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Explaining why the CORALINE musical is cancelled | UK theatre tour pulled amidst Neil Gaiman allegations
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Mickey Jo Theater
The musical adaptation of Neil Gaiman's Coraline will be receiving its UK premiere at Leeds Playhouse before going on to tour two other Midlands and Northern venues. I'm excited to see it. I'm excited for another reason to hopefully return to Leeds Playhouse. So as it turns out, I won't be returning to Leeds Playhouse, at least not as soon as I thought. And neither will this production. That is because the upcoming UK tour of the new musical adaptation of Neil Gaiman's Coraline, which was scheduled to tour to a handful of theatres later this spring, has been cancelled. This perhaps unsurprising news broke earlier today amidst an ongoing response to several allegations which have been made against the author relating to sexual abuse. Now, in truth, as shocking as it may be, this theatrical news doesn't necessarily merit that much further exploration from me. It is, after all, pretty straightforward. However, it does give me pause, because I want to, if I may investigate just a little into why this production has been cancelled and why we don't apply the same standard to a handful of other theatrical productions. For some there is a discernible reason. For others, I would argue there isn't. So that is what we're going to be discussing today. Why was the Coraline musical cancelled? What is the impact going to be for these theaters? And why are other productions based on the works of volatile and disgraced authors continuing to run without criticism? That's right, grab a glass of milk. This one's going to be spicy. Buckle up for a little bit of theatrical discourse if you enjoy this one. Make sure to subscribe to my theatre themed YouTube channel for more theatrical news coverage from me, as well as my usual content of reviews and vlogs and features. And of course, please share your own comments about this developing news story down below. But remember to be respectful of all involved. So here is the news. I'm not reading this from an official press release because I haven't received one. I don't know that one has been dispatched. I'm also not that regularly in conversation with these particular theaters, but news of this began to break this morning because ticket holders were contacted as a priority. That is to say, people who had bought tickets for the show were informed that it would no longer be going ahead and a statement has been released from the joint theaters because this was a co production. This coming from Leeds Playhouse, the Royal Lyceum Theatre in Edinburgh, home Manchester and the Birmingham rep they shared we have decided our production of Coraline, a Musical will not proceed. After careful consideration, we feel it would be impossible to continue in the context of the allegations against its original author. That author is Neil Gaiman. Those allegations are of sexual misconduct by nine women, I believe, including non consensual bdsm, which he has denied. He denies that any aspect of this was non consensual. But some of the commentary that he has made around this does, from my non legal perspective, seem to convey some acknowledgment of sexual relationships in these instances. He has talked about taking the opportunity to reflect on his recollection of events and that those don't necessarily align with the allegations which have been made. I believe a handful of these were first broken last summer and more have been released this very month, which is very troubling timing for this production of Coraline, which was scheduled to commence its UK tour on April 11th through the middle of July. Now I do want to acknowledge how crass it feels to be framing this as, you know, Coraline the musical and that shows cancellation being the biggest casualty of this situation and of these allegations. And I want to applaud the extraordinary strength that it takes for women in this position to come forward with these revelations, especially when it's about a very celebrated male celebrity. We have seen similar stories played out in the media and very uncomfortable ways previously that obviously deter victims from coming forward with this sort of information. But I do also want to highlight what a huge and devastating impact this is for these producing theaters. It is a difficult time to be running a theater in the UK right now. In the British theater industry, it is an even harder time to be running a regional theater. There is a certain amount of recovery financially which has happened post Covid for the majority of the theaters in the nation's capital. For those existing regionally, they are facing a slightly harder time. The situation still looks a little more bleak. And this was a huge, a really significant piece of programming for each of these venues. It was a big musical, it was a big tour, it was a big commercial draw. This was really exciting and, you know, compelling programming. This was really smart producing and you just hate to see something like this fall through for these brilliant spaces. And it is going to affect a great many people. There's going to be a huge amount of lost income and lost employment as a result of this being pulled. I, I don't know if they'd already got to the stage where the show had been cast. There will be other people who would have been working on this who have now lost this job. And it, it is a very difficult situation for these theaters who now have a conspicuous Gap in their imminent scheduling. Needless to say, if you are local to Leeds Playhouse Home, Manchester, the Royal Lyceum Theatre in Edinburgh or Birmingham Rep, all four of these do fantastic work year round. Take a look on their websites. Please, please go and support them. Go. Something else that they are producing this year that would be very welcome. Now, none of this is really a huge surprise because other Neil Gaiman adaptation projects had already been cancelled and adjusted elsewhere, most of these for screen. The most significant adaptation of his work recently for the stage has been the West End and touring production of the Ocean at the End of the Lane, which I'm sad to say, is a really fantastic production. And not too long ago, I think they'd been hinting about some sort of a return. I don't know if that has now been scuppered as well by these revelations. And in truth, I think this has really happened because of timing. I think it's. It's impossible, as they say in that statement, for Coraline to happen right now, because all of this continues to emerge, continues to unfold and, you know, fairly enough, that is going to deter a great many people from wanting to go and see the show. You may be saying, mickey, Joe, it's not that they're going to go and, like, listen to Neil Gaiman speak, they're just going to go see a musical not written by him, but based on his work. Why is that so difficult? Why does it have to be cancelled? The problem here is licensing. The problem is that Neil Gaiman would get a cut of the income generated by the tour because it's his intellectual property that has been adapted for this stage musical. Even though he is not the one who wrote the script or wrote the score, he would financially benefit from the production. And it's as a result of that that people may feel they don't want to buy tickets. I don't necessarily want to go and see this show knowing that that's where the money is going. And not only that, I do think it's very difficult to separate from that new understanding and that new reality, even when seeing the show. And Death of the Author is a thing conceptually, that we can be aware of and we can divorce them from their work to a certain extent, but Neil Gaiman is still very much alive. It's not like we're talking about dubious historical figures here. So it does suck for these theaters, but really it's the timing that sucks, because it seems as though those allegations which emerged in July of last year, they clearly didn't impact the tour in the same way that the more recent ones did. Now, I'm sure there's some sort of a precedent for this having occurred previously. I'm struggling to think of one. If anyone is aware of another situation akin to this, please feel free to share it below in the comments. What I'm curious about now though is those shows that continue to be programmed, continue to be commissioned based on the work of, shall we say, problematic authors and problematic conceptually is inherently subjective. My interpretation of someone who I don't follow find to have, you know, good moral character is not necessarily going to be the same as yours. Some things, like nefarious sexually abusive behavior, are more universally frowned upon. But there are other things like particular political stances and particular opinions within society, other issues where people don't necessarily see eye to eye. So my version of an author whose work I don't want to go and see an adaptation of may not be the same as yours. But it is surprising to me, especially with the arrival of the play Giant, which covers Roald Dahl's sort of reported and admitted anti Semitism in decades past, which is a fantastic play by the way, that brings real nuance to that conversation and finds the humanity amongst these monstrous admissions and, you know, delivers real depth in terms of his character but also those surrounding him. Just really, really brilliant work worth going to see upon its transfer to the West End. But you may think it's surprising with that bringing Dahl's antisemitism back into the conversation, that there isn't more criticism of the many, many adaptations of Roald Dahl's work, particularly in the theatrical realm, including but not limited to the ongoing long running West End production of Matilda, originally produced by the Royal Shakespeare Company. The not too long ago, the recent touring production of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I believe it's still licensed around the UK to amateur groups. There was also recently the musical adaptation of the Witches at the National Theatre, perhaps the most egregious because there are blatant dog whistle anti Semitic tropes contained within this show, some of which the national, to my recollection worked to try and curtail, others of which were disappointingly left in the material and announced earlier today a new stage production of the bfg, which for what it's worth, I think is going to be beautiful and mesmerizing. It was truly inspiring to hear co Artistic Director of the Royal Shakespeare Company Daniel Evans, talking about having developed this piece since he was at Chichester Festival Theatre, which it will also be traveling to after it's played Stratford this winter and the enthusiasm that he has for it, and the creative team that has been assembled for this production, which is going to include puppetry and is going to include music and is going to include illusions and sounds like it's going to just be absolutely dreamy and gorgeous. That being announced hours before the cancellation of Coraline does feel a little bit conspicuous. However, there is a significant difference here. And the difference, again, is, is a financial one, because from my understanding, Netflix paid a huge sum of money to the Dallas State in order to acquire the rights to all of his works, meaning they are now the beneficiaries and the Dahl estate is not gaining income from newly licensed productions of his work. That is my understanding of the situation, at least. Yeah. So this was back in 2021. Netflix bought the Dallas state for a reported $686 million. That's just over 500 million PO pounds. And what they acquired was his estate, including the rights to his literary works. Meaning if you buy a ticket to go and see the BFG at the Royal Shakespeare Company later this year, it will not be benefiting. I mean, it won't be benefiting Roald Dahl because he has passed away. It also won't be benefiting his family, which already is sort of one degree of separation away. And, you know, it becomes very difficult when we talk about cancel culture in this way, when we talk about accountability, which is an important thing. I think the bigger problem with the Roald Dahl stuff, certainly after his death, is the enduring stink of it all and those moments where you can perhaps glimpse bigotry in some of his work. I am not too familiar with the bfg. I read it a very long time ago as a child, and I don't remember it. You could see it in the Witches. I don't believe you can see it in Matilda, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It's not anti Semitic, but it's got its issues. I'm tempted to think of those issues as being a little more of its time, rather than evidence of any other kind of intolerance. But I'm not the moral arbiter in all of this, and I'm not appointing myself one. I am simply drawing a comparison, because each of these Roald Dahl adaptations for the theatre went on with relatively little criticism. And I'm also building up to talk about the show that I really want to talk about, because, again, we have an author who is benefiting from a long running West End production that is based on their very popular children's book series. This author is not dead. This author does continue to financially benefit from the productions of worldwide, some of them very recently announced. I am talking of course about Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, a play which I do not talk about often here on YouTube, simply because I do not want to drive any traffic towards its ticket sales. And even in showing that theater on a vlog video, even in mentioning it, I worry that I will remind someone that this exists and prompt them to go and buy tickets. Which is not something that I want to use my platform to do. On account of the fact that J.K. rowling, the author of the Harry Potter series, uses her platform, dedicated and daily, to spread aggressive anti trans sentiment. Initially disguised behind a veil of concerned feminism and LGB support, her stance on trans issues has subsequently shown itself to be just wildly transphobic and inciting an extraordinary amount of hate among her some 40 million Twitter followers. Ex followers. I apologize. And it's not just tweets. Oh how I wish it was just tweets. Again, the issue is financial. Here's what happens. You buy a ticket to go and see Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, whether you're seeing the two part production in the West End or the bizarrely truncated now shorter than even half of its length was before production that's running on Broadway, which I believe is also the production that's been licensed worldwide. But I really try not to read into it because it just makes me annoyed. You buy a ticket to go and see that show, perhaps you buy merchandise. A portion of the income of that production is going to J.K. rowling, who has such a disproportionate amount of wealth that it doesn't practically make a difference. It is, however, the principle of the thing, because she uses part of that income to fund anti trans bigotry and legal attacks. She donated over £70,000 to a crowdfunder aimed to alter the legal definition of sex in the Equality act with the specific purpose of stripping trans individuals of legal protections all at a time in the UK when they are being politicized and utilized by political figures in a dangerous, divisive and utterly needless culture war. And perhaps it's just because the majority of the trans people I have met in my lifetime have been vulnerable young individuals and not the violent criminals that they are characterized as by the likes of J.K. rowling. But I find it completely impossible as a result of all of this to support the production, and I have a hard time understanding why that continues to run around the world and is so celebrated. And it's because of the Harry Potter of it all. But I have reached the point where the vitriol has become so prolific and so determined and so appalling that I can't enjoy Harry Potter things anymore. I'm not rewatching the films, I'm not playing the apps. I even see the merchandise. It annoys me. I see theater content creators making content about it, dressing up in robes and waving wands. And I think, where are your principles? And this of course isn't to compare or minimize the allegations against Neil Gaiman. But we can see what J.K. rowling is doing with her enormous platform, and it takes either a certain amount of obliviousness or willful ignorance to pretend that that isn't hugely and ongoingly dangerous. But sure, let's go. The two part play was such a vital plot line, they were able to cut it in half when they needed to. Clearly this is a topic that I am very passionate about. I do not disagree whatsoever with the cancellation of Coraline. I agree. I think it's impossible for the production to proceed in 2025. I think it is devastatingly disappointing timing for those theaters. I think they need to be supported. And my thoughts are with not only those affected by Neil Gaiman's actions directly, but also all of the creatives, all of the artists who now will be affected by cancellation. This is very wide reaching. In the meantime, please let me know what you think in the comments section down below. I really want to hear other perspectives on this. Do you remember any other examples of a production being cancelled, not necessarily because of a performer, but really because of an author, whether that's a playwright or the author of the play's original basis? And please weigh in as well on the idea of whether it's just the financial aspect of it all that would stop you going to see a production based on something written by a problematic author, or whether their behavior actually transcends that and affects your ability to enjoy the material, regardless of who's making money off of it? I'm very intrigued to hear all of your responses. In the meantime, that is everything that I have to say about today's theatrical news. If you want to stay up to date with more theatre news, make sure you are subscribed right here on YouTube for more updates, perhaps about this story. I dare say that this is going to be the last we've heard of it, which obviously is also very sad for the writers of this adaptation. If this is to go away forever, it will all depend, I suppose, on the ongoing public image of Neil Gaiman. In the meantime, I hope you've enjoyed this video and I hope that everyone is staying safe and that you have a stagey day. For 10 more seconds, I'm Mickey Jo Theater. Oh, my God. Hey, thanks for watching. Have a stagey day. Subscribe.