Garth Drabinsky, chairman of Livent, a Toronto-based production company, has announced the acquisition of the rights to "Ragtime," E.L. Doctorow's kaleidoscopic 1975 novel set in turn-of-the-century New York City, with plans to turn it into a musical.
The show, planned as an extravaganza on the order of the $10-million "Show Boat," is not likely to reach the stage until 1996. None of the creative team are yet in place, though Drabinsky has been discussing names with Doctorow, who said: "I'm satisfied that the composer, the librettist, the lyricist and the director will be top caliber because I have approval of all of them."It is a rare, if not unique event for a literary novel to be turned into a musical while the author is still alive, Drabinsky said, though he was curiously overlooking "Kiss of the Spider Woman" from the novel by Manuel Puig.