Someone's Making A Vincent Van Gogh Musical, So We Wrote The Playbill For Them

To the delight of many diehard Impressionist fans, and the chagrin of those opposed entirely to the genre of musical theater, someone in Amsterdam is making a musical about Vincent van Gogh.

Yes! screams the type of people who named their cat Grizabella. Noooooooooo! bemoans literally everyone else.

The quirky production is meant to honor the 125th anniversary of van Gogh's death (next year). Because what better way to commemorate the possible suicide of one of art history's most well known figures than a rousing song-and-dance adaption of "Van Gogh in the Borinage"?

"It's perhaps a little odd to celebrate his death," Amsterdam's Van Gogh Museum director Axel Rueger told the Dutch news agency ANP.

...Yes.

The show, poignantly dubbed "Vincent," is planned for the fall of 2015. We know little about it other than Albert Verlinde and the Van Gogh Europe Foundation are masterminding the bonanza. The musical -- set to tour to France and Belgium -- will serve as a finale to "the Van Gogh Year," which will include exhibitions at the Kröller-Müller Museum, Het Noordbrabants Museum and Van Gogh Museum.

No word yet on who will play the lead, though we'd love to be a fly on the wall of that casting call. While we wait on pins and needles for composers to transform "The Potato Eaters" into a high-flying good time, we decided to give the people what they want. A playbill*:

Skull of a Skeleton with Burning Cigarette, 1885–1886, oil on canvas, Van Gogh Museum

VINCENT

Act One: From Groot-Zundert To Zevenbergen, And Other Unpronounceable Dutch Names

1. "The Diary of a Wimpy Kid (Or, a Redhead at Boarding School)" .. Vincent
2. "My Youth Was Gloomy and Cold and Sterile" ................................ Townspeople Chorus
3. "Coal Mining Interlude" "Borinage, More Like Bori-Nope" ............ Vincent, Theo
4. "I Had a Breakdown and Became an Artist #GoodIdea" ................. Vincent, Henry Luyten
5. "All the Potato Eaters, All the Potato Eaters" ................................... Cassandra, Mistoffolees, Bombalurina
6. "At Eternity's Gate: I Woke Up Like This" ........................................ Vincent
7. "Give Me All Of The Straw Hats" ....................................................... Vincent, Straw Hats
8. "Frightening Clarity: I'm Obsessed with Sunflowers" ...................... Vincent

Intermission: Please come back.

Act Two: Great Things Are Done By A Series Of Small Things Brought Together This Is Neither Of Those Things.

1. "Twas a Super Starry Night" .............................................................. Townspeople Chorus
2. "Crazy in Arles" "Adorable Brothels" ................................................. Vincent, Theo
3. "Goodbye, Ear-l" ............................................................................... The Dixie Chicks
4. "Defying Gravity (You're definitely having delusions of grandeur)" .. Paul Gauguin, several cigarette-smoking skeletons
5. "Skimbleshanks: The Life and Times of Someone Who Would Later Be Referred To As A 'Rock Star'" .................................................................................... The Ghost of Vincent van Gogh

*Note: This is not the real playbill. This is the product of arts editors biding time on a rainy weekday. Carry on.