Mrs. Doubtfire
Broadway review by Adam Feldman Have I seen the new Broadway musical Mrs. Doubtfire? At this point, I am fairly confident that I have; ask me in three months, and I’m not sure what I’ll tell you. This pleasant and forgettable show at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre is the epitome of what Sondheim (citing his friend Mary Rodgers) called a “Why” musical: “a perfectly respectable show, based on a perfectly respectable source, that has no reason for being.” Mrs. Doubtfire hopes to draw on audiences’ residual affection for the 1993 Robin Williams film comedy, in which a divorced dad named Daniel disguises himself as a hearty old Scottish nanny so he can spend time with his kids. We’ve already had musical versions of Tootsie and Mary Poppins; now we have the hybrid we never knew we needed and, as it turns out, we don’t. Stepping into Williams’s sensible shoes, gray wig and ample false bosom as the authoritarian-servant poppet-master is Rob McClure, a gifted performer who has proved his bendable mettle in shows including Chaplin. But Williams’s spirit possesses the role, especially when Daniel veers into manic rapid-fire impressions; McClure does the best he can—it’s hard to imagine anyone doing better—but he’s stuck holding someone else’s schtick. Jenn Gambatese has the utterly thankless role of Daniel’s uptight ex-wife, Mark Evans is her spiffy new beau and Charity Angél Dawson is a humorless child-welfare monitor. They all get little help from the score and script by Wayne Kirkpa