Mike Fleming

A lot of reciprocal movement from screen to stage. Smuggler Films, the shingle formed by John N. Hart, Brian Carmody and Patrick Milling Smith, have optioned Jean Anouilh’s Tony-winning 1960 play Becket and plan to turn it into a film. They’ve hired playwright/lyricist Ranjit Bolt to write the script. The David Merrick-produced play –the story of King Henry II’s decision to appoint Thomas Becket to Archbishop of Canterbury in 1162 to check the ever-growing power of the Church over his subjects, and Becket’s risky decision to embrace God over his king–originally paired Laurence Olivier and Anthony Quinn–who alternated roles. The play was turned into an Oscar-nominated 1964 film with Richard Burton and Peter O’Toole, so there is fertile ground for a re-discovery. Bolt, nephew of A Man For All Seasons writer Robert Bolt, has translated classic plays produced by Britain’s Royal National Theatre and The Royal Shakespeare Company, including Lysistrata, Tartuffe, Cyrano de Bergerac and The Real Don Juan. The Smuggler Films team is turning the John Carney-directed independent film Once into a stage musical, and recently acquired the stage rights to Hollywood producer Robert Evans for a musical aiming for a 2010-2011 Broadway bow…Woody Allen might not shoot his films in New York any longer, but he hasn’t forgotten the talent here. He’s cast big names for his next film–Thor co-star Tom Hiddleston is the latest alongside Owen Wilson, Marion Cotillard and Rachel McAdams–but he has also given showy roles to  stage actors Corey Stoll, who’s currently starring in A View From The Bridge, and Nina Arianda, who starred with Wes Bentley in Venus in Fur…Patrick Stewart is returning to Broadway in David Mamet’s A Life in the Theater.