TOOTSIE the Musical: PREVIEWS START — Page 11

I saw the show last night and thought it was excellent, and a genuinely funny musical comedy. The entire cast and especially Robert Horn's book are the stars of the show. Fontana gives a star turn and rightly deserves his frontrunner status for the Tony. He does make a very challenging role seem effortless. I've read some criticism that he doesn't get an 11 o'clock number, but he gets a number of songs that really allow him to shine. He's particularly great in "Unstoppable," and, although it's not the kind of climax in the shows that the act one finale touts, "Talk To Me Dorothy" has a certain amount of introspection and culmination to it. Sarah Stiles is excellent with "What's Gonna Happen," Lilli Cooper is great, and every other member of the main cast delivers, too. The score is definitely not top-tier Yazbek (I'd rank it far behind The Band's Visit and Women on the Verge, too) but in the context of the show it plays very well and it has a number of really good songs. I can see this winning Book and Actor and landing a lot of other nominations.

"I agree about your second point regarding Soap Operas not having the same status with viewers today that they did back in the 80s, but what if the TV show was "Scandal" (which is close to being a currently-aired Soap) and Kerry Washington were to suddenly reveal that she's actually, and has always been a man...?"

Why not date the show back to the 1980's when the movie took place? Does everything have to be in the present? This way you could have kept the story pretty much the same. Just a thought.

yankeefan7 said: "Why not date the show back to the 1980's when the movie took place? Does everything have to be in the present? This way you could have kept the story pretty much the same. Just a thought."

No argument from me! ...and actually, by keeping it in the 80s, the relevance of "#metoo" elements would be more pointed. (I think, anyways...)

...but... the creatives didn't make that choice, so we got what we got.

Updated On: 4/19/19 at 01:12 PM

"Once again to use Dear Evan Hansen as an example, Ben Platt became an overnight sensation. In 2019 a lead in a new Broadway show's fame level is on par or even higher than that of a Soap Opera star. When was the last time something that happened in a Soap Opera, or even a Soap star went viral? The Daytime Emmy's haven't been televised since 2015, and haven't been on broadcast television since 2012. The Tony's, say what you will, are still broadcast on CBS. "

Susan Lucci back in the 1980's was a major star (All My Children) and everybody in the country knew her. There were no bigger stars in the country than Anthony Geary and Genie Frances during the 1980's when people took off work to watch their wedding (believe it had over 25 million viewers) on General Hospital. I am willing to bet I could walk down Times Square now and ask people who Ben Platt is and the majority of the people would not know him. You don't hear anything about Soap Operas anymore because that type of show is basically dead but in the time period of the Tootsie movie it was incredibly popular.

Updated On: 4/20/19 at 03:13 PM

I saw this at the Wednesday matinee. The show was stopped for about two minutes, with the cast going off stage very 'fluidly', as if it were part of the performance. Made me wonder if they rehearse for such an inevitability.

Now about the show, I thought the book and the performances were outstanding, across the board. I can only remember laughing at a musical comedy this much one other time...the Producers.

The problem that I had was that this was a MUSICAL Comedy, and I thought the music was borderline atrocious. Leaving the theatre, I could not remember a single song that Michael or Dorothy sang, which can't be good for a musical. (While I thought Fontana gave a solid performance, I don't feel as strongly about his performance as the reviewers did, because I felt that his performance was hindered by the absence of anything worth singing. Similarly, I loved the idea of an overture -- I love good overtures -- but all the overture or entr'acte did here were establish that there were not likely to be any good songs to come...if those were the best they could showcase, OMG. Finally, at least at my performance, the first Act curtain did not end with heavy applause, again because the number was constrained by mediocre music.

But I did have a smile on my face much of the time...because of the book. I will be shocked if the book writers don't win the Tony.

In some ways this show reminded me of a big-budget The Prom. The best thing about The Prom IMO were the book and the leading performances, as with Tootsie. While I thought the Prom was pretty mediocre overall, I still had a smile on my face a lot, also due to the book.. I thought the score was mediocre (thought, I think better than Tootsie's), and the production values were cheesy. Tootsie's sets may have cost more, but they were still not interesting.

Unlike The Prom, I can't figure out what they can do on the Tony's that will serve the show well. I don't see it winning musical; if, in addition to that, the musical performance doesn't make much of an impression, that could hurt the show's future business.

Why does 'everything', film to stage, have to be 'the musical'.

It seems from what I read on here that practically all seem to fall flat with The Music.

I love musicals for that fact, the music, but why can't some of these very successful moves be adapted for the stage as eg Tootsie-The Play?

Look, I think with comedy, you know what you know and you get to take the leap or not. We knew Don Knotts wasn't the characters we played, and in fact knew him to be a smart and meek man in real life yet we celebrated him playing roles. Similarly, we are all in on the joke, you know? We know the set up so you either roll with it or you do not.

Horn's book is no joke, our modern day Brooks, Gelbart and Burnett. I hope the whole show is on a double cast album.

One doesn't have to hate Hadestown (I really liked it) to adore another, in this case Tootsie. I like to laugh, enjoy fun and a pun, and don't do either much at the theater like I get to do at Tootsie anymore. The choice this year with these two frontrunners is clear: a broad comedic musical by two American musical gems (Yazbek/Horn) up against a delightful small allegory on death, love and dying staged beautifully! You get my sway, and in the BEST PLAY column, I best loved FERRYMAN in a very good year for plays.