Daily Variety reports Kevin Wallace, one of the producers of the big-budget Lord of the Rings musical that opened at Toronto’s Princess of Wales Theatre March 23, confirmed the show will open in London in 2007. The reviews of Lord of the Rings, which began previews on Feb. 4, have been lukewarm thus far. However, Wallace pointed out to DV, “Our market research during previews indicated the show is scoring strongly with the ordinary man in the street.” When asked about the reviews, Wallace replied, “I knew this would always be a show that would divide people. They’d either love it or reject it and no one would offer a middle-of-the-road response.” [More]

NEW YORK (AP) — The box-office performance of Peter Jackson’s “King Kong” wasn’t as chest-thumping as many expected. But to be fair, $217 million isn’t terrible, nor was the $520 million worldwide take. Moreover, the film was well received by critics, nominated for four Oscars and won three: visual effects, sound and sound editing. Those three aspects of filmmaking are represented on the new two-disc special edition DVD coming out Tuesday (a single disc version also is available). The features include post-production diaries that bookend the previously released production diaries of “Kong.” They are an unusual inside look on the minutiae that goes into even the biggest of movies. [More]

Set in the 1930s, this is the story of a young and beautiful actress Ann Darrow from the world of vaudeville who finds herself lost in depression-era New York and her luck changes when she meets an over-ambitious filmmaker Carl Denham who brings her on an exploratory expedition to a remote island where she finds compassion and the true meaning of humanity with an ape Kong. The beauty and the beast finally meet their fate back in the city of New York where the filmmaker takes and displays the ape in quest of his fame by commercial exploitation which ultimately leads to catastrophe for everyone including a playwright Jack Driscoll who falls in love with Ann and plays an unlikely hero by trying to save her from Kong and her destiny. [Order on Amazon]