Overheard whilst exiting Broadway's She Loves Me this weekend:
[surprised] That was just like 'You've Got Mail'!
Bingo, tourist ladies, bingo. She Loves Me, the 1963 musical, currently in the middle of its second Broadway revival, is adapted from the 1937 Hungarian play Parfumerie by Miklós László. It's inspired so many riffs so often you'd think it was a Shakespeare comedy. The play has already resulted in three well-known movies in the form of the touching Jimmy Stewart clasic (The Shop Around the Corner, 1940), an undervalued Judy Garland romance (In the Good Old Summertime, 1949), and the Meg Ryan/Tom Hanks rom-com You've Got Mail (1998). The shop changes as does the mode by which the anonymous lovers correspond without realizing they know and hate each other in real life. Expect an internet catfishing riff on the story in 3...2...1... Anyway, in 1963 the play was adapted into She Loves Me for the musical stage...
She Loves Me is firmly in the vein of the very old fashioned Broadway musical: lots of singing, corny humor, and sentiment. Perhaps it was even old fashioned in 1963? Though it takes place in Budapest it plays like old time Americana. What saves the musical from its own extremely well worn self is the performances. Jane Krakowski does the surprise splits (wow!) and a fun spin on her man-hungry comedy (less bitchy, more lovelorn) and Laura Benanti's gorgeous soprano bell keeps ringing while her comic timing is, as ever, potent. She keeps getting TV roles but the small screen has yet to do her any justice (musical comedy being her forte and there not being much of that on TV). We've come to expect greatness from Benanti & Krakowski (and they rarely disappoint) so the surprise in this iteration of the show is Zachary Levi (former star of "Chuck" and voice of Flint Ryder in Tangled) who seems rimrod straight and capable if a little dull at the beginning of the story and transforms throughout the overly long running time (2 and a half hours for a featherweight musical? Oops) to endearingly besotted and downright exuberant. He's really really charming by the wrap which is perfect for a story about falling in love with someone you don't even think you like at first. That said, it's unlikely we'll hear his name called for a Tony nomination tomorrow morning. Hamilton isn't leaving much room for other male performers since it's expected to take up 4 or 5 of the 10 spots for the male musical acting categories, so every other production will be fighting to make up the very tiny non-Hamilton list.
Tony Preview: This is the third time the musical has been on the boards. The two previous incarnations received multiple Tony nominations and this one looks likely to do the same since it fared well in precursors but here's an odd coincidence: both of the previous iterations only one won prize and not for the same thing. The original won the Featured Actor Tony musical (for Gavin Creel's current role) and when it was revived in the 1990s sturdy theater star Boyd Gaines took the Tony for the leading man role currently occupied by Levi. UPDATE: She Loves Me won the most nominations for any musical revival this year!
The big questions tomorrow for the Tony nominations is "how many nominations will Hamilton get?" (It's eligible in literally every musical category except Best Revival, so we can safely expect somewhere between 12-17 nominations depending how it fares in the acting categories) and "can it beat The Producers record 12 wins?" The Producers famously won every single category BUT Revival and Actress in its year, the two it wasnt eligible for (which both went to the revival of 42nd Street). It could conceivably tie The Producers for wins but I'd be surprised if it could beat it by winning both of the female categories. Its female stars seem to have less awards buzz than their male counterparts and will probably be competing directly with lots of regularly lauded Broadway powerhouses (including maybe: Audra McDonald, Jesse Mueller, Laura Benanti, Jane Krakowksi) as well as highly raved performances from the stars of The Color Purple (Cynthia Erivo and Danielle Brooks) and Bright Star (Carmen Cusack)
No, I have not seen Hamilton yet. Yes, getting quite impatient.