The Lion, et al

The story in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe is primarily about the four main characters learning lessons and growing as individuals. There are moments in the book where this is really pointed out, like when Lucy tells Aslan to hold on a minute after administering the juice of the flower berry to Edmund and Aslan getting cross with her and asking if more should die for her brother. Each child learns to grow up (to a degree, as well as literally) and becomes a better, more caring, and more understanding person because of the lessons he or she learns during the course of the story.

(I grant that, if you want to look hard enough, there are religious allegories. However, I would argue that a) those are not the point of the first book and b) that most children, the aim of these stories, will not recognize or get those allegories with the exception of the obvious "Aslan allows himself to be killed for the sins of another and rises from the dead because of it" one.)

In the movie, the makers changed most of the story to be "more visual". As a general rule, I have no argument with that. However, this caused Edmund to be presented as a much more surly and argumentative child than he ever appears as in the book. On top of this, some of the lessons the children learned are glossed over (Peter's learning to be a leader and king/thinking about those beyond his family) or forgotten/left out altogether (Lucy's, mentioned above). Scenes are completely changed or added to, my guess is, give the movie more of a sense of urgency (the children following Edmund all the way to the point of seeing him enter the Witch's house, Edmund in prison with a woeful Mr. Tumnus, changing a battle that is mostly skipped over in the book (because it is not needed to be told-- you are following a different story) into a grand battle shown from multiple perspectives at the end.

In the play, due to the writer's need to condense the plot and "talk down" to the admitted children's audience, they combined much and skipped over even more. For example, Lucy and Edmund both reach Narnia at the same time, but head off in different direction so that Lucy can meet Tumnus and Edmund the White Witch. Susan and Peter come on shortly thereafter and they all meet up. In the story, it is an important point when Edmund has a talk with Aslan after being rescued but you never find out what is said; in the play, their conversation is a duet all about what is said. It is also an important point made by Susan that she and Lucy must never tell Edmund what Aslan does for him as "it would be too horrible." In the play, Edmund goes with them and watches Aslan being killed in his place and then Peter and the Beavers show up and there is a pretty, but forgettable, song about the glory of Aslan and his sacrifice. Lucy once again does not need to learn her lesson with the healing draught. Susan is much less likable for most of the play, and Edmund once more is way overdone in his surliness and bad behavior.

My point in saying this is the same point I continue to make with other source material (be they comic books being turned into movies or simply books being made into movies or TV shows); you are pulling from a certain source material for a reason-- you have a built-in audience with built-in expectations. When you change for change's sake, you threaten your foundation audience. If that audience gives you a bad review, you will not get much if any new audience on top of that foundation. We have seen this to be true on a number of occasions, but a couple stand out to me:

• The recent horrible, horrible attempt called The Seeker: The Dark Is Rising. They changed so much as to make the much-loved and award-winning novel unrecognizable to the core audience. The word spread and the move absolutely tanked at the home and world-wide box office.


• Catwoman. Riding high on some hits, DC/Warner Bros decided to go for something with a strong female lead. However, again, they took 60 years+ of source material, threw it out the door, and started from scratch and made something unrecognizable to the core audience of comic book readers. Word got out, movie tanked.


• Even TV shows are not immune to this. The Starsky & Hutch movie went far from the source material (which was predominantly a lighter drama) and became a full-on comedy; it tanked at the BO.

When producers/writers stay close to the source material, generally modest to large hits ensue. As examples of this:

• Batman Begins/The Dark Knight
• Jaws (the original)
• Harry Potter series
• Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
• Da Vinci Code
• Spider-man 1 and 2

So, in the end, I am a little disappointed in the first Narnia movie, but not enough that I didn't purchase it. However, I would not go back, nor would I recommend anyone who enjoys the book going, to see the musical. It is important that any version of the story try to include the morals and lessons that are so integral to the story and important to the characters when presenting the story in other media. In the case of the musical, in particular, the writers failed in this.