Houston Hits Underscore Bodyguard Musical???
Plans are progressing with the planned musical adaptation of The Bodyguard, the 1992 film starring Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner. Producer David Ian – whose most recent screen-to-stager was Flashdance, which toured extensively and then had a run this past autumn at the West End’s Shaftesbury Theatre – has secured the rights and will soon start looking for his leading lady, with the aim of bringing it into the West End in 2012.
The Bodyguard, which marked Houston’s acting debut, centred on the relationship between music superstar Rachel Marron (Houston) and her bodyguard Frank Farmer (Costner), a former Secret Service agent who is hired to protect her from a stalker. Houston’s anthem from The Bodyguard, “I Will Always Love You”, became the biggest-selling single ever by a female artist.
The stage production is likely to feature additional music from the film as well as other songs from Houston’s back catalogue. The most awarded female artist of all time, according to the Guinness Book of Records (and Wikipedia), Houston’s hits in the 1980s and 90s included “You Give Good Love”, “Saving All My Love for You”, “How Will I Know”, “Greatest Love of All”, “Where Do Broken Hearts Go” and “I Wanna Dance With Somebody”. However, her career was derailed by a trouble marriage to rapper Bobby Brown, drug addiction allegations, a rocky world comeback tour and other personal struggles.
