Pack Your Tissues, 'The Notebook' Is Headed To Broadway!!!!

Deadline-Nicholas Sparks’ The Notebook is headed to Broadway as a musical, with playwright and This Is Us supervising producer Bekah Brunstetter writing the book and “Girls Chase Boys” hit-maker Ingrid Michaelson handling music and lyrics.

“I am thrilled to work with Bekah and Ingrid in order to make The Notebook a reality on Broadway,” said author Sparks, whose 1996 book was turned into a 2004 film starring Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams. “They are amazingly talented, and obviously, the story is near and dear to my heart.”

The announcement was made today by Kevin McCollum and Kurt Deutsch, who will produce in association with Sparks. McCollum’s producing credits include, among many others, In the Heights, Avenue Q, Rent and the current The Play That Goes Wrong and Mike Birbiglia’s The New One.

How has it taken so long for this to happen?! About damn time. They are pulling all the right people into this project. Broadway has done a great job recently of taking huge movies and turning them into great shows (Mean Girls). A mind from This Is Us plus the brilliant Ingrid Michaelson… is a crier’s dream. The music will be beautiful. Tears will be flowing the entire time. They should install tissue boxes into every seat. Then add in Sparks, who obviously will make sure the story stays in tact, a few more genius Broadway minds, and BAM. We have a smash hit. I might get tickets for opening night.

The casting of this better be an intense, grueling process. Will we get Broadway stars? A couple of newbies? Borrow a pair of young stars from Hollywood? The pressure is huge to fill the shoes of Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams. The chemistry has to be fantastic, like I want to go see this show and think the two main characters are going home together. They will need to have endless screen tests to make sure they get it perfect. I almost want them to go with two people who are more unknown so we can fall in love with them as Allie and Noah. It will be very hard to compete with these two.