In March of this year, an event for kids based on Roald Dahl’s Willy Wonka that took place in Glasgow and was modeled after Timothée Chalamet’s Wonka movie quickly went viral for all the wrong reasons. The immersive attraction, which was held in an abandoned warehouse, received dozens of complaints from parents who paid £35 per ticket to be disappointed by the cheap props, costumes, and AI-generated script. The event was shut down soon after, and many parents demanded their money back and called the police.
Now, the debacle is being transformed into a show called Willy’s Candy Spectacular: A Musical Parody that will run at the Pleasance King Dome in Edinburgh from August 9-26, and some of the original actors from the 1971 film adaptation, Julie Dawn Cole (Veruca Salt) and Paris Themmen (Mike Teevee), will co-narrate it. People involved in the original Glasgow event, including Kirsty Paterson, who became a viral hit after pictures emerged of her as a sad Oompa Loompa, are also slated to take part, and the producers are promising additional surprises.
Producer Richard Kraft said, “It was only in March that I came up with the notion for a stage musical. I had a press release before I had a show. Then a great team of top songwriters wrote our score of 16 tunes. Next, the perfect director, Andy Fickman, signed on. And now our dream cast has assembled to premiere this crazy idea at the Edinburgh Fringe. Even in my purest imagination, I couldn’t have seen this all coming together so beautifully and so fast. It is simply scrumdiddlyumptious.”
The musical is a parody, say the producers, and there is no association with the original event or to those who own the copyright to Dahl’s book. Director Fickman said, “I feel like Willy Wonka himself standing at the gates to the factory with this remarkable cast all arriving with their golden tickets ready to perform. Working with this glorious cast in this dreamy musical is already a joy, but to add the original Veruca Salt and Mike Teevee to the mix – my head is having an explosion of sweet treats.”
In March, it was also reported that a movie about the ill-fated event called The Unknown by Scotland’s Kaledonia Pictures was in the works. “We are excited to begin production and look forward to sharing more with you as soon as possible. We are actually only a few miles from the event, so it is quite surreal to see Glasgow all over social media, worldwide,” said the production house. The horror flick is geared up for production and a late 2024 release and follows a renowned illustrator and his wife who are haunted by the tragic death of their son, Charlie. “Desperate to escape their grief, the couple leave the world behind for the remote Scottish Highlands – where an unknowable evil awaits them,” according to Bloody Disgusting
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