Issue #123: February 1, 2004

• Mel Brooks and Thomas Meehan are behind closed doors writing the film script for the remake of The Producers. Nicole Kidman is already on board to play Ulla, the sexy secretary. Susan Stroman is also ready to bring directing prowess to the film when it starts shooting next February.

• Liam Neeson will be reviving a well-known role when another incarnation of Lerner & Loewe's Camelot takes to the stage later this year. In the role of the king, Neeson will be walking in the shadow of Richard Burton, Richard Harris and Robert Goulet. The rest of the casting is currently underway - no firm date or theater has been mentioned just yet.

• Talk about scary projects - it seems Sylvester Stallone and Sandy Gallin are in talks with rapper R. Kelly about penning the score for the Rocky musical. Apparently they have the busiest writer in stage biz, Thomas Meehan working on the book.

• Three times lucky, at least that's what the producers of the upcoming revival of Sweet Charity are hoping. The casting has seen both Jenna Elfman and Marisa Tomei attached to the project, now they are talking to Christina Applegate. I hope they found out if she could sing before talking to her, unlike the other two candidates.

• Terrence McNally is hard at work on a solo show for Broadway legend Chita Rivera. The yet to be titled musical will be work shopped in the summer at the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center. Once they stage it there a decision to bring it to Broadway will be made.

• Director Michael Blakemore is on board for Christopher Hampton's version of Ibsen's Hedda Gabler. Hampton is banking on the star power of Kristin Scott Thomas whose performance in Three Sisters had the West End buzzing last season. Although at least six months away, if you're planning a trip to London you might want to try to catch this classic.

• We say farewell to another stage legend; Uta Hagen died on January 14 at the age of 84. She may be best remembered for originating the role of Martha in the original 1962 Broadway premiere of Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? for which she won her second Tony Award. Her first in 1950 in the title role of The Country Girl. Ms. Hagen's stage appearances are too numerous to mention and all memorable. A few that have been especially mentioned are her Broadway debut in 1938 playing Nina in The Seagull opposite Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne; Desdemona to Paul Robeson's Othello in the 40s; replacing Jessica Tandy as Blanche Du Bois in the original production of A Street Car Named Desire in 1948. More recently she was seen in the 1995 off-Broadway production of Nicholas Wright's Mrs. Klein and Donald Margulies' Collected Works in 1998. The gift she brought to the stage through the years should be recognized by the Broadway community and hopefully a theater will be named in her honor somewhere down the road.