Billy McFarland’s flaming trash heap of a brainchild, Fyre Fest, refuses to die — and now, like a cockroach in a Yeezy hoodie, it’s crawling its way onto a stage near you as ‘Fyre Fest: The Musical‘.
Earlier this year, McFarland flogged all the Fyre Fest trademarks on eBay for a cool $245,300 (probably still less than JaRule’s bar tab). But far from fading into meme history, the chaos fest is getting reborn as Fyre Fest: The Musical. Yes, really. Someone actually looked at those viral photos of a limp cheese sandwich in styrofoam and thought, “You know what this needs? Show tunes.”
Enter Taika Waititi, who’s producing the fiasco-to-stage pipeline with Rita Ora, Matthew Weaver, and Bryan Buckley’s Hungry Man Productions. “Honestly, I think the idea is exciting, weird, and potentially disastrous, which seems apt and is how I like to work,” Waititi told The Hollywood Reporter. “I can’t wait to get started and snatch me some of that sweet American theatre money.”
Disastrous? Apt? Sweet theatre money? We couldn’t write a better tagline ourselves.
Buckley, who will write and direct the adaptation, admits the premise hooked him because Fyre Fest is basically the most entertaining car crash of our generation. “I never saw myself doing a theatrical musical comedy,” he said. “But then again, I never saw something completely mind-bendingly ridiculous and intriguing as what went down with Fyre-festival. A spectacular failed endeavour — that will haunt a generation forever. And yeah man, this time there will actually be music or your money back.”
The production has some serious names attached: Paul Epworth (Adele, Foster the People, Glass Animals) is on music duty, while Hamilton’s David Korins will handle set design. Which is to say, this thing might actually slap… provided it doesn’t collapse in the Bahamas mid-soundcheck.
Waititi, meanwhile, is gleefully self-aware. “Working in the theatre is always fun,” he said. “I mean, I haven’t done it for 15 years because it was no longer fun, but I’ve been told it will be fun this time. And I believe them. When Bryan Buckley told me he wanted to make a musical about the Fyre Festival, I said ‘Who the hell is Bryan Buckley?’ I then remembered we’ve been friends and work mates for 15 years so it was kinda hard to say no.”
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