I can almost see why this was such a hit on Broadway. Sadly, the transition to the big screen wasn’t kind. The gold standard in musicals translated to the movies is Chicago. That film took all that’s good about stage musicals – the size, the depth and the staging – and applied to them the benefits of movie magic. What came out was something better than either medium could produce alone.
The Producers didn’t pull it off. I think the problem lies in how you treat the musical numbers. If you try to integrate them too tightly into the story line you lose all believability. People don’t just spontaneously break into song in the midst of a conversation. I guess Chicago created such an air of unreality from the beginning that the transitions from dialogue to song didn’t jar. In fact, they made perfect sense.
I wish someone would do a straight remake of the original Producers with Nathan Lane and Gene Wilder. Leave out the obnoxious and obvious gay jokes, the sex, the stupid ending and combine Lane’s manic energy with Wilder’s gentle insanity. That would be a perfect film.
And what happened to my favorite line? “You fish-faced enemy of the people!” Travesty!