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      in Movies

      On TikTok, Fans Are Making Their Own ‘Ratatouille’ Musical

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      With Broadway and theaters across the country idle because of the coronavirus, some actors, producers and prop designers have found an unlikely outlet for their talents: a musical version of the animated film “Ratatouille” that is playing out in exuberant 60-second increments on TikTok.Starting last month, thousands of TikTok users, including many with Broadway credits, have paid homage to the 2007 Disney Pixar film, about a rat who dreams of becoming a French chef, by creating their own songs, dances, makeup looks, set designs, puppets and Playbill programs.The result is a virtual show unlike any on Broadway. There is no director, no choreographer, no stage crew. It has come together organically on TikTok, where users have only a minute to catch people’s attention.In the film, Remy the rat follows the example of a famous chef who says that “anyone can cook.” It is in that spirt that professionals and amateurs alike have taken up the “Ratatouille” musical challenge, said Brandon Hardy, a puppet designer whose Broadway credits include “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” and “The Pee-Wee Herman Show.”“He never limited himself on his vision,” Mr. Hardy, 30, said of Remy. He added, “We just fell in love with this, and we don’t want anyone to stop us.”The project began in August, when Emily Jacobsen, 26, a schoolteacher, Disney fanatic and theater lover from Westchester County, N.Y., read about a “Ratatouille” ride that is scheduled to open next year at Walt Disney World in Florida.As she was cleaning her apartment, she started singing a song about Remy. Adopting a high pitch, she recorded what she described as “a love ballad” for the rat — “Remy, the ratatouille / The rat of all my dreams / I praise you, my ratatouille / May the world remember your name” — and posted a video of the tune on TikTok.
      @e_jaccs A love ballad ##remy ##rat ##ratatoille ##disney ##wdw ##disneyworld ##ratlove ##ratlife ##rats ##Alphets ##StanleyCup ##CanYouWorkIt ♬ Ode to Remy – Em Jaccs Daniel Mertzlufft, 27, a New York-based composer, orchestrator and arranger, was tagged in Ms. Jacobsen’s video. Last month, he used a computer program to enhance her original ode to Remy, adding a French horn, trumpets, vocals and strings to create a big Disney-style finale for a “Ratatouille” musical.Mr. Mertzlufft said he had been inspired by the music Alan Menken composed for “The Little Mermaid,” “Beauty and the Beast” and other classic animated Disney films.
      @danieljmertzlufft Remy: The Musical OG Song @e_jaccs add. Vocals @cjaskier #remy #ratatouille #musicaltheatre #broadway #singer #musical #disney #fyp #disneymusicals ♬ original sound – danieljmertzlufft Since Mr. Mertzlufft posted his video in mid-October, thousands of others have shared their own contributions to what has become something of a virtual “Ratatouille” musical. In the last few days, Disney signaled that it had been paying attention, quoting Ms. Jacobsen’s lyrics on Instagram and Twitter. It even made its own TikTok rap at Epcot, where the “Ratatouille” ride is being built.“We love when our fans engage with our stories,” Disney said in a statement, “and we look forward to seeing these super fans experience the attraction when it opens at Walt Disney World next year.”Kevin Chamberlin, whose Broadway acting credits include “The Addams Family” and “Seussical,” revisited the “Ratatouille” movie before recording his own contribution to the musical. It was the Chef Gusteau character, and his observation that “anyone can cook,” that spoke to him, he said.A theme of the movie, Mr. Chamberlin said, is that even the clumsiest among us can find talent deep inside ourselves. Inspired, Mr. Chamberlain sat down to write while his husband rushed out to get him a chef’s hat.Once in costume, he sat at his piano and sang: “Anyone can cook / All you have to do is look inside yourself.”Only the coronavirus pandemic could have brought out a virtual show like this, Mr. Chamberlin said. “What’s really interesting about all this is that, during this pandemic, art is pushing through because we can’t get on stages and in front of audiences.”Other contributors echoed that sentiment, adding that the “Ratatouille” musical project had given them reason to hope during a dark time.“If it can bring joy to people, and it seems like it has, then that’s the best feeling in the world,” said Tristan McIntyre, 22, a Los Angeles actor who helped choreograph a rat dance for the show.
      @tristanmichaelmcintyre cookin’ up some choreo for #ratatouillemusical ���� @rawalton4 @ratatouillemusical #foryoupage #fyp ♬ original sound – danieljmertzlufft RJ Christian, 21, a vocal performance student at New York University, said he had been inspired by the movie’s acerbic food critic, Anton Ego, for the solo he contributed. He said he wanted embody Mr. Ego with “weird chords, spicy harmony and creepy-crawly kind of music.”
      @rjthecomposer Anton Ego’s chilling solo, when he is served the title dish ##ratatouille ##ratatouillemusical ♬ original sound – RJ Christian For Blake Rouse, 17, of Fort Collins, Colo., the “Ratatouille” project gave him an outlet after the pandemic forced the cancellation of his high school’s production of “Newsies.”He contributed several songs based on scenes from the movie, including a tango between two chefs and a duet between Remy and his brother.“This is no longer a niche TikTok theater joke,” he said. “This is kind of a thing that people care about and are starting to keep up with.”
      @mikeyjosemusic Full version on my insta @mikeyjosemusic ##remi ##ratatouille ##musical ##singer ##disney ##theatrekid ##disneymusicals ##fyp ##foryou ♬ original sound – Mikey Jose Music The contributions go beyond performances. Mr. Hardy, the puppeteer, made some masks and small puppets for the virtual show, even using garbage to create some of the elements.“We’ve created something that’s engaging to people at every level,” he said. “People of every age group are fascinated by this and want to contribute to this. As far as I’ve seen, there really hasn’t been a show or musical in history that’s sort of operated that way.”And Christopher Routh, 30, of Chatham, N.J., used boxes to create elaborate miniature set designs for the show, complete with lighting and a Lego robotics set to move the pieces around.“It’s such an incredible trend on how our community can come together like this and create a musical out of nowhere,” he said. “And it all started with one girl.” More

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      Dave Prowse, Man Behind Darth Vader’s Mask, Is Dead at 85

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusClassic Holiday MoviesHoliday TVBest Netflix DocumentariesAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyDave Prowse, Man Behind Darth Vader’s Mask, Is Dead at 85Mr. Prowse went from being a weight lifting champion in Britain to helping portray one of the most memorable villains in movie history. But his voice did not make the edit.Dave Prowse, left, alongside probably his most famous character, Darth Vader, at a fan convention in Cusset, France, in 2013.Credit…Thierry Zoccolan/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBy More

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      in Theater

      A Second Sudden Exit for a Hard-Charging Artistic Director

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Race and PolicingFacts on Walter Wallace Jr. CaseFacts on Breonna Taylor CaseFacts on Daniel Prude CaseFacts on George Floyd CaseAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyA Second Sudden Exit for a Hard-Charging Artistic DirectorAri Roth founded Mosaic Theater Company after being fired by Theater J. He resigned under pressure after complaints from staff.Ari Roth, the founding artistic director of the Mosaic Theater Company, in 2015 at the theater’s Washington, D.C., home.Credit…Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post, via Getty ImagesBy More

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      in Television

      Geoffrey Palmer, Judi Dench’s Sitcom Co-Star, Is Dead at 93

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      Geoffrey Palmer, a British character actor whose career peaked during the long run of “As Time Goes By,” the romantic BBC sitcom in which he and Judi Dench played lovers reunited after 38 years apart, died on Nov. 5 at his home in Buckinghamshire, near London. He was 93.His agent, Deborah Charlton, confirmed the death.Mr. Palmer, worked in films and theater but was best known for his work in television, including comedies like “The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin” and “Butterflies” as well as several episodes of “Doctor Who.”His hangdog expression and grumpy demeanor also made a memorable appearance on a 1979 episode of the sitcom “Fawlty Towers” as a guest who finds it difficult to get his breakfast order while Basil Fawlty (John Cleese), the hapless proprietor of a run-down hotel, is hiding a corpse.“I’m a doctor,” Mr. Palmer says to a waiter, with great exasperation. “I want my sausages!”Over 67 episodes between 1992 and 2005, “As Time Goes By” became popular in Britain (and on PBS stations in the United States) largely because of the chemistry between Mr. Palmer and Ms. Dench.“When you acted with him, you’d just feel very safe,” Ms. Dench told Radio Times, the British television and radio magazine, after Mr. Palmer’s death. “Geoffers was so sure on comedy that you could be pretty secure knowing he would get you through it and make it funny.”Mr. Palmer’s character on “As Time Goes By,” Lionel Hardcastle, had been a coffee planter in Kenya. Ms. Dench portrayed Jean Pargetter, the owner of a secretarial agency. They fell in love in 1953, before the British Army sent Lionel to serve in Korea. A letter he had written to Jean with his military address never arrived, and they went about their lives.They reunite in a bar in England.“Why didn’t you write?” she asks in that scene.“Let’s not play games,” he says. “Why didn’t you write?”“Where to?” she asks. “Second Lieutenant Hardcastle, somewhere in Korea?”“I sent you the full address as soon as I had one,” he says.“I didn’t get a letter,” she says firmly.“Well, I sent it,” he says with finality, then quickly realizes all they had missed.“As ridiculously simple as that?” he asks, with a chuckle. “A lost letter?”Mr. Palmer and Ms. Dench appeared in two films together in 1997: the James Bond movie “Tomorrow Never Dies” and “Mrs. Brown,” in which Mr. Palmer played the private secretary to Ms. Dench’s Queen Victoria.Mr. Palmer told The Chicago Tribune in 1999 that Ms. Dench “is an actress who anyone would give their eyeteeth to work with.”“She drags you up to her standards,” he added. “She’s extraordinary.”Geoffrey Dyson Palmer was born on June 4, 1927, in London. His father was a surveyor, his mother a homemaker.After serving in the Royal Marines as World War II was ending, Mr. Palmer joined an amateur theater group while working as an accountant. After becoming the assistant stage manager of the Grand Theater in Croydon, he began acting in regional theater.He got his first television roles in the mid-1950s. Early in the ’60s he appeared on “The Saint,” with Roger Moore, and in three episodes of “The Avengers,” in three different roles.He mixed television, film and stage roles for the rest of his career; did voice-over work for commercials; and narrated “Grumpy Old Men,” a BBC talk show on which men aired their gripes about modern life, from 2003 to 2006.His recent film roles included a geographer in “Paddington” (2015), about a bear looking for a home in London, and Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin in “W.E” (2011), which was inspired by the romance between King Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson.His survivors include his wife, Sally (Green) Palmer; a son, Charles; and a daughter, Harriet.The last season of “As Time Goes By” consisted of two episodes in 2005, sort of a Christmas reunion, to wrap up the series. Mr. Palmer said that the impetus for the revival, two years after the previous episodes had aired, came from the United States.“It is ludicrously popular over there,” he told The Times of London. “I think it’s because it’s rather understated, English and well mannered, and nobody is seen in full-frontal nudity.” More

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      in Television

      Laura Benanti Says Goodbye to Melania and Watches ‘Ted Lasso’

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      Laura Benanti is about to lose the job for which she’s best known. And she’s not sad about it.For four years, the 41-year-old actress with a killer soprano and a nimble wit has been channeling Melania Trump for “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.” But Benanti knows her run will likely end at the same time as the Trump Administration.“I feel thrilled,” she said. “I am more than willing to sacrifice this job in order to keep our democracy intact.”The act has also paid dividends for Benanti, introducing her to those who may have missed her 12 Broadway shows, including a Tony-winning performance in “Gypsy.”Thanks to the Colbert appearances, she said wryly, “People are finally taking me seriously as a comedian.”The pandemic has been tough for Benanti: she and her husband each lost a grandmother to Covid-19. She is also remarkably busy, especially given that the coronavirus pandemic has stilled the careers of many performing artists.Last month, Sony Music Masterworks released “Laura Benanti,” an album of contemporary and classic cover songs that she recorded late last year. It’s a mix of some of Benanti’s favorites, like “What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life,” and “The Party’s Over,” and pop songs her producer suggested from the Jonas Brothers and Selena Gomez.“At first I was really skeptical, because I didn’t want to sound like an old lady trying to be a teenager, but when I heard the arrangements, I was really blown away,” she added. “We were able to have 100 years worth of music on one album, and it all feels cohesive — it’s telling part of the same story.”She is also the executive producer of “Homeschool Musical: Class of 2020,” a self-shot, documentary-style special that HBO Max is releasing Dec. 17. The show features performances by and interviews with high school seniors; it was inspired by Benanti’s invitation in March for students whose school shows were canceled by the pandemic to post clips to Twitter under the hashtag #SunshineSongs.“It’s the artistic expression that they missed out their senior year of high school,” she said.She is also back at work as an actor, shooting episodes of a “Gossip Girl” reboot for HBO Max and “Younger” for TV Land, and says being on set now “feels like being in a bad sci-fi movie.”“It’s bizarre — it looks like you’re walking into a hospital, and everybody’s covered in P.P.E.,” she said. “I get a Covid test every single day — because they’re using different companies and will not rely on each other’s testing, the poor inside of my nose is raw — but I’m really impressed with the responsibility that they’re taking to keep everyone safe.”In an interview from the new home in New Jersey she shares with her husband and their 3-year-old daughter (yes, Benanti is among those for whom the pandemic has catalyzed a move out of New York City), Benanti talked about her cultural essentials, crediting her sometime collaborator Ashley Van Buren with keeping her current. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.1. “The Queen’s Gambit”Give me a period piece where a lady is doing something that women of that time didn’t do, and then is also addicted to alcohol and pills, and I’m in. Like, that’s just my genre. And Anya Taylor-Joy is just unbelievable.2. “Stars in the House”Seth Rudetsky and his husband James Wesley were doing two (web-streamed) shows a day, for a very long time, all to benefit the Actors Fund. Our Broadway family is decimated right now, and our health insurance is about to run out, and it’s really scary — it’s dire. They kept people’s spirits up, they kept their hopes alive, all while raising money for the Actors Fund, which does not just go to actors — it goes to everyone involved in the theatrical community. So for me that’s been a really wonderful thing to witness and to be a part of.3. “What Kind of Woman”Kate Baer just put out a book of poetry called “What Kind of Woman,” and I am obsessed with it. I can’t stop reading it. I devoured it one sitting and now I keep just going back and back and back. I found her through Instagram — I saw one of her poems — and I was like, “Who is this?” And we became friendly through social media, which is a new thing you can do, and every week she would post the poems, and I just became so enamored with her.4. “Caste”Another book I’m really loving is “Caste,” by Isabel Wilkerson. It’s never great to read about how Nazis were inspired by our systemic racism, but I think it’s a really important read, especially for white people and especially right now. It’s pretty shocking to me that if it were up to white people we would still have Donald Trump for a second presidency. We have Black people, and especially Black women, to thank, yet again, for saving a democracy that does the least for them. So I feel like, frankly, it’s my privilege and my duty to read books like that.5. “Ted Lasso”It’s the most feel-good television show you’re ever going to watch in your whole life. Look, it’s about soccer in England, which I could care less about. But I love a workplace comedy that does not require you to love the thing they’re talking about. It has that vibe for me, but it’s also laugh-out-loud funny. And I love that it’s unabashedly about a good person — a joyful, good person, going throughout life giving people the benefit of the doubt and seeing how that ripples.6. Jordan Firstman and Caitlin ReillyThey are these two comedians, and they’re on Instagram and TikTok and they are doing impressions that are so next-level funny, so much funnier than any show on TV. Any time I’m needing a little pick-me-up I just go onto their pages and I’ll watch it over and over again. I’m also really excited by seeing how people are using social media and the internet to create their own content. It’s really hard in the corporate world of TV and film to make something really good that you’re proud of, and to be able to do it directly from your own house and onto your phone is kind of magical.7. Virtual Museum TalksI just think it’s so remarkable that you’re able now to basically sit in on a lecture at the Fashion Museum in Bath, England, and watch a lecture on fashion in the Jazz Age. Museums can feel really distant and stuffy, and the fact that people can now Zoom in, in their pajamas from the comfort of their own homes, is kind of miraculous. I am actually very bad at fashion, and I don’t really understand it. But I just like to learn about anything. I just like to get out of my own thoughts.8. GenZHERThere’s a 15-year-old girl whose name is Zikora Akanegbu and she created an Instagram account, and now a zine called GenZHER, that connects young women and mentors, and gives advice on how to get your first job and a ton of really amazing things. And I just think it’s such an incredible example of what these young people are able to do.9. #SunshineSongsAm I allowed to say #SunshineSongs even though it’s my own thing that I started? For me, going and revisiting that hashtag, that people are still posting things to, and seeing all of these young people pouring their hearts out, and the incredible innovation. At a time where I feel like the language that we speak is mostly sarcasm, it’s so refreshing to see kids care about something. So that and also videos of people in Italy singing out their windows to each other. Seeing people pour their art out into a world that feels really dark — that to me is really beautiful.10. “I Can’t Breathe”I’m really inspired by H.E.R. in general — she’s so prolific — and this song in particular feels like something we all really need to hear. Music is so powerful in that it opens your heart to a place where you can then receive whatever message it is, and I think that that’s something that song does really beautifully. More