So the local High School did a production last week, and did it quite well, but one thing seemed missing…
does the stage version not have any scene with the dentist’s masochistic patient? I thought maybe it had been dropped as being too sexually suggestive
or some such BS, but so far, all the info I can find on the Net suggests it was left out totally from the stage version and put back in for the musical movie?
And have there been stage productions which have taken the liberty of re-adding it? OR which have done the movie-created happy ending instead of (or maybe along with) the bleak original ending?
I saw a college production a few years ago and if IIRC, it did not have the masochistic patient. It did have the happy ending (I think), but had “Don’t Feed the Plants” tacked on at the end.
I’m fairly sure about the not having the patient, more fuzzy on the ending though.
I saw it both in high school and middle school, (the same year, actually, went back to my middle school after I’d graduated,) and I don’t remember anything about a masochistic patient. They definitely both had the ‘un-happy ending’.
I saw a performance of it at a local college a couple of years ago, and it didn’t have the masochistic patient. In a way, I was glad, because I couldn’t imagine anyone but Bill Murray in that role. In another way, I kinda missed it. It’s one of the funniest scenes in the movie, imho.
Jack Nicholson played Wilbur Force in the 1960 Roger Corman production of Little Shop of Horrors. This was his first movie role. He had three previous appearances in television productions.
No, the Bill Murray role was specifically created for the movie and does not exist in the original stage version. And you can’t “take the liberty” of adding that scene or using a different ending than what’s written. You must do the show the way it is licensed: as written.
Interestingly enough, though: The movie version did originally go with the “real” ending, where everyone ended up dead, but test audiences hated it and wanted a happy ending, so they changed it. But there is a DVD out there that has the original ending as a bonus feature that you can find from time to time on eBay for about a hundred bucks.
I wish that the movie were more like the stage version. I saw it on Broadway a few years ago when it was on, and I liked it so much better. Seymour’s “selling his soul” for fame/money/Audrey is way more pronounced (the death scenes make him more culpable). And there’s that ending, of course.
That may be legally true, but that doesn’t mean people don’t do it. I saw a very enjoyable version just last year by a small professional company that included the masochistic patient.
**Diddy ** writes the absolute truth here, but I just wanted to add that it would not be impossible or uncommon for an amateur production to just add that scene in anyway. I’ve seen *Grease * done four times, never the same way twice, as different directors like to add different songs from the movie. This is, unfortunately, only one example. I won’t give more, but I could. And it is entirely in violation of the contract those companies signed and could have resulted in the show being shut down and those companies barred from ever putting on any show from that licensing agency again.
The Wiki page first mentions that there have been talks of a DVD release featuring the original ending- then gives a cite as such.
In the very next sentence it is mentioned that the project has been dropped, again a cite is produced.
O.K., plans were made then plans were abandoned. But, add confusion in that the cite following the statement that the project has been dropped does not say that the project has been dropped. The cite offered to support the statement that the project has been dropped says, contradictorily, that the DVD release is a possibility.
Anyway, if it happens- I want it.
I saw it off-Broadway, (though after I saw the second movie) and it had the unhappy ending and no dentist. A whole set for one little scene might have been excessive. I did miss “Mean Green Mother from Outer Space,” though.
Well, as I and the Wiki article mentioned, the DVD is available… you just have to look for it and be willing to pay top dollar for it. In the meantime, it looks like someone put the alternate ending on youtube in three parts. Part One.Part Two.Part Three.
Well, okay. Isn’t that true for every other law in the world, though? It doesn’t make it any less criminal.
No, I think Voyager mis-spoke (mis-typed?). The original show has the dentist.
Yes, in my post I should have typed “re-issue”, rather than “release”. I am indeed aware that it had briefly been released then recalled and that the handful of copies bought before the recall are sometimes found second-hand at crazy prices due to the rarity.
In fact, I shouldn’t even have typed “re-issue” since what I’m really hoping for is a restored version of the film, the likes of which the article says David Geffen wants to have happen.
Although, it does seem like David Geffen’s want of this might not be a wanting accompanied with much enthusiasm. Really, he has the rights and he’s David Freaking Geffen- if he really wanted it all that much I don’t see much standing in his way keeping it from happening.
ETA: Thanks for the YouTube clips!!! I’ll have to check them out later!
Um, I never said it wasn’t criminal. My point was that even though it’s not legal, people sometimes do it, which was a direct answer to this question from the OP:
