Barbra as Gypsy is On

No wonder the rapture didn't happen last week, Arthur Laurents arranged for Heaven on Earth shortly before he died a few weeks ago.  The playwright and director signed off on a deal with Universal Pictures and producer Joel Silver to remake a film version of Gypsy starring none other than Miss Barbra Streisand.  This will be Miss Streisand's first screen musical since Yentl in 1983.  Stephen Sondheim, who wrote the lyrics for Gypsy, is also in on the development discussions.  The agreement calls for the film to be "substantially similar" to the stage musical, thank God.  

Gypsy was made into a 1962 movie starring Rosalind Russell and a 1993 TV movie starring Bette Midler.  Laurents famously hated the '62 film because he didn't think Russell brought a necessary trashy quality to Rose.