Pantoland Review Roundup

Posted on December 10, 2021 by boz

London theater critics have given generally positive reviews to the West End return of the holiday extravaganza Pantoland, which runs at the London Palladium through Jan. 9, 2022. The creative team includes Michael Harrison (direction), Karen Bruce (choreography), Ian Westbrook (sets), Ben Cracknell (lights), Hugh Durrant (costumes), Matt Peploe (sound), Twins FX (special effects), and Gary Hind (musical superivsion, orchestrations). The cast includes Donny Osmond, Julian Clary, Paul Zerdin, Nigel Havers, and Gary Wilmot, with Jac Yarrow and Sophie Isaacs.

Evening Standard (Melanie McDonagh): Think of the most unlikely stage pairing, and you’re unlikely to beat Julian Clary performing a duet with Donny Osmond. … It’s a blast. This is panto, but nothing like we know it. … Normal panto has a narrative roughly framed around a children’s story, peppered with innuendo. This is innuendo peppered with the most fabulous variety acts with no reference whatever to a story. … The filth quotient means this is a panto oxymoron, one for the grown-ups. … The best line of the night was Nigel Havers’: “I haven’t had this much fun since Boris’s cheese and wine party!” How we laughed. 5 out of 5 stars.

London Theatre (Sophie Thomas): For a show called Pantoland at the Palladium, there’s one thing this show isn’t — and that’s a pantomime. … It’s a highlight reel of shows gone by, rather than offering anything new. Julian Clary, Nigel Havers, Gary Wilmot, and Paul Zerdin return for another year of Pantoland fun, guaranteeing a good time at the theatre. … There’s one new addition to this year’s celebrations. Donny Osmond as the “Wizard of Pantomime” brings magic to the Palladium, turning the audience into a gaggle of screaming teenagers. He’s a panto natural. … To change a Donny Osmond lyric, I love theatre for a reason, let the reason be pantomime. 4 out of 5 stars.

Telegraph (Claire Allfree): With Pantoland dropping all pretence at a child-friendly plot, the Palladium’s Christmas show is becoming, perhaps irredeemably, a case of adult-flavoured style over content. Pantoland was conceived last year as a stop-gap response to Covid. … Clary and co have retained the concept, serving up a reheated package of greatest hits. … This is Variety theatre that’s low on, er, variety. If you really are going to dispense with plot and go for all-out spectacle amid an unstoppable stream of unprintable quips about sex, you need a bit more than rings of fire and a line of dancing women with feathers on their heads. 2 out of 5 stars.

Times (Dominic Maxwell): Since the Palladium pantomimes have come so close to just being flat-out variety shows in their five-year recent history, why not just abandon any lingering fig leaf of fairytale and get on with the bawdy or spectacular or beautifully bananas set pieces? That’s the thinking behind Pantoland, a show in which the regular quartet of Julian Clary, Gary Wilmot, Nigel Havers and the ventriloquist Paul Zerdin pay tribute to the spirit of pantomime while trying to avoid laborious detail such as story. 3 out of 5 stars.

What’s On Stage (Theo Bosanquet): Panto is back at the Palladium. Sort of. This, the second installment of Pantoland (though last year’s only ran for six performances before being forced to close), is in fact a variety show in a mask. As the imperious Julian Clary declares, “If you want plot stay at home and watch Casualty.” Clary is joined by the core Palladium troupe … alongside several new faces. Top billing goes to Donny Osmond. … There’s an irony in the fact that Michael Harrison’s production sets out to celebrate the history of panto at the Palladium … but doesn’t actually constitute a pantomime. Having said that, when the cast are as high calibre as this, the lack of a recognisable story seems a minor quibble. I gobbled it up. 4 out of 5 stars.

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2021 AFI Awards

Posted on December 10, 2021 by boz

On December 8, the American Film Institute announced the 10 oustanding film and 10 outstanding television honorees that the group deemed “culturally and artistically representative” of the year’s most significant screen achievements. AFI also named three additional honorees, among those works of excellence that are outside of the institute’s criteria of American work, for special awards. The musical works on the institute’s list of honorees were the film adaptations of the stage shows Tick, Tick …  Boom! and West Side Story and the original TV miniseries Schmigadoon!, while the documentary film Summer of Soul was among the three works chosen for special awards. The honorees will be celebrated Jan. 7, 2022, at a private reception at the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills.

This year’s jury featured artists Lee Isaac Chung, Liz Hannah, Anjelica Huston, and Ed Zwick; film historians Annette Insdorf, L.S. Kim, Akira Mizuta Lippit, Leonard Maltin, Ellen Seiter, and Robert Thompson; the AFI trustees; critics Shawn Edwards and Claudia Puig as well as those from other outlets. The jury was chaired by AFI board member Jeanine Basinger and AFI board vice chair Richard Frank.

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Company Review Roundup

Posted on December 9, 2021 by boz

New York theater critics have given generally positive reviews to the long-awaited Broadway transfer of the 2018 Olivier-winning West End revival of Company. The creative team includes George Furth (book), Stephen Sondheim (music, lyrics), Marianne Elliott (direction), Liam Steel (choreography), Joel Fram (music supervision), Bunny Christie (sets, costumes), Neil Austin (lights), Ian Dickinson (sound), Chris Fisher (illusions), Campbell Young Assocs. (hair & makeup), David Cullen (orchestrations), and Sam Davis (dance arrangements). The cast includes Katrina Lenk (Bobbie), Patti LuPone (Joanne), Matt Doyle (Jamie), Christopher Fitzgerald (David), Christopher Sieber (Harry), Jennifer Simard (Sarah), Terence Archie (Larry), Etai Benson (Paul), Bobby Conte (P.J.), Nikki Renée Daniels (Jenny), Claybourne Elder (Andy), Greg Hildreth (Peter), Manu Narayan (Theo), and Rashidra Scott (Susan), with Kathryn Allison, Britney Coleman, Jacob Dickey, Javier Ignacio, Anisha Nagarajan, and Heath Saunders (New Yorkers).

AMNY (Matt Windman): In Marianne Elliott’s bold and contemporized production, the male Bobby has become the female Bobbie. … With a handful of exceptions, turning Bobby into Bobbie mostly works. In fact, making the character a woman whose biological clock is ticking (literally ticking in this production) adds urgency to the question of whether and when the character will settle down and marry. … Lenk gives a passive, barely passable performance. … However, it is easy to overlook Lenk in light of the outstanding supporting cast. … I could easily sit through Company again, though I would prefer to see it with a different Bobbie — or Bobby for that matter.

Deadline (Greg Evans): If there’s a better, more vital way to honor the late, incomparable Stephen Sondheim than Marianne Elliott’s superb production of Company, Broadway hasn’t invented it. This gorgeous revival … is, from across-the-board excellent performances and thoughtful revisions to the visual delight of a lovely and ingeniously clever set design, a gift both to and from the genius we lost last month. … If Company is a reminder of Sondheim’s brilliance — not that we needed reminding — “Ladies Who Lunch” demonstrates yet again that LuPone is a theater concoction through and through, a treasure like Sondheim was a treasure.

Hollywood Reporter (David Rooney): While staying faithful to the original material, Elliott and Sondheim tweaked lyrics, visual references and Furth’s book scenes, transforming the show into a portrait of a contemporary single woman. … The production is so vibrant, so alive and stimulating, reconceived with such cleverness and humor, that even a conspicuously miscast lead doesn’t cancel out its pleasures. … Company has ripened over the decades to reflect a world in which questioning the balance in all types of relationships has become a more open part of the conversation. … This first major stage revival of a Sondheim work since his death may not be perfect, but damn it’s good.

New York Times (Jesse Green): In a gender-flipped version abetted by Sondheim himself, what was once the story of a man who is terrified of intimacy becomes something much less interesting. … Company offered a groundbreaking way of looking at its subject … a new method of storytelling in which thematic consistency trumped conventional plot — and nearly obliterated it. Though fascinating in theory, and worth considering as a way of reorienting the original’s outdated sexual politics, Elliott’s idea that the material could be regendered for a new era completely disrupts that consistency. … Truth be told, I was never less than riveted. … So I guess I’m sorry-grateful. Sorry for not liking this version of Company better — and grateful to Sondheim for providing the chance to find out.

Time Out (Adam Feldman): I think Elliott’s Company is the most satisfying Broadway revival of a Sondheim show in history. The modern setting and gender switches help; with a woman as Bobbie, and the sexes of several couples swapped around, the text plays out in exciting new ways. … Lenk holds strong at the center, bringing her formidable charisma and individuality to the role of Bobbie; you understand why everyone in town seems to want her to themselves. While she’s not quite up to the vocal demands of the show’s emotional-breakthrough finale, “Being Alive,” she acts the hell out of it. … As the world mourns [Sondheim’s] loss, Company offers a regretful-happy reminder of how alive his work remains. 5 out of 5 stars.

Variety (Naveen Kumar): Director Marianne Elliott’s sensational new revival strikes like a lightning bolt, surging with fresh electricity and burnishing its creators’ legacy with an irresistible sheen. It’s silly and sophisticated, intimate and in-tune with the currents of modern life, brilliantly conceived and funny as hell. … Company has always reached to the heart of what it means to be a person in the world. But rarely has our human desire for connection … felt as urgent and essential as it does right now. “Life is company,” so the song goes. And Company is sublime.

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Kimberly Akimbo Review Roundup

Posted on December 9, 2021 by boz

New York theater critics have given generally positive reviews to the new Off-Broadway musical Kimberly Akimbo, adapted by Jeanine Tesori (music) and David Lindsay-Abaire (book, lyrics) from his 2001 play. The creative team also includes Jessica Stone (direction), Danny Mefford (choreography), Chris Fenwick (music direction), David Zinn (sets), Sarah Laux (costumes), Lap Chi Chu (lights), Kai Harada (sound), Lucy MacKinnon (projections), J. Jared Janas (hair & makeup), and John Clancy (orchestrations). The cast includes Steven Boyner (Buddy), Victoria Clark (Kimberly), Justin Cooley (Seth), Olivia Elease Hardy (Delia), Fernell Hogan II (Martin), Michael Iskander (Aaron), Alli Mauzey (Pattie), Bonnie Milligan (Debra), and Nina White (Teresa). The show continues its limited engagement at Atlantic Theater Company through January 2.

Victoria Clark

New York Stage Review (David Finkle): [Lindsay-Abaire’s] a playwright who sees the world through his own akimbo instincts, something both director Jessica Stone and choreographer Danny Mefford fully understand. So, as Kimberly Akimbo passes, it remains cheerily akimbo. It retains a cuteness while never dipping into cutsie-poo-ness. … Best yet is the closing number, “Great Adventure,” with its lyric advising, “So just enjoy the view, because no one gets a second time around.” Any musical ending as strong as this does is lucky, for sure. … If you enter without your arm and head akimbo, you’re likely to leave arm and head fully akimbo-ed. 4 out of 5 stars.

New York Times (Jesse Green): Unlike adaptations that do little more than nail vocal Sheetrock onto bare studs of borrowed story, and have approximately the same elegance, this one … remakes the original on new terms, with songs that beautifully tell us new things. This is done without undue violence to the ingenious original premise, which makes comedy, as we all must, of tragedy. … Kimberly Akimbo is already the rare example of a good play that has become an even better musical. It warms up the zaniness of the original without overshooting and making it “normal.” … “No one gets a second time around,” they sing in the finale (though Kimberly Akimbo fortunately did). It may be an old-style “carpe diem” message … but in this case, leavened by exceptional craft, it makes a totally satisfying meal.

Time Out (Adam Feldman): Clever, touching and idiosyncratic, Kimberly Akimbo is the best new musical of 2021, and Jessica Stone’s well-cast world-premiere production at the Atlantic does it justice. The dark absurdist comedy of Lindsay-Abaire’s original play … remains, but it is tempered by the addition of a four-person chorus of students and by Tesori’s winding, agile melodies; material that might have been rendered merely as zany has a more human dimension. … Mortality is in every beat of this show, but less like a clock like a pulse. As Kimberly sings: “I know I might be dying” — aren’t we all? — “but I’m not dead.” 4 out of 5 stars.

Vulture (Helen Shaw): The way teenagers in the new musical Kimberly Akimbo express love … is by making anagrams of each other’s names. A high-school student, Kimberly, crushes on the tuba-playing, Elvish-speaking Seth, and the two nerdy adolescents express their affection by making word scrambles. … Puzzles require attention, which is the first component of love. To change David Lindsay-Abaire’s poignant 2001 comedy into this fresh and gorgeous musical required this same deep-play, letter-by-letter concentration. Lindsay-Abaire and the composer Jeanine Tesori pick up the original (Kimberly Akimbo the play) and rearrange its pieces carefully (Kimberly Akimbo the musical), and in doing so they find hidden, sideways beauty.

Wrap (Robert Hofler): This almost never happens to a novel, movie or play when it’s turned into a musical. Typically, when songs are added, the narrative needs to be made simpler, character motivations get scrunched and so the original source material ends up being compromised. Something different has happened to David Lindsay-Abaire’s play Kimberly Akimbo on its way to becoming a new musical. … It’s still funny and quirky and very off-center, but … Jeanine Tesori’s music grounds the story in a way that gives the source material resonance, makes it more substantial and far more emotionally engaging. … It’s a real musical-theater breakthrough.

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Chicago Tribune: Best Theater of 2021

Posted on December 9, 2021 by boz

Yesterday, Chicago Tribune theater critic Chris Jones published his choices for the ten best shows in the Chicago area during the past year, including seven musical offerings. Two productions still running are Cinderella, a revival of the Rodgers & Hammerstein classic with “a superb lead turn from the pitch-perfect Mikayla Renfrow,” at Aurora’s Paramount Theatre until January 9, and Holiday Inn, a revival of the Irving Berlin musical with “exceptional chemistry between” Adrian Aguilar and Erica Stephan, at Oakbrook Terrace’s Drury Lane Theatre until January 9.

Musical premieres on Jones’s list include the Broadway-bound Paradise Square, which closed at Chicago’s Nederlander Theatre on December 5 and begins performances at New York’s Ethel Barrymore Theatre on February 22, and the regional premiere of the Tony-winning Kinky Boots, which played at Aurora’s Paramount Theatre from August 18 through October 17.

Two plays that prominently featured music are Chicago Shakespeare Theater’s production of As You Like It, in which director Daryl Cloran and music supervisor Ben Elliott interpolated more than 20 Beatles songs, and Fannie: The Music and Life of Fannie Lou Hamer, Cheryl L. West’s tribute to civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer at the Goodman Theatre, starring E. Faye Butler.

The final musical on the list is Northlight Theatre’s production of Songs for Nobodies, Joanna Murray-Smith’s revue of iconic songs from the catalogs of Judy Garland, Patsy Cline, Billie Holiday, Edith Piaf, and Maria Callas, starring Bethany Thomas.

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In Memoriam: Keith Herrmann

Posted on December 8, 2021 by boz

On December 5, Tony-nominated composer Keith Herrmann passed away. Born March 4, 1952, in Brooklyn, Herrmann graduated from Westfield H.S. in New Jersey, where he was active in the music program. Below is a recording of Herrmann singing the carol “Sleep, Holy Babe” in one of his school’s choir concerts, which accompanist Eric Van Leuven transfered into digital audio from the vinyl LP Art Masterpieces 1969.

Herrmann began his professional career as a pianist and music director, working on the national tour of Godspell (1974) and New York run of The Magic Show (1975). In 1979, he earned his first Broadway credit on the revival of Whoopee! and his first New York writing credit (with collaborators Charlotte Anker and Irene Rosenberg) on the Off-Off-Broadway run of Unescorted Women. Retitled Onward Victoria, the show transferred to Broadway in 1980 but closed on opening night. Below is Emma Benson singing “Where Is the Vision” from the 2017 Shenandoah Conservatory staged reading.

After serving as music supervisor on the short-lived Censored Scenes from King Kong (1980), Herrmann found steadier work creating revues for St. Regis Hotel’s cabaret. Then in 1982, he was hired to music direct and play for Cats. He performed on the Grammy-winning cast album and on its star Betty Buckley’s self-titled 1984 album. He ended the decade on Broadway with Romance/Romance (1988), for which he and Barry Harman received the Outer Critics Circle Award and a Tony nomination for best score. Below are Scott Bakula, Alison Fraser, and the cast at the 1988 Tony Awards.

During the 1980s, Herrmann also wrote jingles (including “Yugo Is All You Need” in 1986 with Larry Goodsight) and film scores (including Taking a Stand in 1989 with Betty Buckley). He began the 1990s by working with Stephen Witkin and Larry Goodsight on Prom Queens Unchained (1991), which ran Off-Broadway at the Village Gate. Below is Betty Buckley singing “Corsage.” In 1993, Herrmann reteamed with Barry Harman for The Haunted Hotel, adapted from the Wilkie Collins novella, which was revised for the 2003 New York Fringe Festival as Suspect! and reworked again as Incredible High.

Herrmann’s later musical work includes the 1998 animated Buster & Chauncey’s Silent Night, the original Shadows of Pompeii (2009) with R.C. Staab, the revue Amazing Sex with Barry Harman, and the children’s musical Homework Machine with Mark Cabaniss, adapted from the Dan Gutman book. Below is video of Herrmann and Cabaniss in rehearsal for the 2014 Boston Children’s Theatre production of their show.

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A Chorus Line Review Roundup

Posted on December 8, 2021 by boz

The UK regional revival of A Chorus Line has received generally favorable reviews from British theater critics. Last revived on London’s West End in 2013, the current production of the 1975 Broadway musical is playing at the Curve, Leicester, through December 31. The creative team includes James Kirkwood and Nicholas Dante (book), Marvin Hamlisch (music), Edward Kleban (lyrics), Nikolai Foster (direction), Ellen Kane (choreography), Grace Smart (sets), David Shrubsole (musical supervision), Edd Lindley (costumes), Howard Hudson (lights), Tom Marshall (sound), and Tamara Saringer (musical direction).

The cast includes Adam Cooper (Zach), Carly Mercedes Dyer (Cassie), Ronan Burns (Bobby), Beth Hinton-Lever (Bebe), Katie Lee (Kristine), Redmand Rance (Mike), Emily Barnett-Salter (Sheila), Bradley Delarosbel (Gregory), Lizzy-Rose Esin-Kelly (Diana), André Fabien Francis (Richie), Ainsley Hall Ricketts (Paul), Joshua Lay (Al), Kanako Nakano (Judy), Jamie O’Leary (Mark), Tom Partridge (Don), Rachel Jayne Picar (Connie), Chloe Saunders (Val), Charlotte Scott (Maggie), and Taylor Walker (Larry).

Guardian (Clare Brennan): It’s not difficult to see why Nikolai Foster has chosen A Chorus Line as Curve’s first post-Covid Christmas show. … Its continual focus-switching, from collective to individual experience, from gritty endurance to exuberant celebration, speaks powerfully to our pandemic-troubled times. Staging and design add impact to the dramaturgical focus-shifts. … At times, individuals dominate the setting — faces, projected in closeup on to the back wall. Even here, though, the dancers are subject to manipulation. … For the closing number, Howard Hudson’s lighting rig takes on a life of its own, dancing above the high-kicking chorus — identical in gold outfits, but each now unique, to our eyes, and all wonderful. 4 out of 5 stars.

Guardian (Chris Wiegand): What a thrill … to see the deep Curve stage flooded with talented dancers, delighting in one of musical theatre’s most enthralling openings. And 5, 6, 7, 8: off they go, driven on by the irresistible brassy attack of Marvin Hamlisch’s score. … Almost 50 years on, much of what the show says about the theatre business still rings true although it can’t help but feel rather limited when the industry is having long-overdue conversations about abuse of power and mental health. Those tunes though. … There can’t be an unused spotlight in the building by the end of “One,” which becomes a moving testament to all those theatre workers who mobilised as a chorus for their imperilled industry. 4 out of 5 stars.

Jonathan Baz Reviews (Jonathan Baz): It’s a bold statement from Leicester’s Curve that sees them stage A Chorus Line as their seasonal musical. … Directed by Nikolai Foster, the musical magic is a singular sensation. While it is invidious to name cast members as the entire ensemble are all magnificent in the different glimpses of humanity they reveal, … the key drivers of the narrative are outstanding. … The people of Leicester have again been blessed with this festive treat — and if you don’t live nearby, then jump in a car or train and go. This may not be the traditional family show — but for Christmas quality, Nikolai Foster’s A Chorus Line is the “One”!

Times (Donald Hutera): It is nearly half a century since this era-defining, smash-hit and Pulitzer prizewinning Broadway musical had its premiere but, as the Curve artistic director Nikolai Foster’s absorbing new production demonstrates, it still packs an emotional wallop. Originally conceived, directed and choreographed (with Bob Avian) by Michael Bennett in 1975, it is heartfelt, slick and scintillating entertainment. Groundbreaking, too, as a plotless musical (something for which Stephen Sondheim had paved the way five years earlier with Company) structured round a collage of characters who are, crucially, dancers.  4 out of 5 stars.

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Something’s Coming: West Side Story

Posted on December 7, 2021 by boz

On Sunday, the ABC-TV news magazine 20/20 aired the hourlong special “Something’s Coming,” featuring interviews with the creators and performers of the new film version of West Side Story, ahead of the upcoming general release of this second screen adaptation of the 1957 Broadway musical. During the broadcast, director Steven Spielberg talked about how the original cast recording of the stage show helped to inspire his career and how he set about reimagining what the Oscar-winning 1961 film adaptation had done. You can watch the full episode here, and you can watch that first segment of the episode below.

The broadcast also included interviews with the film’s leading performers Rachel Zegler (Maria), Ansel Elgort (Tony), and Ariana DeBose (Anita), as well as with screenwriter Tony Kushner, casting director Cindy Tolan, and the historians who consulted on the film. The second segment below features Zegler, who sent in her audition tape after a friend saw the open casting call on Twitter, one of 35,000 actors to do so.

Others interviewed for the program include Rita Moreno, who won an Oscar for her portrayal of Anita in the 1961 film, and Chita Rivera, who created the role of Anita on Broadway, as well as show lyricist Stephen Sondheim in one of his final interviews. Below, the third segment from the broadcast includes Moreno talking about Latino representation on film.

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New York Times: Best Theater of 2021

Posted on December 6, 2021 by boz

This weekend, the New York Times theater staff gave their list of the best productions from the past year, both online and in-person. Among its 10 “Streaming Highlights” were Jason Robert Brown’s 2001 two-hander The Last Five Years, presented by Out of the Box Theatrics and Holmdel Theater Company, starring Nasia Thomas (Cathy) and Nicholas Edwards (Jamie), and the Master Voices presentation of Adam Guettel’s 1998 song cycle, Myths and Hymns, featuring Kelli O’Hara, Renée Fleming, Jennifer Holliday, Norm Lewis, John Lithgow, and the a cappella group Take 6. Below are a clip of “Goodbye Until Tomorrow” from The Last Five Years and the promo for Myths and Hymns.

Among the physical productions on the editors’ list were the Broadway transfers of the 2017 British musical Six, which finally had its opening night this October after being shuttered by the pandemic on the very day of its originally scheduled premiere in March 2020, and the 2018 West End revival of the 2003 musical Caroline, or Change, starring Sharon D Clarke, reprising her Olivier-winning performance. Below are the trailer for Six and highlights from Caroline, or Change.

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Mrs. Doubtfire Review Roundup

Posted on December 6, 2021 by boz

The new Broadway musical Mrs. Doubtfire, adapted from the 1993 film based on Anne Fine’s 1987 novel Madame Doubtfire, has received mixed reviews from New York theater critics. The show made its world premiere in 2019 at Seattle’s 5th Avenue Theatre and opened at Broadway’s Stephen Sondheim Theatre last night. The creative team includes Karey Kirkpatrick (book, score), John O’Farrell (book), Wayne Kirkpatrick (score), Jerry Zaks (direction), Lorin Latarro (choreography), Ethan Popp (orchestrations, arrangements), Zane Mark (dance arrangements), Zachary Dietz (music direction), David Korins (sets), Catherine Zuber (costumes), Philip S. Rosenberg (lights), Brian Ronan (sound), David Brian Brown (hair), and Tommy Kurzman (makeup, prosthetics).

The cast includes Rob McClure (Daniel / Mrs. Doubtfire), Jennifer Gambatese (Miranda), Analise Scarpaci (Lydia), Jake Ryan Flynn (Christopher), Avery Sell (Nattie), Brad Oscar (Frank), J. Harrison Ghee (Andre Mayem), Charity Angel Dawson (Wanda Sellner), Mark Evans (Stu Dunmeyer), Jodi Kimura (Janey Lundy), and Peter Barlett (Mr. Jolly).

AMNY (Matt Windman): Mrs. Doubtfire brings up the inevitable question of why the film has been adapted to a musical and what if anything the adaptation adds. … For the most part, the stage adaptation is competent but labored, with a weak, unmemorable score and a book that leans heavily on the gags and construction of the original film. … Mrs. Doubtfire plays at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre. … One hopes that future musicals that play the theater will be ones that at least make a good faith effort to live up to Sondheim’s innovative standards, as opposed to continuing the never-ending cycle of churning middlebrow musicals out of familiar movies.

Broadway News (Charles Isherwood): As the title character in the musical Mrs. Doubtfire, the superlative performer Rob McClure tears around the stage like a human tornado. … But his herculean efforts to lift the show into the musical theater heavens, while always fun to watch, are ultimately unavailing. Mrs. Doubtfire, like virtually all stage adaptations of popular movies, still feels like an unnecessary and at times laboriously strained transcription of the original film. … Audiences looking for something familiar and family-friendly will hardly go away disgruntled. But it represents another in a long line of forgettable musicals adapted from superior films.

Daily News (Chris Jones): A good time for all ages, despite our beloved, battered Broadway, is exactly what the audience-friendly, warm-centered, modestly scaled Mrs. Doubtfire delivers. … This superbly cast musical has been given a whiz-bang farcical staging by the wily old maestro Jerry Zaks, who has installed more physical shtick, especially from the droll ensemble, in almost any show since The Producers. … Add in some catchy contemporary tunes, a hilarious central performance from Rob McClure, cute Broadway-style kids and a big heart, and you’ve got a show that all kinds of folks will enjoy.

New York Theater (Jonathan Mandell): [Mrs. Doubtfire] has the misfortune of opening in the Broadway theater named after Stephen Sondheim a week after his death. Sondheim set a standard for musical theater that Mrs. Doubtfire doesn’t even attempt to meet. That’s not to say that this new musical comedy … is something rotten. … But none of the theater makers involved seemed to have spent time answering the kind of basic question that Sondheim liked to ask: Why does this need to be a musical?

New York Times (Maya Phillips): Mrs. Doubtfire simultaneously tries to replicate an outdated story and update it for the times. But the show only ends up cowering in the original film’s shadow. … The director Jerry Zaks’s ambivalent production tries to have it both ways: The story of a playful man-child with whom we empathize but whose good intentions can’t excuse his machinations. The film pulled it off at the time, primarily thanks to Williams’s charms. McClure’s Daniel, though, is more irritating than entertaining. … A man in drag? C’mon, it’s 2021.

Variety (Naveen Kumar): Mrs. Doubtfire, a polished and pandering new musical … has been dutifully trotting the bases of its source material (the 1993 film starring Robin Williams) for two hours by the time an aggrieved daughter pleads with her dad: “Please tell me you have a plan to end all of this.” … Her weary impatience could just as easily apply to the rote and persistent assembly line of commercial Broadway musicals fabricated from VHS favorites. … [McClure] delivers an undeniably charming and virtuosic performance. Showcasing his extreme vocal gymnastics and expert slapstick seems to be the production’s most convincing creative defense.

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