Get into the groove

Desperately Seeking Susan is showing on Channel Five this afternoon. And by a strange coincidence it's about to make a comeback in the form of a West End musical. I'm actually quite excited by this news, in spite of the fact that I don't find the original movie much cop. The 1985 film seems pretty dated and flat now, despite the presence of Madonna (in one of her better screen performances - probably cos she's basically just playing herself), the delightfully kooky Rosanna Arquette (where has she disappeared to?) and the handsome, hunky Aiden Quinn (whose bare bum we even get an enticing glimpse of in one scene - shame there wasn't more where that came from).

The premise of the film is a good one - a bored suburban housewife becomes obsessed with a woman called Susan she only knows through reading messages to and from her in the personal ads section of a paper. Aforementioned houswife then gets hit on the head and starts thinking that she really IS Susan. Cue lot of confusion, mistaken identity and various other farcical elements. I think the film wants to be off-the-wall and like, craaazy and zany, but for some reason it doesn't quite come off. Well, it was over 20 years ago and production values have kind of changed since then. I do remember reading the novel version and rather enjoying it (even film adaptations can be more illuminating than the original film - they're good at getting inside the psychology of a character in a way a film can't always do. My, don't I sound intellectual and pretentious?).

Anyway I'm still interested in seeing what the new stage version will be like. A definite bonus is the fact that the musical will feature the songs of Blondie, plus a new song written by Debbie Harry and Chris Stein, especially for the show. Hopefully it'll get all of us into the groove.