Matilda - The Movie

Im dubious about Jodie's singing ability does anyone have any videos? I recently seen a few clips of Emma Stone singing in Cabaret and was starting to warm to the idea.

I agree that there isn’t really a need for another Matilda movie, but if they stick to the narrative structure of the musical, both will be very different adaptations of the same source material.

Plus it will be nice to have a British Matilda - I never understood why they had to make it American. The movie also changed things up and added new parts that weren’t in the book, so they won’t transfer over and hopefully people will remember the source material before calling the musical out for not including certain moments.

Somewhat confusingly, Netflix are also working on an animated adaptation of Matilda, as part of their deal with the Dahl estate to adapt basically everything Dahl wrote into either an animated movie or series.

Are pantos doomed then?

Erm. Mrs Doubtfire was YEARS ago and I don’t think those other 2 films are exactly great examples to go by.

Remember we are living in the age of everyone being outraged and cancel culture. It’s a risk they aren’t prepared to take.

Yes!

Or Sarah Lancashire?

The world needs to accept that certain characters created for the stage are played by the opposite gender. It's not an attack or judgement on anybody, it's just the context and history of that show. If people choose to be offended by that, then equally they have the choice not to watch, but if we're moving into a world where Trunchbull, Edna Turnblad and countless panto dames are played by women just to avoid perceived prejudice that isn't there, then it's a very sad thing. What's next, Simba can only be played by a real lion?

The thing with Miss Trunchball is that like Roald Dahl's villains she is a bigger than life character. He shows adults from a child's perspective on a big and grotesque scale

Now she is neither a witch or a giant but a woman who was an athlete in her day.  But Roald Dahl and Quentin Blake depicted her as this towering monster that frightened both children and adults

The musical clearly stayed close to the illustrations in the book. So obviously they needed to cast men to pull off her ugliness, stature and inhumane character. Even better when she doesn't sound effeminate. Mature as well since trunchball looks to be in her late 50s-60s. Not to be down on the young men who understudy the role but they never sound convincing.

Beth Malone played the character in 2019 and she was not convincing at all.


It's possible that a woman can play the role. It's already been done with Pam Herris in the 1996 film and she depicted the character very well. But she did have the help of the low camera shots to make her look bigger than she is.

I'm sure there are actresses that would fit the look of the character. But how many are they? And that actress will have to be well known since this is hollywood we're talking about?

The only one I know who could come close to pull it off is Gwendoline Christie

I just remembered there was an audio dramatisation of Matilda that Penguin publishing produced alongside dahl’s other books

It isn’t credited who exactly played Trunchball but Rula Lenska is listed and she sounds similar. To me if you want the voice of Miss Trunchball then she nails it. So big, authoritative and threatening

On the other hand I loved Bertie Carvels cold depiction at Stratford. But I hated how he changed it and became more shrill for laughs when the show got to London and Broadway

Eddie Izzard is actually a very good call. Btw, Trunchbull has already been played by women in the musical, most notably Tony-nominee Beth Malone in the US in 2019. Besides, the character was not conceived as a drag role by the creative team:

I'd like to see a good actor or actress take the role. Much as I like Eddie Izzard, she isn't the right person in my opinion.