‘Pretty Woman’: Classic film becomes a musical that’s headed for Bay Area
The 1990 film that made Julia Roberts a superstar, “Pretty Woman,” quickly became iconic. Even if people didn’t actually see the romantic comedy about a sex worker with a heart of gold and a vulture capitalist with a credit card of platinum, everybody knew the gist of it. Clips and quotes and images in music videos seemed to be everywhere in the ensuing decade.
The only real surprise about it turning into a stage musical is that it took so long.
“Pretty Woman: The Musical” hit Broadway in 2018 and is just now coming to the Bay Area for two six-day runs. The first is at San Jose’s Center for the Performing Arts as part of the Broadway San Jose season starting March 21, and the second pass comes to San Francisco’s Orpheum Theatre on April 25 through BroadwaySF. (It comes to Sacramento’s Safe Credit Union Performing Arts Center May 2-7).
The book of the musical is by those who know the story best, the movie’s director Garry Marshall and screenwriter J. F. Lawton. (Also the creator of TV sitcoms such as “Happy Days” and “Mork & Mindy,” Marshall died two years before the musical premiered.)
The songs are by Canadian rock star Bryan Adams and his longtime songwriting partner Jim Vallance.
Vallance says the seed for their involvement was planted more than a decade ago.
“Bryan was looking at maybe writing a Broadway musical, and ‘Pretty Woman’ was one of the movies he was interested in maybe turning into a musical,” Vallance says. “Disney owns part of the rights, and at that time Disney said they had no plans to make ‘Pretty Woman’ into a musical. Fast forward 10 years, and a friend of his said, ‘Did you ever follow up on your plans to do a musical?’ And he said, ‘Well, I looked into “Pretty Woman,” but it was a no-go.’ And his friend said, ‘Oh, I just heard they’re making it into a musical.’ So Bryan made a few phone calls, and he called me and said, are you interested in participating? We met with the director, Jerry Mitchell, who was in London at the time working on ‘Kinky Boots,’ and we hit it off.”
A few months later they met with Mitchell again, this time with writer Lawton and producer Paula Wagner.
“They weren’t expecting us to bring any music, but Bryan and I had written a couple of songs, just kind of took a chance on a couple of songs we thought that might be appropriate,” Vallance says. “They liked the songs, and Bryan and I got the job.”
Both of those songs are still in the musical, one of them as the opening number.
Many of the songs Adams and Valance wrote for the show have a rock vibe appropriate to the movie’s era.
“Because the film takes place in the ’80s, we went with kind of an ’80s sound — which is obviously right up our alley, because that was when Bryan’s career first blossomed,” Vallance says.
In addition to many Adams hits such as “Run to You” and “Summer of ’69,” Vallance has written for many other musical acts such as Aerosmith, KISS, Bonnie Raitt and Heart. But this was his first time actually working on a stage musical.
“I wasn’t prepared for how much work it was going to be,” Vallance says. “Previously I’d written sometimes one or two songs for an album. With Bryan, I’ve written entire albums, say 10 songs. But with a musical, there’s about 20 songs all told. And because the director was very specific about what he wanted, we would write a song and it might stay in for a week or so, and then he’d say, ‘That’s not quite working. Can you write something else?’ So when all was said and done, I think we wrote 40 songs to get 20.”
A few of the songs they wrote that didn’t make the cut wound up on Adams’ albums instead.
Though he enjoyed the experience, Vallance wouldn’t exactly say he caught the musical theater bug.
“I’m really glad I did it,” he says. “Normally when I’m working with Bryan or Steven Tyler or whoever, it’s just two people in a room. But with a musical, it’s such a group effort, working closely with the director and the producers. And then you go into rehearsals with these amazing kids who are all so talented and so enthusiastic, and the vibe is so positive. I enjoyed that very, very much.”
“But at the age of 70,” he adds, “do I want to go back and do a three-year project again? I don’t think so.”
Contact Sam Hurwitt at shurwitt@gmail.com, and follow him at Twitter.com/shurwitt.
‘PRETTY WOMAN: THE MUSICAL’
Book by Garry Marshall and J. F. Lawton, music and lyrics by Bryan Adams and Jim Vallance, based on the Touchstone Pictures film.
In San Jose: Presented by Broadway San Jose; March 21-26; Center for the Performing Arts, 255 S. Almaden Blvd.; $38-$103; 800-982-2787, www.broadwaysanjose.com.
In San Francisco: Presented by BroadwaySF; April 25-30; Orpheum Theatre, 1192 Market St., San Francisco; 55-$172; 888-746-1799, www.broadwaysf.com