Barenaked Ladies to Pen Animal House Musical; Tony Winner Casey Nicholaw to Direct

Bluto, Otter and Boon may be leaving the frat house for a Broadway house! The 1978 college comedy National Lampoon’s Animal House is getting a musical adaptation, with a score by Canadian rock band Barenaked Ladies and a libretto by Michael Mitnick. Tony winner Casey Nicholaw has signed on as director and choreographer. No other details of the project have been announced.

Set at a college in 1962, the orginial film begins as Dean Wormer is determined to expel the entire Delta Tau Chi Fraternity, but the frat's misfit group of troublemakers has other plans. Animal House, a spinoff from humor magazine National Lampoon, starred the late John Belushi, Tim Matheson, Karen Allen, future Tony-winning Spring Awakening lead producer Tom Hulce and Kevin Bacon.

Universal Pictures Stage Productions will produce the musical in association with Jeffrey Richards, Jerry Frankel and James L. Nederlander. Matty Simmons, who produced the film Animal House and was a founding publisher of National Lampoon magazine, will serve as executive producer.