I learned today that the spooky Scandinavian vampire novel Let The Right One In, first adapted – very successfully – for the screen, has now been turned into a theatrical production. But not just any old production. No, this is Let The Right One In – On Ice!
Perhaps it is just me whose brain turns to putty when I hear those dread words – On Ice! – appended to a title. I can think of few less edifying experiences than watching a drama – any drama – given the skating-rink treatment.
But audiences do seem to lap them up, so it strikes me that it might be financially profitable to turn my hand to such an adaptation. What would be even more unlikely than a moody vampire yarn? My initial thoughts turn to The Anatomy Of Melancholy On Ice!, or The Strange Death Of Liberal England On Ice! But I am drawn irresistibly to the titanic challenge that would be Christopher Smart’s Jubilate Agno On Ice!
First I must contact Andrew Lloyd Webber to do the music. If he insists on roller skates rather than ice skates, I might be open to persuasion.
Dante’s Inferno… On Ice!
The Consolation of Philosophy on Ice!
Befuddled by Cormorants – On Ice!
A Stratigraphic Index of Dinoflagellate Cysts – On Ice!
(That is an actual book, by the way – I have a copy of it that I found in a car park in Colliers Wood in 2005, and have treasured ever since…)