Ex Bill and Priscilla Queen of the Desert star Ben Richards finishes playing Hook in Peter Pan at Southampton tomorrow and is then taking part in a workshop for the new Tim Rice musical From Here to Eternity next week.
So it looks as if the project is moving forward. and Richards is playing Sergeant Warden which is the part originally played by Burt Lancaster (who I think he bears more than a passing resemblance to).
The 1953 film version was about life in a US military fort on the Hawaiian island of Oahu before Pearl Harbour and deals with the troubles of the soldiers played by Burt Lancaster, Montgomery Clift, Frank Sinatra and Ernest Borgnine with Deborah Kerr and Donna Reed playing the women in their lives. It featured that wonderful Lancaster/Kerr beach scene which was considered very risqué in those days.
Rice explained that the stage show is based on the book and not Daniel Taradash’s movie screenplay. He said: “It’s taken several years to secure full stage rights. It’s only really now that we are all gung-ho”.
Rice is the co-producer with a score by young British composer Stuart Brayson. He said last year: “I've got a director (Tamara Harvey - Tell Me On A Sunday): I've got a book writer (Bill Oakes ): and I found myself becoming the producer - it took me quite a while to get the rights. We still need some new songs, and Stuart wants me to do the lyrics, so I've already done one new song with him and we've got a few more in the works. I hope to get From Here To Eternity off the ground next year."
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