Is Rexy still sexy? It would appear so since a Broadway musical adaptation of Empire Records is in the works, Rolling Stone reports.
The 1995 film focused on a group of young employees at Empire Records who made it their mission to save the independent record store from being bought out by a large chain. Starring Renée Zellweger, Liv Tyler, Ethan Embry, Robin Tunney, Rory Cochrane and Johnny Whitworth, the movie became a cult classic.
Embry reacted to news of the Broadway production on Twitter. “A musical huh? The original was borderline a musical with all that damn dancing in it,” the 39-year-old actor tweeted. “The only question should be, how much weight will [GWAR] be pulling?” Embry’s character, Mark, had a hallucination that he played with the heavy metal band GWAR after eating a pot brownie.
The musical is expected to premiere in 2020, in conjunction with the 25th anniversary of the movie’s release.
Producer Bill Weiner explained the decision to adapt Empire Records for Broadway. “The film has developed a cult audience over the years, and addresses issues that people of all ages can identify with,” he told Rolling Stone. “It also evokes an interesting period in time, the Nineties, where the music business was changing — and a lot of people remember that as part of their youth. I knew we had something when I would tell people about the show and consistently see faces light up — everyone has a story, whether it’s that they saw the movie 10 times, stole the video cassette from an older sibling or the soundtrack was the first CD they ever purchased.”
Films being turned into Broadway shows is not a new trend. Mean Girls, Frozen, School of Rock and Anastasia are just some of the movies that have hit the stage in recent years.
