Jason Robert Brown joins creative team for Broadway-Bound King Kong

According to BroadwayWorld.com, Australian based production company Global Creatures might have added yet another name to the list of creatives working on their mega musical, King Kong.

American music theatre composer Jason Robert Brown is now reportedly connected to the project as it undergoes further developmental changes before making its way to Broadway.

King Kong debuted in Melbourne for an extended season at the Regent Theatre on Collins St and received immediate attention for its giant Kong – a ground-breaking, giant puppet, the largest ever built for the stage, that seemed to have an incredibly emotive space. The show received five Helpmann Awards, including one created to acknowledge the achievement in creating Kong.

The show was something of a spectacular, with frenetic lights and constant movement, and featured some excellent performances,  though it received mixed reviews for its disjointed score and poor book.

But as BroadwayWorld reports,

“Directed by Tony Award-nominee Eric D. Shaeffer, this version features a book and lyrics by Tony and Pulitzer Prize-winner Marsha Norman and a score by Marius De Vries and Tony Award-winner Jason Robert Brown.”

This could potentially iron out some of the longstanding challenges of the show – a cohesive score with form, motif and internal logic could help raise the story to new emotional heights (Brown is paricularly effective with this which you can hear works like The Last Five Years and The Bridges of Madison County), and Norman’s skils could help shape the book through its wild ambition into beauty. Stay tuned!