleviate some of my fridging concerns, and I think Cyrus is an incredibly interesting artist. Writing a musical is no small feat, but my guess is she could have made that happen!

Unfortunately, it does not look like the musical will ever come to pass. Cyrus reached out to Cosmatos to discuss a musical adaptation, but it didn’t work out. While that will not happen, the director is working on Cyrus’ next album which she says will have visual components. Cosmatos clearly was impressed enough that he wanted to collaborate with the pop star, which is very exciting.

Still, I would have loved to see Cyrus and Cosmatos shake up musical adaptations of movies. Maybe it will happen one day when Broadway is strictly movie adaptations and the occasional Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. Why not let Cyrus go wild with a bottle of vodka in a kitchen set that can be wheeled away like magic?