15 years ago, on this day (December 30), Johnny attended the "Edward Scissorhands Musical/Dance Play” at the Ahmanson Theater, in Los Angeles, California.
On that day, Johnny watched the play played by Sam Archer as Edward Scissorhands, and later went personally to met and greeted him and the cast on the backstage. But in reality, his presence was originally planned to happen one year earlier, when the play made its debut on November 30, 2005 at Sadler's Wells Theatre, in London. On that day he was going to watch the play with Tim Burton and Helena Bonham Carter but due to his busy schedule (at that time he was filming “Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest”) he couldn’t attend.
As we know, Johnny cried as a baby when he read the original script of Tim Burton’s movie, and this time was not different, and after watching the play he said:
“Bravo! I teetered on the verge of tears throughout”
> About “Edward Scissorhands” theater play:
15 years after the release of Tim Burton’s 1990 “Edward Scissorhands”, the movie was adapted by the multiple awarded English choreographer Matthew Bourne, into a contemporary dance for theaters, starting on November 2005.
With music by Terry Davies and helps from the original screenwriter and composer of the movie, Caroline Thompson and Danny Elfman (who co-adapted the material for the stage) the dance version of “Edward Scissorhands” has a pretty similar plot to the movie, but dozens of differences such as:
> Being set in the 1950’s instead of the late 1980’s as in the movie.
> A sadder backstory and origin to Edward.
While in the movie, Edward is an artificial humanoid creation with scissor blades instead of hands, in the stage version Edward was originally a little human boy who while playing with scissors ended up being struck and killed by a lightning. His father, who is an also an inventor, suffering with his death, decides to create Edward “Scissorhands”, as a replacement for his beloved son.
> All the clothes were redesigned to match with 50’s era, and Edward clothes were redesigned and changed for lighter clothes instead of the heavy ones originally used in the 90’s movie, which would make the dance movies almost impossible.
> Edward’s scissor-hands were also changed to not portray any real blades and be a little bit lighter in order to make the dance movies better. Also, there were moments in the play where Edward was seen with bare hands without his scissorhands.
> The story is told entirely through music and in some places along a live orchestra, an in others with a taped pre-recorded instrumental.
> There’s no acting just dance with and any spoken words.
> For being an adaption dozens of new scenes were made, such as Edward and Kim dancing with living topiaries and other scenes altered, such as the reason for Edward flee back to the old castle: While in the movie, Edward saves Kim’s brother, Kevin from being hit by Jim who was driving around in a drunk, but ended up cutting Kevin as he checked if he was okay, and then hunting Jim who was accusing Edward of attacking Kevin; in the play Jim makes Edward get drunk ending up destroying the Christmas tree and injuring Kevin.
> The main role of Edward Scissorhands is played by two dancers: Sam Archer and Richard Winsor who alternated the role throughout the tour in different places.
The show was also staged in dozens of countries around the world, such as England, France, Belgium, Japan, South Korea and Australia, and dozens of cities in the USA, which also held an exclusive screening of Tim Burton and Johnny’s movie.
