MENKEN: We knew there were people who wanted to bring Little Shop to Broadway, and Howard said absolutely not.
GEFFEN: The [Off Broadway] show was very successful, highly thought of. Then we opened it up in Los Angeles. It was natural that we’d make it as a movie.
The creative team began planning a feature film, which Geffen would produce. Tom Cruise, per Menken, wanted to play Seymour (although his reps have claimed he wasn’t interested in the role); he was immediately vetoed by Ashman. Geffen had his eyes set instead on a comedic actor from Canada.
RICK MORANIS (“SEYMOUR”): I first started hearing about the film being made early on, like ’82 or ’83. I ran into David Geffen randomly—I had never met him before—and he stopped me and said, “I want you in my movie.” I said, “Which one?” And he told me, and I said, “Well, okay!” And then for the next three years, I would occasionally hear about it or read about it in the hands of one director or another, and nothing ever happened.
At one point, Steven Spielberg was slated to produce the film, with Martin Scorsese directing. John Landis was also attached to the project for a time. Perhaps the name that made the most sense on paper was Frank Oz, best known as the man who brought to life childhood staples like Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, and Yoda.
FRANK OZ (DIRECTOR): I saw [the show] and thought it was amazing. But I didn’t have a take on it. And when I read the script for the movie, I couldn’t get my hands around it. It was so big, and I didn’t have a clear vision of it. So, through my agents, I said, “Thank you, but I can’t do it.” Two weeks later, something clicked in me regarding the three girl-group singers. I realized that when they entered onstage, all they could do was enter from the left or from the right…. But in a movie, it’s 360 degrees; you can have them enter from anywhere. So that’s what kind of changed my idea. I called back and I said, “You know, I may have a way to do this,” and then David asked me to do a rewrite…. Then I went to London, and I spent a month on the rewrite, and I felt really good about it. I knew if I said yes [to directing it], that’d mean two years of my life would be on this project. But I was committed and excited about it.
