In August 2020, a small TikTok song dedicated to Remy the Rat (the animated star of the 2007 Pixar film “Ratatoullie”) sparked a musical metamorphosis. Within days, the boy from the TikTok theater was asking the same question: “What if there was a musical ‘Ratatoullie’?”
The social media app was flooded with offers of 60 seconds from designers, singers and choreographers, all adding contributions to the work. Solo performances would turn into choral hymns as user after user added their touch to each singer’s performance. A musical was taking shape with fantasies, dances and even tiny dioramas of projected scenarios. The overwhelming isolation of the year and the lack of live performances created the perfect spark to ignite an organic musical, entirely collected.
As the entries for “Ratatouille: The TikTok Musical” grew, so did his notoriety. Soon Andrew Barth Feldman (who played the lead role in “Dear Evan Hanson” on Broadway) was posting his own ballads as Linguini (the strange chef who uses Remy’s help to cook).
When it came time for the musical to come together, director Lucy Moss signed a contract to turn this phenomenon into a cohesive show. “Despite being in a format at the forefront of technology and the most Gen-Z thing in the world, people aspired to be like a classic musical, ”Moss told The New York Times. “The challenge of doing this in the least theatrical space ever – online – was to try to stay true to that aspiration. The goal is a Zoom reading or an online show that drank 20 Red Bulls and spat on the screen. ”
With Feldman as Linguini, additional Broadway / Hollywood names also began to show interest. Tony-winning actor André De Shields plays scary critic Anton Ego, Wayne Brady plays Remy’s father Django, Adam Lambert plays Remy’s brother Emile, and the iconic Tituss Burgess is Remy the star of the show.
And now the masterpiece is complete, with all proceeds going to the Actors Fund charity, the public can donate to watch the entire show on this Today Tix link. But be warned that the show will only be available for 72 hours.