Tootsie

[edjames]

Currently running in Chicago and coming to Broadway next spring...

 

 

Early Tony buzz for Broadway-bound ‘Tootsie’ musical

By Michael Riedel

September 13, 2018 | 7:07pm

 

Dustin Hoffman starred in the 1982 movie "Tootsie."Everett Collection

With only a couple of previews in Chicago under its corset, “Tootsie” is shaping up to be a hit.

 

Buzz was building during rehearsals for Santino Fontana, as the main character, and it exploded after the first performance Tuesday night at the Cadillac Palace Theatre.

 

“I just saw next year’s Tony-winning performance for Best Actor in a Musical,” a high-powered Broadway executive texted when the curtain came down.

 

Fontana plays the Dustin Hoffman role of Michael Dorsey, an actor so fussy and demanding, nobody will cast him. He transforms himself into Dorothy Michaels and becomes a star — and a better person.

 

The stage version retains “the bones” of the 1982 movie, a production source says, “but has been completely rethought for the stage.”

 

The big change is the setting. The movie took place in the world of soap operas. The musical’s creators — composer David Yazbek, writer Robert Horn and director Scott Ellis — have set their story on Broadway, where Dorothy becomes a musical-comedy sensation of Bette Midler-like fame.

 

While the film had Dorothy’s rise chronicled via magazine covers, accompanied by the lyrics “Go, Tootsie, go!,” the musical shows her name appearing on one Broadway marquee after another.

 

Michael’s love interest, Julie (Lilli Cooper, late of “SpongeBob SquarePants”), still throws a martini in Michael’s face, but the musical has eliminated her father (played by Charles Durning in the movie), who unwittingly falls in love with Dorothy. In the stage adaptation, her admirer is now the male lead in the show within the show.

 

Dorothy’s director in the musical is modeled on Dabney Coleman’s sexist soap director. As played by Reg Rogers, the character is still arrogant but, in these #MeToo times, no longer a predator.

 

Michael McGrath has a memorable turn as Michael’s long-suffering agent, but the restaurant they meet in has been switched from the Russian Tea Room to something resembling Joe Allen.

 

Gone altogether is the most famous line in the film: “How do you feel about Cleveland?”

 

But the musical has some fresh zingers from Horn, who’s written for some funny TV series, “Designing Women” among them.

 

“It’s a real book musical,” says a source, adding: “The wit and romance from the movie are in place.”

 

“Tootsie” opens Sept. 30 in Chicago. Previews begin March 29 in New York at the Marquis Theatre.

 

Santino Fontana

[bostonman]

I had a chance to have a nice conversation with one of my new freshmen in my college musical theatre program yesterday. The Band's Visit came up and we were both talking about how much we love the score. I asked if she know about the new Yazbek musical now in tryouts, and she didn't. When I mentioned it was Tootsie, based on the film, I got a blank stare. She's never heard of it.

 

I feel old, lol.

 

Looking forward to seeing how this develops, though - especially as a big Yazbek fan.

[bnm73]

Currently running in Chicago and coming to Broadway next spring...

 

 

Early Tony buzz for Broadway-bound ‘Tootsie’ musical

By Michael Riedel

September 13, 2018 | 7:07pm

 

Dustin Hoffman starred in the 1982 movie "Tootsie."Everett Collection

With only a couple of previews in Chicago under its corset, “Tootsie” is shaping up to be a hit.

 

Buzz was building during rehearsals for Santino Fontana, as the main character, and it exploded after the first performance Tuesday night at the Cadillac Palace Theatre.

 

“I just saw next year’s Tony-winning performance for Best Actor in a Musical,” a high-powered Broadway executive texted when the curtain came down.

 

Fontana plays the Dustin Hoffman role of Michael Dorsey, an actor so fussy and demanding, nobody will cast him. He transforms himself into Dorothy Michaels and becomes a star — and a better person.

 

The stage version retains “the bones” of the 1982 movie, a production source says, “but has been completely rethought for the stage.”

 

The big change is the setting. The movie took place in the world of soap operas. The musical’s creators — composer David Yazbek, writer Robert Horn and director Scott Ellis — have set their story on Broadway, where Dorothy becomes a musical-comedy sensation of Bette Midler-like fame.

 

While the film had Dorothy’s rise chronicled via magazine covers, accompanied by the lyrics “Go, Tootsie, go!,” the musical shows her name appearing on one Broadway marquee after another.

 

Michael’s love interest, Julie (Lilli Cooper, late of “SpongeBob SquarePants”), still throws a martini in Michael’s face, but the musical has eliminated her father (played by Charles Durning in the movie), who unwittingly falls in love with Dorothy. In the stage adaptation, her admirer is now the male lead in the show within the show.

 

Dorothy’s director in the musical is modeled on Dabney Coleman’s sexist soap director. As played by Reg Rogers, the character is still arrogant but, in these #MeToo times, no longer a predator.

 

Michael McGrath has a memorable turn as Michael’s long-suffering agent, but the restaurant they meet in has been switched from the Russian Tea Room to something resembling Joe Allen.

 

Gone altogether is the most famous line in the film: “How do you feel about Cleveland?”

 

But the musical has some fresh zingers from Horn, who’s written for some funny TV series, “Designing Women” among them.

 

“It’s a real book musical,” says a source, adding: “The wit and romance from the movie are in place.”

 

“Tootsie” opens Sept. 30 in Chicago. Previews begin March 29 in New York at the Marquis Theatre.

 

Santino Fontana

 

The first word that went through my head was "why?"

 

After reading the article, I wondered if it had been written by the show's publicist.

[bostonman]

The first word that went through my head was "why?"

 

Because it's a quintessential variation on the "backstage" story - just like Kiss Me, Kate, which is also seeing a production this coming season at the Roundabout. In the case of Kate, it's about the ironic parallels between the stage and real life as both collide - in the case of Tootsie, it's the struggle to keep the two aspects separate and secret.

 

I have been a fan of composer David Yazbek since the Tonys snubbed his fantastic work on The Full Monty - now that The Band's Visit has finally gotten him that award, I tend to think this show will be of that much more interest - and I think that in particular, his zany/quirky comic musical style will be a perfect fit for this story.

 

That's why.

[bnm73]

Because it's a quintessential variation on the "backstage" story - just like Kiss Me, Kate, which is also seeing a production this coming season at the Roundabout. In the case of Kate, it's about the ironic parallels between the stage and real life as both collide - in the case of Tootsie, it's the struggle to keep the two aspects separate and secret.

 

I have been a fan of composer David Yazbek since the Tonys snubbed his fantastic work on The Full Monty - now that The Band's Visit has finally gotten him that award, I tend to think this show will be of that much more interest - and I think that in particular, his zany/quirky comic musical style will be a perfect fit for this story.

 

That's why.

Oh, don't get me wrong. I'm not doubting the talent of the writers, etc. I was just wondering "why make Tootsie a musical." A good musical -- if based on another work -- has something to say through music. The afore-mentioned "The Band's Visit" is a beautiful example of where adding music and songs augmented the original piece. Others are more of a "chop and drop" -- chop out some of the movie/book/play to make room for an unnecessary musical interlude. I hope the latter doesn't happen.

 

I agree that it would need some retooling of some of the plot points. For example, there's not really much in the way of soap operas anymore on TV....you'd either have to make it an "80s period piece" or give that a tweak...and how many people going to watch a musical want to be taken back to the 80s? Making it based in the theater might be a good way to go....but if there is a revival of Kiss Me, Kate on the horizon, it will be compared against it by the critics (both being about theater and actors). No matter how talented Yazbek is (and he is talented), I worry that he will be unfavorably compared to Cole Porter.

 

There are also troubling parallels in some of the description with "Rachael Lily Rosenbloom," one of the more notorious disasters in Broadway musical history...I hope that doesn't happen and that the critics don't go there.

[bostonman]

It may depend on what the Roundabout’s take on “Kate” will be. If they plan to resurrect the lame rewrite which was the last revival (1999), Cole Porter will lose.

[bnm73]

It may depend on what the Roundabout’s take on “Kate” will be. If they plan to resurrect the lame rewrite which was the last revival (1999), Cole Porter will lose.

 

I just don't get people who think they have to take seminal works of American art and try to "make them better" by re-writing them, re-adding cut material, cutting out parts that were left in, rewriting the book, et al....but that's another thread.

[bostonman]

I just don't get people who think they have to take seminal works of American art and try to "make them better" by re-writing them, re-adding cut material, cutting out parts that were left in, rewriting the book, et al....but that's another thread.

 

It is a subject for another thread - but just to say that for most musical revivals these days, that's exactly what happens.

[edjames]

It's a hit! Great reviews and a sure leader for the Tony?

I have a ticket for the May 9th performance and I'm now looking forward to it.

 

NYTimes critic Jessie green writes:

Review: ‘Tootsie,’ a Musical Comedy That Fills Some Mighty Big Heels

As a critic, I feel it’s my responsibility to tell you what’s wrong with “Tootsie,” the musical comedy that opened on Tuesday at the Marquis Theater.

But nah.

Let me tell you instead what’s right. It’s a musical. And it’s a comedy.

That might seem like faint praise. But over the decades, the genre that brought us “Guys and Dolls” has withered into a damp tangle of wan jokes floating in a slick of ditties. With few exceptions — including, this season, “The Prom” — musical comedies today are comedic only in the sense that the protagonist doesn’t croak, and musical only in the sense that he does.

“Tootsie” could so easily have been one of those. Based on the first-rate movie starring Dustin Hoffman, it might have made any or all of the mistakes such adaptations typically do. Infidelity. Overfidelity. General witlessness. A central performance unhappily unequaling the original. A borrowed score or one that sounds nothing like the story.

Or, most damagingly: a story so denatured it’s no longer worth the trouble.

“Tootsie,” with a book by Robert Horn and songs by David Yazbek, has somehow avoided all those traps. Though it retains

, it diverges smartly in both plot and milieu. Michael Dorsey, a New York actor who can’t get a job because he’s so difficult, still finds success after retooling himself as a Southern lady named Dorothy Michaels. But it’s no longer a bad soap opera that Dorothy stars in; naturally, it’s a bad musical comedy.

How bad? “Juliet’s Curse” is a sequel to “Romeo and Juliet” in which the resuscitated heroine falls for Romeo’s ripped brother, Craig.

So instead of camera angles and lechers with comb-overs, this is a world of Fosse hands and himbos. Hired to play Juliet’s nurse, Dorothy (Santino Fontana) quickly clocks the show’s ludicrousness and, undermining the toxic director, Ron Carlisle (Reg Rogers), sets out to revamp it. In the process, Michael (also Mr. Fontana, obviously) falls for Julie (Lilli Cooper), who plays Juliet, even as dim Max Van Horn (John Behlmann), who plays Craig, falls for Dorothy.

So far the plot tracks the movie’s closely enough to raise, in a new era, the issues that made it fascinating in the first place. What does a man learn from pretending to be a woman? And what remains masculine about him no matter how thick his makeup?

But exactly because this is a new era, and because an adaptation has to spring its own surprises, the musical develops these issues quite differently. Julie in particular is a far cry from Jessica Lange’s delicate flower; she’s independent, confident and up for anything. (Ms. Cooper makes her tremendously appealing.) So when her friendship with Dorothy stumbles into something more physical, it isn’t the end of the world; it’s just the end of Act One.

Mr. Fontana, in the difficult dual role, gets just about everything right. Visually, his Dorothy is still dowdy — “Faye Dunaway as a gym coach,” a character says — but seems younger and hipper than Mr. Hoffman’s. The persistence of Michael even in Dorothy drag, and later vice versa, is charmingly handled, helping us get past both Michael’s obtuseness and Dorothy’s unlikeliness. Mr. Fontana sings beautifully, in a novel tenor-falsetto blend, and nails every joke.

If his comic timing is impeccable, it helps that he has such great lines to deliver. But even though Mr. Horn’s book bristles with zingers, a lot of the humor is so rooted in story it doesn’t need words. Andy Grotelueschen as Michael’s laconic roommate, Jeff, gets huge laughs just from pauses. He is topped at one point by a door cracking open.

Comedy rarely flows as smoothly as it does here. The secret is more than the book; it’s the songs. Mr. Yazbek is one of the few composer-lyricists working today who can set jokes to music and make them pay. The most obvious instance in “Tootsie” is “What’s Gonna Happen,” a showstopping patter number for Michael’s ex-girlfriend, the neurotic Sandy (Sarah Stiles). In a tumble of words reminiscent of “Model Behavior” from Mr. Yazbek’s underrated score for “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown,” she goes well past that verge.

But even though his trick rhymes glitter — how he manages to pair “see ya” and “Scalia” is priceless — it’s the complexity of his characterization that really keeps “Tootsie” sparking. Fittingly for a tale of duplicity, everything has to do double duty. The opening number, called “Opening Number,” is somehow an example of both a bad one (for an earlier Ron Carlisle show) and a good one (for “Tootsie”). A vapid audition song (“I Won’t Let You Down”) transforms into a moving anthem when Dorothy uncovers new meaning in it.

To support so much lyrical cleverness, Mr. Yazbek has largely dialed back his music. Its angular, brassy New York sound — I imagined Frank Loesser in a traffic jam — has more in common with his earlier movie adaptations (“The Full Monty” and “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”) than with his haunting, Tony-winning score for “The Band’s Visit.”

As “Tootsie” is a comedy, that makes perfect sense, but when Mr. Yazbek switches modes — in sincere, never maudlin, songs like “Who Are You?” — the relief is palpable. Though his mocking pastiche is always better than what it mocks, there’s simply too much of it here.

Which brings me back to my critical duty. To pull the Band-Aid off fast: The staging and physical production of “Tootsie” are so trite and vanilla they could pass for the work of Ron Carlisle on “Juliet’s Curse” — or perhaps George Abbott in 1965. (Scott Ellis is the director.) The theory that musical comedy requires a flat, conventional environment to let the jokes stand out is evidently being heeded here. But though “Tootsie” is hardly avant-garde, it need not have been a throwback.

It wasn’t one in 1982, even though some critics already questioned the movie’s gender politics. That was a sign the comedy was working; the ideas buried in the jokes got people thinking. Now, as if spooked, the musical exhumes those ideas too insistently. That a man might enhance his masculine power by masquerading as a woman is a premise, not a platform. One joke about it is plenty; two is diminishing; three plus two speeches and a song is nearly a comedy killer.

Happily, “Tootsie” recovers, thanks in part to its excellent cast, which includes Michael McGrath as an agent and the delicious Julie Halston as a producer. It also benefits from its mastery of a paradox built into the genre. Musical comedy only soars when it’s fully grounded, and “Tootsie,” however unbelievable, has its feet on the ground — in a modest Size 13 heel.

[edjames]

NYPost also raves;

 

THEATER REVIEW TOOTSIE

 

Running time: 2 hours, 35 minutes, one intermission. Marquis Theatre, 210 W. 46th St.; 212-239-6200.

 

Meet Dorothy Michaels: Renowned stage actress and chanteuse. A brutally honest feminist who’s built like a Hummer, she lives in New York, and — oh, right — she’s really a he.

Dorothy is the memorable main character of Broadway’s funniest new musical, “Tootsie,” which opened Tuesday night. Once again, it’s taken a drag musical to drag us out of the doldrums.

“Tootsie” is nothing like “Kinky Boots” or “La Cage aux Folles,” however. For one, Dorothy ain’t pretty when she dons her wig and iconic red dress. Take this classic line from the 1982 Dustin Hoffman movie on which this show is based. “I’d like to make her look a little more attractive. How far can you pull back?” the soap opera producer asks a cameraman. “How do you feel about Cleveland?” he responds. Not that you’ll hear that line onstage: Book writer Robert Horn has smartly moved the action from TV soap to Broadway stage.

Even with a score by Tony winner David Yazbek, “Tootsie” doesn’t feel so much like a razzmatazz musical as it does a sitcom in its prime. With a slate of mean, neurotic New York characters getting themselves into impossibly wacky scenarios, it’s practically “Seinfeld: Live!” With killer jokes to match.

The plot kicks into gear when struggling actor Michael Dorsey (Santino Fontana) can’t land a part in a show — not because he’s lousy, but because he’s a jackass. He has frequent outbursts, often telling directors that their musicals stink. So he’s a bad employee, but he’s a killer teacher. One day, while he’s telling a friend and fellow performer, Sandy (Sarah Stiles in Teri Garr’s part in the film), how she should be reading her lines, she says through tears, “You’re even a better woman than I am!”

And thus Dorothy Michaels is born. Inspired, Michael arrives at New 42nd Street Studios with a wig and a prayer, ready to audition for a role in “Juliet’s Curse,” a sequel to “Romeo and Juliet.”

If Fontana isn’t as instantly convincing a woman as Hoffman was, due to the limitations of onstage quick changes, wait till you hear him sing. He croons the tuneful audition song, “I Won’t Let You Down,” in a remarkably high, seismic voice that leaves no doubt in your mind that she’s our girl.

Dorothy charms the producer (an utterly perfect Julie Halston) with her assertiveness and lands the role of the Nurse. The rest of “Tootsie” sees the brash broad unexpectedly rise in fame and nearly become romantically involved with a co-star (Lilli Cooper) as Michael and his Pigpen-like roommate Jeff (Andy Grotelueschen) frantically work to keep Dorothy’s little secret.

That farcical setup — and Horn’s extraordinary new book, which is even funnier than the movie — delivers the finest collection of character actors onstage right now. Reg Rogers makes hay out of a cliché as a narcissist director who can’t quite wrap his head around #MeToo. Showing an actress where to stand, he mutters, “I’m moving you, not touching you.” And Stiles cranks up Garr’s Sandy’s insecurity to 11 when she sings a patter song about how horrible auditions are. There are many more, but to list them would read like an Oscars speech.

While Yazbek’s jazzy score doesn’t reach the heights of his work in “The Band’s Visit,” there are a few really terrific numbers. You won’t leave “Tootsie” humming, but you will leave laughing — which is even better.

[bostonman]

For me, I'm most excited to hear David Yazbek's score. I've been a huge fan of his ever since The Full Monty. His work, for me, is always inventive, clever, surprising, and also wonderfully tuneful (and/or whimsically quirky). I feel that he's a composer/lyricist that is always going to deliver something worth hearing.

[+ WilliamM]

I am seeing Tootsie today. Last night was supposed to be Burn This but I fell coming out of a restaurant. The theater did give me the backstage number, so I can check back tomorrow.

[+ Robster]

After reading those reviews, I'm even more eager to see it than I already was! The movie is one of my all-time favorites.

 

Rob

[+ WilliamM]

After reading those reviews, I'm even more eager to see it than I already was! The movie is one of my all-time favorites.

 

Rob

 

I did not read the reviews for "Tootsie," and was surprised the musical was so funny. Michael's agent leaves after firing him as a client. And he returns quicky to find Dorothy there. He is thrilled because he loves her star performance on Broadway.....then.

 

Santino Fontina is wonderful as Dorothy/Michael. He must be exhausted by the end (a long show).

[Cooper]

@WilliamM. I’m with you on this one. A very funny musical. Good acting, singing, & dancing. Liked that it’s been updated from the movie to address the current times.

 

Very likable cast & the joke about how River Dancing got started was a real hoot.

 

It received 11 Tony nominations. I did like Tootsie better than The Prom.

 

Today was the shows 1st Wednesday matinee & it was a full house.

[RyanDean]

Saw today’s evening performance — very very funny, with an appealing Yazbek score (in the FullMonty vein) and standout supporting performances all around...

[foxy]

Usually with musical comedies I smile. With Tootsie I laughed. A terrific show.

[edjames]

I agree. This show is a most delightful and entertaining evening of theater.

It is a laugh-out-loud experience. The jokes fly fast and furious. It is so well written.

The cast is great but alas, the music is "meh". Don't get me wrong, it's OK but no numbers to hum on the way out of the theater.

Still it well worth the experience to sit back and enjoy an evening of theater that takes you away from all the troubles outside.

HIGHLY recommended!

[bostonman]

it's OK but no numbers to hum on the way out of the theater.

 

Generally, in my experience, if there is such a tune you can hum on the way out (in a score you're hearing for the very first time), it's the one the orchestra is playing at the time - and/or the last song in the show. It's never a question of remembering some big tune in the middle of Act I that you've only heard once. No one remembers that in any show. But it certainly could be that "hook" from the last song you just heard.

 

This is one reason why older shows tend to contain lots of reprises, especially in Act II - in the hopes that the tunes will "stick" due to lots of repetition. (They'd also be used in scene change music, incidental music, overtures, entr'actes and bows/exit music of course). Not that reprises are a thing only of the past, but generally, composers don't use them in the same way as they used to - meaning that we're not as exposed to the tunes, and therefore they don't get in the brain as easily. it's not about the complexity of the music - one example is some of the musically complex themes in Evita that do tend to stay with you, because Webber uses them over and over and over.

 

Also, older composers relied on radio play of the tunes, along with cast recording sales, sheet music sales, etc. And, overtures were often written with the expected big tunes in mind, so that you would have already been exposed to the big melodies before hearing them sung for the first time.

 

But I do find that even when I do know a score well, the tune that I "hum" afterwards is the last one I heard in the theatre. (And of course if a composer is smart, they'll try to put their biggest tune or tunes in the exit music, for that very reason.)

[+ WilliamM]

Mostly agree with @bostonman. I saw several Boston out of town tryouts of Broadway musicals , including "I Can Get It Wholesale," On a Clear Day I can See Forever," "Funny Girl." "Subways are for Sleeping," "Tovarich." I vaguely knew the songs were often wonderful, but that is it.

[bostonman]

Another observation - I think one of the reasons that jukebox musicals have been so prevalent is that the producers know that the average (and non-theatre savvy) audience member can "hum all the tunes" BEFORE seeing the show.

[edjames]

Last chances...closing January 5, 2020...shame, it is a fun production.

 

 

‘Tootsie’ to Pack Up Her Wig on Broadway

The musical comedy, which earned Santino Fontana a Tony Award for best actor, will close after its Jan. 5 performance.

 

“Tootsie,” the Broadway musical adaptation of the 1982 movie of the same name, will close in January, the production announced on Monday.

Despite having earned critical approval and two Tony Awards, the show, which opened in April, is unlikely to recoup its investment costs. The show was capitalized for up to $19.975 million, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Like the movie, the musical tells the story of a struggling actor named Michael Dorsey who finds success disguised as a woman named Dorothy Michaels. (In the film he lands a part in a soap opera, but in the show he is hired for a musical theater role.)

“Tootsie” features a high-powered creative team that includes the Tony-winning composer David Yazbek and the director Scott Ellis. The show was nominated for 11 Tonys and won two: for Santino Fontana in the lead role and for Robert Horn’s book.

But in a crowded moment for new musicals, including several others based on popular films, the show never truly broke out. For the week ending Nov. 10, it grossed $943,765 — a solid total but only 58 percent of its potential in the comparatively large Marquis Theater, meaning many seats had been sold at a discount.

The show’s final performance will be Jan. 5. At that point it will have played 293 performances and 25 previews.

A North American tour will begin at Shea’s Buffalo Theater in Buffalo, N.Y., in October 2020, with additional cities to be announced. In a statement, the producers said that international productions were also in the works.