“Crazy Rich Asians” will soon hit Broadway, years after author Kevin Kwan's bestselling book leapt from page to screen in a watershed moment for Asian representation in Hollywood.
Warner Bros. Theater Ventures revealed Wednesday that director Jon M. Chu will helm a musical based on Kwan's “Crazy Rich Asians” trilogy. The musical will also be based on Warner Bros.' 2018 film adaptation of the first novel, directed by Chu.
Playwright Leah Nanako Winkler will write the book, which will feature music by Helen Park and lyrics by Amanda Green and Tat Tong. Warner Bros. Theater Ventures said a schedule for a “pre-Broadway” engagement will be announced at a later date.
While the musical “Crazy Rich Asians” will be Chu’s Broadway debut, he is no stranger to bringing popular theater productions to the screen. In 2021, Chu directed the film adaptation of Lin-Manuel Miranda's Tony-winning “In the Heights.” Later that year, he was introduced as director of Universal Pictures' “Wicked.”
Chu’s “Wicked,” starring Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo, will be divided into two chapters: the first installment will be released in November and the second in 2025. Last year, Chu was tapped to direct a film adaptation of “Joseph and the “Amazing”. Technicolor Dreamcoat” for Amazon Studios, Deadline reported.
The press release from Warner Bros. Theater Ventures described the new musical “Crazy Rich Asians” as “a fun, engaging and hilarious look at what can happen when young love collides with old money.”
Chu's 2018 “Crazy Rich Asians” starred Constance Wu as an Asian-American woman struggling to prove herself to her boyfriend's (Henry Golding) extravagantly rich and extremely selective loved ones in Singapore. When it was released, “Crazy Rich Asians” was the first American-made film to feature an all-Asian cast since 1993’s “The Joy Luck Club.” The cast also included Michelle Yeoh, Awkwafina, Ken Jeong, Gemma Chan and Nico Santos.
“Crazy Rich Asians,” with a script co-written by Peter Chiarelli and Adele Lim, dominated the box office for weeks after its release.
“I remember growing up as a kid and not seeing many people on the big screen, or even behind the screen, who looked like me,” Chu recalled to The Times in 2018. “So the fact that we can show themes romantics stars in a contemporary film, which shows this experience of an Asian-American who goes out into the world and discovers Asia, that we are not just a mass of Asians, it means a lot.”
News of Chu's upcoming musical comes amid uncertainty over the “Crazy Rich Asians” film franchise. In 2022, Deadline reported that she was in the works adapting Kwan's sequel, “China Rich Girlfriend,” but his status has since been unclear. A representative for Warner Bros. Pictures did not immediately provide further details about the project to The Times.
