Tim Minchin found inspiration in Matilda’s story of rebellion

Tim Minchin reveals why he had no qualms about writing a musical – now made into a Netflix movie – about Roald Dahl’s classic Matilda.

Tim Minchin doesn’t believe any book should be held sacred.

And that’s not just because he is an out and proud atheist.

“I don’t believe that anything is fundamentally sacred or untouchable,” he says.

“There’s no earthly reason why one shouldn’t climb up a rock. Just as there’s no earthly reason why one shouldn’t jump on an altar, or piss in the holy water.

“None of it is logical, but the stories we tell ourselves about what’s sacred, do matter. They matter profoundly actually.

“In fact, humanity depends on shared stories of meaning. But, but in terms of holding some artistic property sacrosanct, I take them as they come.”

This is why Minchin had no qualms about writing musicals inspired by Roald Dahl’s classic book Matilda and the cult favourite movie Groundhog Day, starring Bill Murray.

His musical adaptation of Groundhog Day won over not only the film’s most ardent (and sceptical) of fans but it’s original star as well.

“Bill Murray came twice in a row because he’s hilarious and he absolutely loved it,” Minchin says.

Charlie Hodson-Prior as Bruce Bogtrotter and Emma Thompson as Agatha Trunchbull in Matilda the Musical. Picture: Dan Smith/Netflix

Matilda: The Musical – which has now been made into a Netflix movie – wasn’t the first time that story has been adapted.

Before his playful lyrics and catchy tunes gave the book a new lease on life on Broadway in 2010, Matilda was made into the 1996 movie starring Danny DeVito, his real-life wife Rhea Perlman (Cheers) and Mara Wilson (hot on the heels of her delightfully precocious debut in Mrs Doubtfire).

Matilda: The Musical quickly wowed theatre audiences around the world and won five Tony Awards, seven Oliviers and 13 Helpmanns.

Despite his success, Minchin doesn’t believe all stories have musical potential.

“I think nearly everything should not be turned into a musical,” he says.

“I think most musicals are not great. I get asked all the time [to turn a film or book into a musical] and I can’t hear it. I can’t see it. What you want is a story with an amazing conceptual underpinning.

“Groundhog Day has got this incredible philosophical underpinning, like what is the meaning of life? It’s a redemption story that, if you want to change the world, you need to change the way you look at the world. And the musical doesn’t compete with the movie. Many, many people came to see the musical who loved the film and – to their shock – they loved it too.”

Tim Minchin. Picture: Richard Dobson

Minchin found inspiration in Matilda’s story of rebellion against authority as well, and he approached writing it in much the same way that he penned the script for his Foxtel series Upright.

“I really believe you should trust your audience that that they will come with you wherever you need to go, and that the main job of storytelling in any form in art is to make your characters sympathetic, so your audience can feel their pain, and feel their laughter, and go with them on an adventure and care deeply about how s**t turns out,” he says.

“That’s the job.”

Of course, it is rather tricky to make Miss Trunchbull – the cruel and foreboding school principal who locks unruly students in a torture chamber known as The Chokey – remotely likeable, even with someone like Emma Thompson in the role.

It’s not the first time that Thompson has hidden herself under dowdy make-up for a role in a children’s classic. In the Harry Potter film series, she donned thick glasses and a frizzy wig as Divination Professor, Sybil Trelawney. And as the titular Nanny McPhee, she slowly metamorphosed on screen from a plain, wart-faced babysitter into her true self.

And now, in Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical, the Oscar-winner is unrecognisable as the villainous Trunchbull, where Thompson’s ordinarily sunny features are buried under a prosthetic nose, fat suit and a glowering expression.

Emma Thompson as Agatha Trunchbull in Matilda the Musical. Picture: Dan Smith/Netflix

For Thompson, the appeal of Matilda lay in its female-centric storyline. And in addition to Thompson, the key players are the gifted but underappreciated Matilda (Alisha Weir), Lashana Lynch (Brotherhood) as her sweet teacher, Miss Honey, and Shindu Vee (Sex Education) as an eccentric librarian.

Making films with strong female characters has been Thompson’s “guiding principal” since she was 19 and just starting out as an actor.

“I’m constantly looking for great, great female heroic roles and villain roles,” she explains.

That quest resulted in her winning an Oscar for her 1995 adaptation of Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility, which she also starred in alongside Kate Winslet.

The Titanic star has since said that the guidance Thompson offered her on that film set has inspired her to go to also be a mentor to young actors herself.

Thompson still gets a kick out of working with young performers too, marvelling at their positivity and openness.

On Matilda, she found herself in a cast of more than 200 children spearheaded by 11-year-old Irish actor, Weir.

“Alisha’s in a different kind of position because she’s in all the scenes and she’s on her own,” she explains of her young co-star.

“But you see how all of those children just step right up to the plate, you know, Ashton (Robertson as Nigel), Charlie (Hodson-Prior as Bruce Bogtrotter) and Winter (Jarrett-Glasspool as Amanda Thripp), and everyone playing the parts around Alisha, they really took them on.

“It could have been that Matilda was the only child you remember, and you only remember her and somehow have a vague sense of there being other children, obviously that’s the director as well as Denis Kelly’s writing. It’s a great joy to work with young people like that.

“I was absolutely at their feet; I completely worship the ground they walk on.”

Alisha Weir in a scene from Matilda the Musical.

Weir was equally enamoured with Thompson, saying she helped her stay calm and focused on set. The young star says another production highlight had been Minchin’s music, and particularly the new song he wrote specifically for the movie, Still Holding My Hand.

But most of all, like most kids her age, Weir simply loved the story at the centre of it all and the message it had for young girls to stand up for themselves.

“I just really liked how strong she was and how kind she was and how she stands up for what’s right,” she enthuses.

“And I think, although her main superpower is making things move with her eyes, like telekinesis, I think her actual superpower is having courage.

“Because, although she’s in a little girl’s body, I think she has the mentality of an adult. So, she stands up for what’s right and she doesn’t let her parents walk all over her.”

Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical streams on Neftlix from December 25

Originally published as Tim Minchin found inspiration in Matilda’s story of rebellion