[UPDATE 2/7/24]: This week, new social media accounts for the forthcoming stage adaptation of 1984 Prince film Purple Rain sprung to life with a series of posts teasing the show’s pre-Broadway debut in Minnesota in 2025.
The first three posts on the @purplerainbway account indicate that the Purple Rain adaptation—featuring music and lyrics by Prince, book by playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, and direction by Lileana Blain-Cruz as noted below—will make its debut at the famed State Theatre in Prince’s native Minneapolis in the spring of 2025.
Each of the three posts on Instagram, one of which was seemingly authenticated via a cross-post from the official Prince account, directs viewers to a website where they can register for email updates about the Purple Rain musical’s Minneapolis debut as they become available. For more information, head here.
Scroll down to read more about Purple Rain and its forthcoming entree into the world of jukebox musicals.
[Screengrab via @purplerainbway Instagram]
[1/8/24]: Purple Rain, the 1984 film starring and scored by the late Prince, is being adapted as a stage musical for Broadway.
News of the forthcoming Purple Rain adaptation was revealed on Monday by its producer, Orin Wolf, whose previous credits include the Tony Award-winning The Band’s Visit. Per The New York Times, “The stage adaptation will feature a book by the playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, a MacArthur Foundation ‘genius’ grant winner whose family drama, ‘Appropriate,’ is now running on Broadway. The director is Lileana Blain-Cruz, whose revival of Thornton Wilder’s “The Skin of Our Teeth” (with new material contributed by Jacobs-Jenkins) had a short run on Broadway in 2022.
The original Purple Rain film, written by Albert Magnoli and William Blinn and directed by Magnoli, starred Prince, in his acting debut, as The Kid, a talented but troubled young musician largely based on Prince himself. The film’s soundtrack album of the same name served as Prince’s sixth studio LP. It won an Academy Award for Best Original Score, earned two Grammy Awards Prince and The Revolution, and is often referred to as one of the greatest albums of all time.
“Jukebox musicals,” or musicals built around pre-existing caches of songs, have long been a staple on Broadway. They generally fall into one of two categories: telling an artist’s story through their music (think Jersey Boys, the Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons musical) or crafting a new story out of a certain songbook (a la lauded ABBA homage Mama Mia). A “jukebox musical” recreation of Purple Rain could, in theory, straddle that line. The loose, music-first nature of the film’s narrative leaves plenty of room for the playwrights interpolate further elements of real-life Prince while maintaining the creative freedom to take the story to new places. However the book ends up reading, you already know that the score will be top-notch. This is Purple Rain, after all.
The announcement of the Purple Rain stage adaptation did not specify a timeline for the production, so you likely won’t see it on Broadway any time soon. In the meantime, you can watch the original 1984 film and listen to the album below.
Purple Rain (1984) – Official Trailer
Prince – Purple Rain – Full Album
The post ‘Purple Rain’ Stage Musical To Mount Pre-Broadway Debut In Minneapolis In 2025 [Update] appeared first on L4LM.
