New York (AFP)
Stimulated by a tribute song to the animated film "Ratatouille", members of the social network TikTok have imagined a musical dedicated to the adventures of the rat Rémy, a project that will become reality on January 1 with the participation of professionals from Broadway.
It all started with a video posted on TikTok in August by Emily Jacobsen, an English teacher at an elementary school in upstate New York.
She sang there a ballad dedicated to Rémy, "the rat of my dreams".
This creation of only a few seconds was spotted and rearranged, still on TikTok, by Daniel Mertzlufft, professional composer and arranger, used to musical performances.
The musician then launched the idea of a complete musical dedicated to the friendly rodent and gastronomic genius.
TikTok then seized the idea and hundreds of videos were posted on the social network, to the point of making the project a phenomenon.
In particular, a song was proposed for a tango between Colette Tatou, character in the film, and Alfredo Linguini, Rémy's human accomplice, and a title entitled "Anyone Can Cook" (everyone is capable of cooking), Gusteau's favorite phrase , founder of the restaurant where the film takes place.
Some also imagined costumes, makeup and staging ideas.
Theater, television and film production company Seaview has signed up for the project to make it into a real production, which will air online on January 1.
Traditionally very protective of its rights, Disney, of which Pixar is a subsidiary, has given its blessing to this creation.
A certain mystery remains around the musical, especially which songs will be in it or who will perform them, although it seems that they will be mainly Tiktokers, who are sometimes professional musicians or singers.
Virtual tickets, priced from $ 5 to $ 50, have been put up for sale for the performance, the proceeds of which will go to The Actors Fund, a fund to support entertainment professionals hard hit by restrictions and closures related to the coronavirus pandemic.
After its broadcast, the show will still be visible for 72 hours.
Became essential with the pandemic, thanks to its small videos often shot at home, TikTok is still under the blow of a closure in the United States, decided by the Trump administration which saw in this subsidiary of the Chinese group ByteDance a threat to security from the country.
But two court decisions, one rendered in September, the second Monday, suspended the decision and allowed, for the moment, the social network to continue its activity in the United States.
© 2020 AFP