Between Frozen, Coco, and Frozen 2, Kristen and Bobby Lopez have made a career out of heartwarming and earworm-worthy movie musicals. The couple, who recently got their third Oscar nomination for Frozen 2‘s “Into the Unknown”, are apparently lending their talents to an adaptation of a fan-favorite graphic novel. According to a new report from Playbill, the Lopezes will be working on a movie musical version of The Prince and the Dressmaker, based on the Jen Wang graphic novel of the same name. The Lopezes are reportedly working with Pulitzer Prize finalist Amy Herzog on the adaptation.
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“Our next movie musical project is with Marc Platt and it is a musical version of a graphic novel called The Prince and the Dressmaker,” the Lopezes said in a statement.
The Prince and the Dressmaker follows Prince Sebastian, a young Parisian royal whose parents are seeking a potential bride for. Unbeknownst to his parents, Sebastian leads a secret life — by night, he wears spectacular dresses and embodies the role of Parisian fashion icon Lady Crystallia. The only person who knows Sebastian’s secret is Frances, his best friend and dressmaker, who soon decides that she wants credit for her fashions.
The Prince and the Dressmaker was originally published by 2018, and subsequently won awards at the Harveys and the Eisners. The graphic novel – and its positive representation of queerness and gender expression – have been praised across the board in the years since.
“I’d been wanting for a while to do a story about a character whose superpower is making clothes that transform the wearer,” Wang told Forbes in 2018. “Simultaneously I’d been wanting to work on something fun like a Disney fairytale musical with a contemporary twist. Gender expression is something I’ve always thought about growing up and when I happened to be watching RuPaul’s Drag Race one day everything clicked into place. It was like a domino effect, the whole story fell into place pretty quickly.”
“To me, Sebastian is someone who identifies with different modes of gender expression and is comfortable alternating between both masculine and feminine,” Wang continued. “Genderqueer is probably the best descriptor. But I’m also open to readers’ interpretations of how they see the character. If a reader feels that this story is just the first step to Sebastian discovering they’re trans, or if they feel Sebastian is a cis male that likes to dress up I’m happy with all of that!”
Are you excited to see The Prince and the Dressmaker get adapted into a movie musical? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!
The Prince and the Dressmaker does not currently have a release date.
