It’s no easy feat to make a movie.
And no company is going to let out something that makes their product look like shit. And that is what a “camera at the back of the theater” type recording would do. You would not be able to see faces, the spectacular parts would look unimpressive, the lighting would be off and the whole thing would be very “flat” and boring to watch. No one who owns a musical is going to let out something that makes their musical look that bad.
It doesn’t matter if you don’t mind that it looks like shit. The theater company has a very very big interest in making sure that people don’t see it’s product at anything less than it’s best. On screen, that is just not economical.
When we watch a stage play, our eye flick around the stage. We never percive the world as one big flat panorama. If you’ve watched enough experiemental film, you’ll learn that close-ups and cuts and stuff are important. They make a film actually watchable. So, now we need to do close ups and cuts, which makes stuff harder.
First off, there is lighting. Film lighting is different than theater lighting. The human eye interprets light very differently than the camera lens. So you need to set up new lighting, with new lighting designers, electricians, etc. Usually you need different lighting for close-ups than wide shots. Each of these set ups can take hours to get right.
And then there is angles. When you change shots, you need to change angles or else it will look like a “jump.” Of course, stages are only meant to be seen from one angle. So you will need to redesign set pieces to look good from different angles. But thats okay because you probably need to redesign all the costumes and sets and make-up anyway. These things were made to look good at a distance. They were never meant to stand up to close inspection. What looks good on stage looks tacky, unfinished, fake and distracting on screen.
And any special effects will need to be reworked. In plays, we are used to watching people stand around talking. So when Les Mis busts out this big barricade, it’s impressive. But on screen, we are used to watching things blow up. That puny barricade is going to look sad and cheap. They’ll have to work on ways to make the special effects continue to look impressive.
Finally, the actors will need to be retrained. Stage acting and screen acting are seperate, oppositional arts. On screen, every movement is magnified. You want to act as subtly as possible and convey emotion with the tinyest changes in expression. On stage, you need a whole audience to see and hear you and everything is done larger and more grandly than in life.
And for all this reworking, rebuilding, retraining, etc. hundreds of people are going to need to get paid. Additionally, the stars are going to want additional rights. Probably a whole new division will need to be created to deal with all this, and a whole office of people to manage it will need paying. Films cost all that money for a reason. It’s an expensive art that can only count on volume to recoup it’s investment. A theatrical release is probably more risk and bother than a stage company wishes to go through. And a direct-to-video release would have a hard time paying for itself, much less covering whatever lost tickets it might generate.
And that is why it doesn’t happen.
and that it was instead: