Hairspray (2007 film) the 1988 John Waters film upon which the stage musical is based, became interested in adapting the stage show as a musical film. Development work began in late 2004, while a similarly film-to-Broadway-to-film project, Mel Brooks' "The Producers", was in production. Craig Zadan and Neil Meron, the executive producers of the Academy Award-winning film adaptation of the Broadway musical "Chicago", were hired as the producers for "Hairspray", and began discussing possibly casting John Travolta and Billy Crystal (or Jim Broadbent) as Edna and Wilbur Turnblad, respectively. Thomas Meehan and Mark O'Donnell, authors of the book for the stage musical, wrote
West End theatre for their injuries. In 2012, gross sales of £529,787,692 were up 0.27% and attendances also increased 0.56% to 13,992,773-year-on-year In 2013, sales again rose this time by 11% to £585,506,455, with attendances rising to 14,587,276. This was despite slightly fewer performances occurring in 2013. The length of West End shows depend on ticket sales. The longest-running musical in West End history is "Les Misérables". It overtook Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Cats", which closed in 2002 after running for 8,949 performances and 21 years, as the longest-running West End musical of all time on 8 October 2006. Other long-runners include Lloyd Webber's