The panned Australian musical will have a major rewrite, but retains its award-winning production design.

Australia has welcomed a host of imported blockbusting musicals in recent years, from Les Misérables, to Wicked, Tim Minchin’s smash-hit Matilda, and in the coming months Andrew Lloyd Webber’s hugely popular festival of felines, Cats. However now Australia is set to export some home-grown musical theatre to one of the most hallowed homes of art form, New York’s Broadway, although given the mixed reviews of the original 2013 production some may question whether Marius de Vries and Craig Lucas’ King Kong is really the show we want waving the Aussie flag overseas.

Premiered in June 2013 at the Regent Theatre in Melbourne, the production is a faithful adaptation of the iconic 1933 film which starred Hollywood darling Fay Wray as the beauty who tamed the beast, Ann Darrow. The songs and book were largely panned in the critical press although the show’s many technical triumphs, including an astonishing six-meter tall, 1-tonne gorilla puppet, created by Global Creatures, earned King Kong five Helpmann Awards, including Best Scenic Design and Outstanding Theatrical Achievement for the creation and operation of the King Kong character.

The conspicuous faults...