Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611

  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Strings: The Musical

Strings: The Musical

Lambert, Michael

Paperback

Film StudiesScreenplays

ISBN13: 9798255000609
Publisher: Independently Published
Published: Apr 11 2026
Pages: 124
Weight: 0.39
Height: 0.26 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
Strings an unreleased, too-controversial 1980s film it gathered dust in a studio vault and became underground legend: There are films that disappear because they flop.
Strings disappeared because it frightened the people who made it. When production began in the summer of 86, it was never meant to be a blockbuster. A modest budget. A first-time director. A simple story about a boy, a guitar, and the lies we tell ourselves about talent. It was supposed to slip quietly into arthouse cinemas and maybe, if it was lucky, pick up a cult following on VHS. No one expected it to ignite. Originally written for the stage it had a small run in the avant garde theatre circut. Test audiences walked in anticipating the usual coming-of-age fare: a dreamer finds a gift, butts heads with his father, learns something wholesome, rolls credits. What they got instead was something no studio executive had approved a story suggesting talent could be faked, that success could be hollow, and that love, real and complicated, didn't always look the way Hollywood wanted it to. By the final test screening, the controversy had devoured the film's prospects. Some viewers found the ending unnecessary. Others called it provocative. A few labelled it dangerous. Two women, in the closing moments, choosing each other without shame? In 1986, that was considered a career-ending mistake. The studio panicked.

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