THE inhabitants of Skopelos, a sleepy little island in the Aegean Sea, are preparing for an invasion – the “Mamma Mia!” invasion.
The film version of the hit musical was shot on Skopelos, an island without an airport. Featuring the songs of ABBA, the movie opens July 18. If, as the pundits predict, the film proves as popular as the show, the Skopelitans had better get started building a runway pretty quick.
In terms of tourism, “Mamma Mia!” could do for Skopelos what “Zorba the Greek” did for Crete.
“Before we left, they were already starting to make ‘Mamma Mia!’ T-shirts with Pierce Brosnan‘s picture on them,” says Judy Craymer, producer of both the stage show and the film, which also stars Meryl Streep, Colin Firth, Julie Walters and Christine Baranski.
“I’m afraid there are going to be ‘Mamma Mia!’ cocktails and heaven knows what else there very soon.”
The cheeky and cheerful “Mamma Mia!” is one of the most successful theater productions of all time, closing in fast on reigning box-office champs “The Phantom of the Opera” and “Les Miserables.”
Since opening in London in 2000, the show has played 170 cities around the world, grossed more than $2 billion, and has been seen by more than 30 million people.
On Broadway alone, it regularly earns more than $1 million a week.
All of this has made Craymer, who’s said to own nearly 25 percent of the show, one of the richest women in England.
“There wasn’t a master plan for the world when we set out to do the show,” says Craymer, who took a leave from her day job as a television producer to oversee the musical.
“It was only after I noticed the box-
office figures going up in the first week of previews that it dawned on me that we might do well in London. But I had no idea we’d have 19 productions.”
What Craymer had going for her – in addition to her wit and pluck – was the trust of Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus, the founders of ABBA.
They’d been burned on Broadway when their musical “Chess” failed in 1988 and vowed never to do another show. But Craymer had been the executive producer on “Chess,” and the ABBA boys liked her. So when she came to them with a proposal for a show originally titled “The Winner Takes It All” – her favorite ABBA song – they gave her a hearing.
But they wouldn’t give her the rights to their songs “until I could come up with a story worth doing,” she says.
“The rights were the carrot they were always dangling in front of me. I think they thought, ‘She’ll never get it together, so we won’t be bothered by it.’ ”
Craymer hired avant-garde playwright Catherine Johnson, who came up with the concept that eventually won them over: the story of a single mother and her daughter, who wants to find her father.
“Suddenly Benny and Bjorn’s nos became yeses,” says Craymer.
Craymer has kept a tight leash on “Mamma Mia!” – Hollywood threw tons of money at her for the movie rights, but she wouldn’t sell. Eventually she made a deal with Universal that gave her total artistic control. She insisted that all the creators and designers of the musical work on the movie.
“I made huge plans and efforts to make this a big happy family,” she says.
That family now extends to the people of Skopelos – and they’re starting to cash in, too.
The island’s Web site features a big “Mamma Mia!” logo as well as photographs and directions to the ” ‘Mamma Mia!’ Beach,” the ” ‘Mamma Mia!’ Church” and “the house of Meryl Streep.”
Now if they’d just build the “Mamma Mia!” Airport, they’d be in business.