TOOTSIE Reviews- Page 9

[Big Apple2]

Posted: 5/1/19 at 7:52am

Saw this last night and thoroughly enjoyed it. It was very funny and Fontana does a great job. Audience members were laughing a lot too. With the Tony nominations also announced yesterday, in the scene where his manager tells him “You were going to be nominated for a Tony and I was even going to vote for you” got the cheers and the loudest and longest applause of the evening. So well deserved.

[Big Apple2]

Posted: 5/1/19 at 8:28am

There were still no magnets being sold but the headshots were given out last night.

[NYCblurb]

Posted: 5/3/19 at 12:13am

Cast album recorded Sunday and Monday. Looking forward to buying. I just saw again and Yazbek's score is so strong. Memorable.

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 5/3/19 at 1:56pm

I already pre-ordered my cast recording of Tootsie on Amazon.  Release date is August 16.

[DAME]

Posted: 5/3/19 at 2:22pm

Mister Matt said: "I already pre-ordered my cast recording of Tootsie on Amazon. Release date is August 16."

YEY Mattie!  Will do the same.  Hadestown as well.

[Luscious]

Posted: 5/4/19 at 2:34am

For anyone who has seen the show or is familiar with the Marquis Theater, is the stage set high? Will I be craning my neck from the 5th Row/Right Orchestra?

Updated On: 5/4/19 at 02:34 AM

[Robbie2]

Posted: 5/4/19 at 5:12pm

Luscious said: "For anyone who has seen the show or is familiar with the MarquisTheater, is the stage set high? Will I be craning my neck from the 5th Row/Right Orchestra?"

O no you'll  be fine. great seats

[Luscious]

Posted: 5/4/19 at 6:01pm

Thanks Robbie2! Looking forward to seeing the show on 5/28!

Updated On: 5/5/19 at 06:01 PM

[BwayinVan]

Posted: 5/5/19 at 9:07pm

So this was the first show I saw of my broadway week. I saw the matinee on Wednesday. Everyone is correct, it’s a funny afternoon of theatre. Is it life changing? No. Are the songs epic? Not really. But the cast is giving it all. Santino Fontana is very funny. I actually found he was funniest when he didn’t say anything. His facial and body reactions had me chuckling. Lilli Cooper is a great leading lady. I don’t think she’ll win the tony but she has her moment to shine and she takes it.

Sarah Stiles is very funny but I found her character too repetitive. Her song was funny the first time but by the second time and third or hearing the same thing I wanted something different.

With it being a matinee I was probably the youngest person in there and I’m 33. I was shocked at the terrible etiquette of the “older” broadway crowd. Up and down throughout, talking loudly throughout and leaving before the curtain call. People complain about teenagers and young adults but I was shocked by what I saw.

Would I recommend people see the show? Absolutely, but it wouldn’t be my first choice.

[YvanEhtNioj]

Posted: 5/12/19 at 11:24am

I finally saw it last night. I was surprised how much I enjoyed it. Fun, and colorful.

That "what's gonna happen" song reminds me of "not getting married"
I think my only criticism is that the supporting characters had much better and stronger songs than Michael/Dorothy. Sandy and Julie have the best numbers in the show, and they shouldn't.

Updated On: 5/12/19 at 11:24 AM

[Luminaire2]

Posted: 5/12/19 at 12:55pm

Well this was scathing. Thoughts?

https://www.out.com/theater/2019/5/06/tootsie-may-be-funny-its-hella-problematic?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=theater

“The problem with the book and with the content of the musical is another story, and it is here where most of the larger problems lay. The musical relies on the terribly dated “man in a dress” comedic trope, which is deeply rooted in transmisogyny. The almost entirely-male creative team doesn’t even come close to having any meaningful discussion of drag or of gender; everything being a means to an end, in this case, a laugh. They seem unwilling and unable to explore any of the nuances of gender — like what if Michael is a trans lesbian and Dorothy is more than just a persona to get a role? They not only don’t entertain that conversation, but even worse, they seem unaware they should discuss gender identity at all.

In an interview with Playbill, leading man Santino Fontana ironically said that this musical is “perfect for the moment” and is a great exploration of gender inequality. But Tootsie is dated and still relies on sexism, ableism, homophobia, and transphobia to get laughs. It is rife with jokes about genitalia — like a reference to Dorothy being “half-cocked” or “not the package you imagined” — and extended bits about Michael getting into and out of drag, like “I am a man in love! Toss me my bra!” These are supposed to be comedic, but they just come off an uninformed and transphobic.”

[YvanEhtNioj]

Posted: 5/12/19 at 2:14pm

I hate where we're heading as a society. I 100% support speaking up for injustice, being an activist, and invoking change...but people nowadays LOOK for reasons to label something as "problematic".

The show has such a strong feminist message for all women (Trans or cis-gender) about inequality, but people choose to focus on **** like this.

 

My favorite line from the show is when he demands they pay Julie the same amount as the male lead. THAT is the kinda stuff people should be focusing on. 

Updated On: 5/12/19 at 02:14 PM

[GeorgeandDot]

Posted: 5/12/19 at 2:19pm

I don't think any of thr comedy of the show comes from him being in a dress. Also, I feel like it's transphobic to say that a man in a dress is transphobic because that seems to suggest that a trans woman is a man in a dress, which is not the case. A trans woman is not a man in a dress, a trans woman is a woman.

[carnzee]

Posted: 5/12/19 at 4:47pm

GeorgeandDot said: ". A trans woman is not a man in a dress, a trans woman is a woman."

This. This exactly. And I'm  not buying  that the ancient "man in a dress" bit is rooted in "transmisogyny." 

In a related note, I just stumbled across a new movie that seems inspired by Tootsie. LOQUEESHA is about a white DJ who can't get work, so he creates a "larger than life"  black female character named Loqueesha. Now THAT is some problematic ****. 

[magictodo123]

Posted: 5/13/19 at 8:32am

YvanEhtNioj said: "I hate where we're heading as a society. I 100% support speaking up for injustice, being an activist, and invoking change...but people nowadays LOOK for reasons to label something as "problematic".

The showhas such a strong feminist message for all women (Trans or cis-gender) about inequality, but people choose to focus on **** like this.

THIS. I can't tell you how many harsh, rude, and downright disgusting comments I have seen about this show. What really gets me is that I know someone who basically hates the show and has not been shy about voicing their opinion on that, even going so far as to criticize the show every single time it wins an award. This person also wants to be involved in the recently announced Mrs. Doubtfire musical. What's amusing is that Mrs. Doubtfire is also "problematic". This guy dressed as woman, and he basically did it to stalk his children. You could say he had good intentions, I guess, but in the end he basically got rewarded for his actions (being able to see his children who he stalked) without supervised visits. Is that really a good message? Is that really something you can be so enthusiastic about, but you can say things like "f*** Tootsie" and say you don't want the show to win awards, and continuously put it down? These people are also the ones who make me feel like I have to like everything they
 like and GOD FORBID I don't like something they don't like, because then they come out of the woodwork saying how amazing it is, and people just don't appreciate such different work. It just doesn't make sense to me. 


My favorite line from the show is when he demands they pay Julie the same amount as the male lead. THAT is the kinda stuff people should be focusing on."

 

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 5/13/19 at 2:38pm

Well this was scathing. Thoughts? 

https://www.out.com/theater/2019/5/06/tootsie-may-be-funny-its-hella-problematic?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=theater 

The same writer copied and pasted portions of that review and expanded on it in this article:
https://www.americantheatre.org/2019/05/07/the-gender-problem-tootsie-cant-dress-up/?fbclid=IwAR0vkuSmlTH5tlh4tHImmsTRMhmE6KwByLXjCl6eDGykwzf3hqTwA5zXtU8

When asked on Facebook about my opinion that the article was filled with inaccuracies and false comparisons, this was my response:

"Drag is not inherently transphobic, but the drag in Tootsie absolutely is. The point of drag is to queer gender and prove how socially constructed it is, to show that gender is a performance. Tootsie (mis)appropriates drag in ways that enforce ideas about binary gender by making jokes out of the dichotomy between Michael, the straight cisgender protagonist, and his drag persona, Dorothy. This frequently takes the the form of crude and transphobic bodily humor about genitals or gags about bras, wigs, and heels and how ridiculous it is that Michael would wear them."

The drag element in Tootsie is not that of the character's actions, but the audience's knowledge. Dorothy is neither drag nor trans because drag intentionally informs the participants, either directly or indirectly, that they are performing a different gender (and it's rare that I see a drag performer NOT make crude genital jokes of every kind). Michael is cis-gendered and trying to mask his gender as Dorothy. And the jokes aren't about how ridiculous it is that he "would" wear them, but how strange it is to either see him wearing these or how different it feels to Michael to be wearing them.

"Tootsie is by no means the first musical to play with the possibilities of drag. Kinky Boots, La Cage aux Folles, Priscilla Queen of the Desert, Rent, and this season’s under-appreciated Head Over Heels all use drag, in both serious and comedic ways, to explore queer identity, marginalization, and the power of performance. Unlike the lead in Tootsie, the characters who do drag in those shows don’t constantly make jokes about their genitals, lie about their gender, or use drag to 'get ahead,' steal a job from a woman, and manipulate those around them."

False comparison because the characters mentioned above are drag personas/performers, but Michael/Dorothy is not. The difference is pretty obvious.

"Instead all of those musicals have drag performers fighting to perform, to be listened to, and to be taken seriously on their own terms. Lola, Zaza, the queens of Priscilla, Cleophila, and Angel are marginalized because of their queer identities and their choice to do drag, all of which reflects reality."

Rinse and repeat. Michael/Dorothy is not a queer character fighting to be accepted for their choice to do drag. It's like trying to compare these characters to any of the gender-masquerading characters of Shakespeare. You can't make orange juice out of apples and then admonish it for not being apple juice.

"The notion that Michael would get cast more easily and have more creative power as a woman than as a man isn’t just implausible; it’s also damaging, a further erasure of actual cis and trans women’s experience."

That's reductive and misleading. The director didn't like Dorothy at the audition and tries to dismiss her. It's the female producer who pulls the strings that overrides the director and listens to Dorothy. It's the help from that producer and the female lead of the show that allow Dorothy's voice to be heard and succeed. There is no message that the character's life is easier and better "as a woman".

"Michael is not openly a drag queen but is fully pretending to be a woman and 'getting away with it,' the show subtly reinforces the transphobic claim that trans people are liars, pretenders, or fakers."

The author now undermines all the drag comparisons noted before. The point about reinforcing transphobic stereotypes seems pretty debatable, but I can't speak for the trans community.

"Through all of this, there is never a discussion of Michael’s gender in relationship to his drag, although there certainly could have been."

And here starts the ruminations of changing the plot and characters to something different, not unlike the changing of Romeo & Juliet to "Juliet's Curse", but "they coulda done THIS" doesn't really support an argument. They could have made all the characters African-American trans-bisexuals and none of them in drag, but that's not what the show is, so where's the validity in what-iffing it?

"Head Over Heels ends with a character, who has done drag throughout, saying he wants to keep his drag persona around—that she is part of him now. In a slightly similar vein, Michael says, 'I am Dorothy. Dorothy is me,' but only as a justification for his ruse"

That's not why he says and it's not in a similar vein at all. The reasons those characters make those statements are entirely different. This is a misleading inaccuracy.

"he never entertains the idea that he might continue to do drag (in less problematic ways, ideally) or that maybe this experience has caused him to reconsider his own gender identity. Could Michael be a trans lesbian, or maybe a genderqueer pansexual? Perhaps, but this version of Tootsie makes no effort to explore these possibilities or talk about gender identity at all. Instead, Michael ends the show by bizarrely telling his love interest, 'I was a better man with you, as a woman, than I ever was with a woman, as a man. I just have to learn how to do it all without the dress.' But why without the dress?"

Rinse and repeat. Still what-iffing what isn't as a basis for proving something that may or may not be implied depending on how you choose to interpret (or misinterpret) a story and its characters.

"To make matters worse, the creative team, which is almost entirely male (and is exclusively cis), seems to think they can defuse the show’s (cis)sexism by dropping some self-aware critiques into the show."

Making assumptions on the very specific motives of the creative team doesn't help.

"it comes off as pandering, and can’t erase the transphobic binarism that is the source of most of the musical’s humor. These moments of wokeness are clearly performative; a glance through Robert Horn’s script shows him referring to 'Michael/Dorothy' with inconsistent pronouns." 

I'm confused. Do they mean parenthetical stage directions from literally reading a printed script? Because inconsistent pronouns have everything to do with the fact that Michael/Dorothy is not trans and the situation and characters that use them. 

"The writers of Tootsie clearly have a very limited, binary understanding of gender, and rather than work to expand it they seem to have gone out of their way not only to avoid addressing it but instead to make fun of it."

Again, this is another assumption based on a desire for Tootsie to be a completely different story.

"The creators aren’t the only ones who seem to think they’ve solved the show’s gender problems."

Another assumption leading to an opinion that muddies the topic.

"This moment feels like a perfect metaphor for the show itself: Tootsie engages with gender only in superficial ways, either to score points for being 'feminist,' or more frequently simply to make another transphobic dick joke."

I only remember maybe two jokes involving a penis. But as for gender and feminism, I left the show feeling that we're viewing these topics through the lens of Michael's journey. A farcical musical comedy in which the protagonist is not considered a hero. The jokes about his being in drag seemed to be specifically either about his discomfort being a cis-male not accustomed to wearing women's attire and digs from his roommate who consistently tells him he's doing the wrong thing.

[JuneJune]

Posted: 8/29/19 at 9:50am

HamilHansen said: "Question for all the "F*ck Tootsie" people: have you seen the show? Cause I didn't find anything remotely anti-feminist or #metoo at all. In fact, I praised the inclusion of such topics being brought into play in a story like this."

The arguments I see a lot for this (but strongly disagree with) are:

i. Anti-feminist: that a man was successful by posing as a woman, so it serves as a message that even the strongest success a woman can get is really accomplished by a man.

ii. Transphobic: the butt of a lot of jokes come from the fact that there is crossdresssing

iii. Homophobic: This one is the least talked about now (at least from what I've seen), but back during previews, Tootsie's merch got flack for being insensitive due to the "Friend of Dorothy" t-shirt. From then on, word that tootsie was homophobic spiraled on twitter (at least for a bit), whether posters fact checked it or not.

Honestly, most people who have claimed this are speaking from uninformed word of mouth. The show itself references just how unfair and bad it is that Michael finds success through posing as a woman. Feel free to make arguments as, since I'm not a member of the gay/trans community I may be disregarding something, but I believe Tootsie isn't controversial at all.

 

Topic shift, but I saw it for the second time this Tuesday for a lottery win. The Mezzanine was more than half empty, and the orchestra had more than a few empty spots (at least, from my view). Audience seemed to love it though, so it was a shame to see it so empty. 

[JuneJune]

Posted: 8/30/19 at 2:02pm

HamilHansen said: "Thank you!I was a bit confused as to why exactly people were hating on this one."

No problem! And I have to correct myself, it wasn't the "Friend of Dorothy" shirt that stirred things up (though some people did talk about it being insensitive to the LGBT community).

It was a shirt that they ended up discontinuing during previews that said, "Being a woman is no job for a man," which people took as transphobic. Which, to be honest, I get how people would be offended without the context of the original quote.

Updated On: 8/30/19 at 02:02 PM

[Pose2]

Posted: 8/30/19 at 2:17pm

Of course the haters haven't seen the show, they are too busy bitching and being offended about everything in the world!

[Tom5]

Posted: 8/31/19 at 11:16am

I never liked the fact that the show changed the story concept from a nationwide live soap opera to a theatrical production. So when Dorothy did her big reveal at the end it was just to a few hundred people. So my question to anyone who saw it on stage is this: In the film when the producer asks the cameraman "How far can you pull back to make her look good?" and the cameraman replied "How about Philadelphia?" how was it translated on stage or was it thrown out completely?

[JuneJune]

Posted: 8/31/19 at 11:49am

Tom5 said: "I never liked the fact that the show changed the story concept from a nationwide live soap opera to a theatrical production. So when Dorothy did her big reveal at the end it was just to a few hundred people. So my question to anyone who saw it on stage is this: In the film when the producer asks the cameraman "How far can you pull back to make her look good?" and the cameraman replied "How about Philadelphia?" how was it translated on stage or was it thrown out completely?"

I think they trashed it completely. All I can seem to recall from her is a, "HOLY SH*T!" after the reveal.

[MollyJeanneMusic]

Posted: 8/31/19 at 12:11pm

HamilHansen said: "Well, this was a fun surprise! I got tickets day of and went in almost blind (having seen them perform on the Tony's). I ended up having a fantastic time. The score isn't as memorable as the one-liners, but damn those one-liners were good. Sarah Stiles is a national treasure, the guy playing Jeff brought the house down, and Santino is a star. I love me some Alex Brightman, but Santino did deserve the Tony.

Question for all the "F*ck Tootsie" people: have you seen the show? Cause I didn't find anything remotely anti-feminist or #metoo at all. In fact, I praised the inclusion of such topics being brought into play in a story like this.

Also I got to meet Santino afterwards and he was so gracious. Also ran into Robert Manion and Mariah Rose Faith (from Team Starkid) backstage, so that was a fun surprise."

YOU GOT TO MEET MARIAH AND ROBERT OH MY GOD

I'm really glad you liked the show!  Personally, while I'm not super-interested in seeing it on Broadway (I might see a tour if it comes to my area), I have sort of wanted to see the show just for the sake of Britney Coleman (Bellatrix and Dean Thomas in AVPM) in the ensemble.  (Same for the Mean Girls tour and Mariah.)

[BalconyClub]

Posted: 8/31/19 at 5:39pm

Tom5 said: "... In the film when the producer asks the cameraman "How far can you pull back to make her look good?" and the cameraman replied "How about Philadelphia?" .....

The line from the movie is "How about Cleveland."

The line does not appear in the staged production.

[RWPrincess]

Posted: 9/1/19 at 9:33pm

I ended up winning the lottery last minute yesterday so I saw this again last night. House seemed like it was full. There were several understudies on including for Sarah Stiles. Leslie Flesner was on as Sandy. I thought she did a great job but seeing someone else in the role made me realize just how much Sarah Stiles steals the show. Finally got to meet Santino at the stage door as well so it was a good night overall.

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 10/5/19 at 1:47am

Friday was the final night of my tripl and I saw Tootsie. What I great show to cap 8 days of shows and concerts. The audience was eating it up. People were talking about how much better it was an expected as they were walking out the door. I don’t think I’ve laughed that much at a musical since BoM. I’m actually looking forward to going back and listen to the cast recording again. I’m not sure I understand why people feel like the cast recording is so weak. I do agree that the book is really funny. Also it seems that I can call people saying that Michael doesn’t have any emotional growth throughout the show and I would disagree with that. I’m really, really glad I saw this. I feel good musical if there ever was one 

Only replacement in the cast was John Arthur Greene as Max Van Horn. He was excellent as was the rest of the cast, including Fontana. 

I bought a magnet, program and the Friends of Dorothy mug.  

As far as stage door goes, it appeared a lot of people were going backstage through the stage door so only John Arthur Greene, Lilli Cooper ahh Sarah Stiles came out and all were lovely. I guess this is JAG’s first week in the role and he was impressive. Is Stiles in a comic book? Two young ladies waited only for her to hand her things and then have her sign some printed out graphics of a cartoon character and it’ sounded like they had seen her at comicon earlier in the day. 

I’m still operating on two hours sleep so I think I’m gonna call tonight. I should be packing but I’m too tired and my town car doesn’t come in until 2 PM. 

Updated On: 10/5/19 at 01:47 AM