The ’90s cult classic 10 things I Hate About You is heading to Broadway.
I can watch this film at least once a year, and I know plenty of other die-hard fans are the same.
So hearing that 10 Things I Hate About You is heading to the stage brought up some mixed feelings, until I saw who was behind it.
Carly Rae Jepsen is co-writing the music and lyrics with Grammy-winning producer Ethan Gruska, while Lena Dunham is tackling the book alongside playwright Jessica Huang.
Suddenly, a musical version of 10 Things I Hate About You starts to not sound so bad.
Broadway previews are set to begin on August 17, 2027, bringing Kat, Patrick, Bianca and the halls of Padua High to the stage nearly three decades after the film first arrived.
Jepsen feels like a particularly good fit. Beyond ‘Call Me Maybe’, she’s spent years writing about crushes, longing, bad timing and the emotional mess somewhere between falling for someone and actually admitting it.
So pretty useful territory when you’re dealing with Kat Stratford and Patrick Verona.
Gruska brings a different set of credentials, with production and songwriting work including Phoebe Bridgers and boygenius. Together, the pair have the fairly intimidating job of adding new songs to a film whose musical moments are already a huge part of its appeal.
There is also the Heath Ledger problem.
The original gave us Ledger dancing through the Padua High bleachers singing ‘Can’t Take My Eyes Off You’, a scene that has survived countless rewatches and every stage of the internet since.
On the writing side, Dunham and Huang will adapt the story for the stage, while two-time Tony winner Christopher Wheeldon, whose credits include MJ and An American in Paris, will direct and choreograph. Pulitzer and Tony winner Tom Kitt, best known for Next to Normal, will handle music supervision and orchestrations.
The story remains at Padua High, following sisters Kat and Bianca Stratford through dating rules, high-school politics and their very different ideas about independence.
The 1999 film, starring Julia Stiles, Heath Ledger, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Larisa Oleynik, was itself a teenage reworking of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew and became one of the era’s most enduring teen films.
So maybe a stage adaptation is actually on the money.
But with Jepsen, Gruska and some serious Broadway experience behind it, cautiously optimistic feels like a pretty safe place to land.
Casting, the Broadway theatre and an official opening night are still to be announced.
