In a story in Friday's New York Post, entertainment scribe Michael Reidel reported that Tim Burton was set to direct a Broadway musical version of the Batman saga written by David Ives with a score and songs from Jim Steinman.  Warner Brothers, which has noted the Disney Studio's success on the Great White Way, has formed its own theatrical division, which will produce the musical, which will open out of town in 2004 and arrive on Broadway in 2005.  Will the Caped Crusader be able to forge a Broadway success story akin to The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast?  Warner Brothers is betting at least $15 million that the Dark Knight can do it, and Burton (Planet of the Apes, Legend of Sleepy Hollow) will probably have to take at least a year off his moviemaking career to direct his first Broadway production.

 

According to the Post story Burton is eager to reclaim the Batman franchise from the depths to which it sunk under the leaden touch of director Joel Schumacher (Batman Forever, Batman and Robin).  Steinman told the Post that Burton had a list of some 20 designers from all over the world that he might be interested in working with to create his vision of 'Gotham City as Berlin in the 1930s.'