‘Kiss Of The Spider Woman’: Everything To Know About The Jennifer Lopez-Starring Broadway Adaptation

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Kiss Of The Spider Woman fans know that the Broadway musical was a massive deal back in its day: In 1993, it won a bunch of Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Original Score. Now, over 30 years later, the story is hitting the big screen via a film adaptation led by Jennifer Lopez.

The movie was a hit earlier this year at Sundance, where the Associated Press reports audiences broke out “in spontaneous applause” at its premiere. They got perhaps the best-possible candidate to helm the film, too: Bill Condon, who directed and wrote the screenplay. He has a superlative track record when it comes to Broadway-to-film adaptations, as he was behind the screenplays of both Dreamgirls and Chicago.

As Kiss Of The Spider Woman‘s theatrical release approaches, continue below to learn everything you need to know about the movie.

Plot

We already know the main plot of this one, since the film is based on the musical, which itself is based on Manuel Puig’s 1976 novel. It focuses on the imagined films of Luis Molina, a gay hairdresser serving an eight-year prison sentence in Argentina in 1981. His stories star Ingrid Luna, an actress who plays the “spider woman,” whose murderous trademark is using a kiss to kill her victims. Molina also forges a deep and unexpected connection when another prisoner is brought into his cell.

In an interview with Variety, Lopez said of the movie:

“It’s about two different people who come together and find the humanity in one another and fall in love. To me, that is something that is special and needs to be seen. We are all just human. It’s an important movie in this way.”

Cast

Aside from Lopez, the cast includes Diego Luna, Tonatiuh Elizarraraz, Tony Dovolani, Josefina Scaglione, Bruno Bichir, Aline Mayagoitia, and Lynn Favin.

Lopez told Variety, “I was waiting my whole life to be able to do a real big MGM Hollywood musical, and I finally got to do it. It was more [than I hoped]. Me and Diego were on set and we’re dancing around and we’re singing and looking at each other and it’s like we don’t want to do anything else but musicals. Diego said that! Me, too. I don’t want to do anything else.”