A Goold blend of talent for Elton’s new hit musical
ELTON JOHN has accelerated plans for his latest musical by collaborating with one of the UK’s top directors on a show about televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker.
The rock superstar has put his faith in Rupert Goold, who runs London’s Almeida Theatre. Goold also made the feature film Judy starring Renee Zellweger, who won a best actress Oscar last month for her heartbreaking portrait of Judy Garland.
Next week, Elton will be in Los Angeles with his band to record new material he has written with Scissor Sisters’ Jake Shears. The five songs from the LA sessions will join the numbers that Elton and Shears have worked on for the past eight years.
Playwright James Graham has written a new book that will focus on Tammy Faye’s colourful life from her 20s to her mid-50s, some of it spent with her cheating preacher husband Jim Bakker.
Goold, who directed Graham’s hit play Ink, about how The Sun newspaper was created by Rupert Murdoch, told me he has been in extensive talks with Elton, the star’s husband David Furnish, and Joseph Smith, who runs the couple’s Rocket Stage division of their entertainment company. They are casting the main roles for a workshop to be held in London in late April. Of the lead, Goold told me: ‘It’s a big singing role and a great comic part, so we’ll need a comedienne for the workshop to look at the songs already written, and the new songs.’ He said they’re working to a timetable that could see the show premiering at the Almeida next year. He noted that the current ideas for the set would fit on the Almeida stage. ‘The show might grow, so we’ll see, but we’re interested in the Almeida for it initially.’
When I last talked to Elton he said he was drawn to creating a show about Tammy because, while most Christian preachers lashed out at gay people, Tammy Faye ‘had a willingness to preach acceptance amid a world that was so quick to pass judgment’.
Elton will work on the show’s new tracks with top recording engineer Matt Still. The songs will then be handed over to Martin Koch, who will orchestrate them for the theatre.
Back in the 1980s, Tammy Faye electrified congregations with her elaborately coiffed hair and outlandish fluttery eyelashes.
She and Bakker lived in tasteless opulence. Their dogs had air-conditioned kennels, and the couple held a wedding ceremony for Tammy’s Yorkshire terrier and poodle.
Elton’s hit shows include the Billy Elliot musical, which won accolades in the West End and on Broadway, and The Lion King, which is in its 21st year in London. Rocketman, a musical movie inspired by Elton’s life, enjoyed box office and critical success last year.