The Drowsy Chaperone
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| The Drowsy Chaperone | |
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| Broadway production windowcard | |
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| Music | Lisa Lambert Greg Morrison |
| Lyrics | Lisa Lambert Greg Morrison |
| Book | Bob Martin Don McKellar |
| Productions | 2001 Toronto 2006 Broadway 2007 West End Japan Australia |
| Awards | Tony Award for Best Score Tony Award for Best Book Drama Desk Outstanding Musical Drama Desk Outstanding Music Drama Desk Outstanding Lyrics Drama Desk Outstanding Book |
The Drowsy Chaperone is a musical with a book by Bob Martin and Don McKellar and music and lyrics by Lisa Lambert and Greg Morrison. It debuted in 2001 at the Toronto Fringe Festival and opened on Broadway on May 1, 2006.
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The Drowsy Chaperone is a homage to American musicals of the Jazz Age.
Act one begins with Man in Chair, a mousy, agoraphobic Broadway fanatic whose coping mechanism for "non-specific sadness" involves listening to an old record of a classic 1928 musical comedy, The Drowsy Chaperone. By the time the first note sails out of his speakers, he's been transported to a magical dream world, one where the actors in the recording enter his dingy apartment and transform it into a gloriously garish set complete with seashell footlights, sparkling furniture, painted backdrops, and costumes that would put the Ice Capades to shame.
The show-within-a-show centers on Janet Van De Graff, a showgirl and star of "Feldzieg's Follies", giving up the stage to marry oil tycoon Robert Martin. Janet's producer, Feldzieg, receives pressure from two pun-happy gangsters in the employ of the chief investor of Feldzieg's Follies disguised as pastry chefs to ensure that the wedding does not take place. To ensure this, he enlists the help of Aldolpho, an over-the-top Latin Lothario, to seduce the Bride. Meanwhile, Janet develops cold feet, and a massive misunderstanding emerges between her and Robert. What follows is a pastiche of every classic, clichéd plot thread ever to grace the stage, including mistaken identity, spit-takes, phony French accents and the occasional deus ex machina, involving such stock characters as an unflappable English butler, an absent-minded dowager, a ditzy chorine, a harried best man, and, last but certainly not least, Janet's "Drowsy" (read "Tipsy") Chaperone, played in the show-within-a-show by a blowzy Grande Damme of the Theater specializing in "rousing anthems" and not above upstaging the occasional co-star.
Watching from his armchair, Man in Chair is torn between his desire to absorb every moment of the show as it unfolds and his need to insert his own personal footnotes as he continuously brings the audience in and out of the fantasy. As the show goes on, more and more of his personal life is revealed through his musings about the show, until, as the record ends, he is left again alone in his apartment ... but still with his record of a long-beloved show to turn to whenever he's blue.
The show had its start in 1999, when McKellar, Lambert, and Morrison created a spoof of old musicals for the stag party before the wedding of their theatre friends Bob Martin and Janet Van De Graaff. In its first incarnation, there was no Man in Chair, the musical styles ranged from the 1920s to the 1940s, and the jokes were a lot more risqué. When the creators decided to reshape the show for the Toronto Fringe Festival, Martin jumped on board as a co-writer and they created Man in Chair to serve as a narrator/commentator for the piece.
Following the Fringe staging, Toronto commercial theatre owner and producer David Mirvish financed an expanded production at Toronto's 160-seat, non-profit Theatre Passe Muraille in 1999. Box office success and favourable notices from critics at Passe Muraille led Mirvish to finance further development of the script and produce a mainstage version at Toronto's 1000-seat Winter Garden Theatre, as part of a subscription season, in 2001. Near the end of that engagement (July 28, 2001), Linda Intaschi, Associate Producer of Mirvish Productions, invited New York producer Roy Miller to see the musical. Miller saw great potential in the show and he acquired the rights.
With Canadian actor and fund-raiser Paul Mack, Miller in 2004 produced a reading for the New York's National Alliance for Musical Theatre[1] – and invited his colleague and Broadway producer Kevin McCollum. The reading captured McCollum's interest, and he teamed up with Miller, as did producers Bob Boyett, Stephanie McClelland, Barbara Freitag and Jill Furman. An out-of-town engagement followed at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles (2005), and after alterations to the show's second half (one song (a parody of the dream ballet from Oklahoma! was cut, another expanded and a duet for two characters replaced by another), The Drowsy Chaperone officially opened on Broadway on May 1, 2006,.
After 32 previews, the Broadway production, directed and choreographed by Casey Nicholaw, opened on May 1, 2006 at the Marquis Theatre, where it closed on December 30, 2007 after 674 performances.
The original Broadway cast included Bob Martin, Sutton Foster, Georgia Engel, Edward Hibbert, Beth Leavel, Jason Kravits, Garth Kravits and Danny Burstein.
The show lasted about two months in London’s West End. The team that brought the show to Broadway staged the show. Previews started on May 14 2007, first night was on June 6, and after fewer than 100 performances, it closed on August 4. A largely British cast, including the established Elaine Paige – making her West End comeback after six years – and Summer Strallen joined the show’s co-author Bob Martin recreating his Broadway role of "Man in Chair." The Novello Theatre’s owner Sir Cameron Mackintosh, who had seen the show in previews in New York had supported its transatlantic transfer.[2] London's critics were generally optimistic about the show,[3] although some had been less impressed.[4][5] Even the slashing in mid-June of 35 percent off the price of the best seats failed to generate enough interest; a month after opening, the producers decided to close it on August 4 2007, instead of the scheduled February 23, 2008.[6][7] "… shows in London can run safely … at lower capacities than they require on Broadway.… But, as the transfer of The Drowsy Chaperone has just proved, sometimes even a Tony-winning Broadway hit can’t even achieve that," London's The Stage commented.[8]
The national tour of The Drowsy Chaperone started on September 19, 2007 in Toronto at the Elgin Theatre. Among the performers are original Broadway cast members Bob Martin and Georgia Engel, who originated the roles of the Man in Chair and Mrs. Tottendale, respectively. While Engel is expected to perform with the company for an extended engagement, Martin did not continue beyond Toronto; his role was taken over by Jonathan Crombie. Nancy Opel plays the role of "The Drowsy Chaperone". The Drowsy Chaperone will play more than 30 cities in the United States, including Los Angeles at the Ahmanson Theatre, where the show ran before going to Broadway.[9]
An Australian production is rumoured to open in 2008 or 2009, most likely in either Melbourne or Sydney. Early closure of the West End production however has put this in doubt, and no formal announcement has been made.
The first translated production of the musical will open in Japan in January 5, 2009[1].
- Overture – Orchestra
- Fancy Dress – Company
- Cold Feets – Robert, George
- Show Off – Janet, Company
- As We Stumble Along – Drowsy Chaperone
- I Am Aldolpho – Aldolpho, Drowsy Chaperone
- Accident Waiting To Happen – Robert, Janet
- Toledo Surprise – Gangsters, Feldzieg, Kitty, Mrs. Tottendale, and Company
- Message From A Nightingale – Kitty, Gangsters, Aldolpho, Drowsy Chaperone
- Bride's Lament – Janet, Company
- Love Is Always Lovely In The End – Mrs. Tottendale, Underling
- I Do, I Do In The Sky – Trix, Company
- As We Stumble Along (Reprise) – Company
The original cast recording contains two bonus tracks titled, "I Remember Love," which is a duet between Mrs. Tottendale and Underling, and "Message From A Nightingale", which is the unabridged version of a portion of a song that is cut short in the show. "I Remember Love" also contains a ukelele solo by Ukelele Lil as Mrs. Tottendale. It was replaced by "Love is Always Lovely in the End."
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- Awards
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Book of a Musical – Book by Bob Martin, Don McKellar
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Costume Design – Gregg Barnes
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Featured Actress in a Musical – Beth Leavel
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Lyrics – Lisa Lambert, Greg Morrison
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Music – Lisa Lambert, Greg Morrison
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Musical
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Set Design of a Musical – David Gallo
- 2006 Theatre World Award – Bob Martin
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical – Bob Martin, Don McKellar
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Costume Design of a Musical – Gregg Barnes
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical – Beth Leavel
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Original Score – Lisa Lambert, Greg Morrison
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Scenic Design of a Musical – David Gallo
- Nominations
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Actor in a Musical – Bob Martin
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Actress in a Musical – Sutton Foster
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Choreography – Casey Nicholaw
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Director of a Musical – Casey Nicholaw
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Featured Actor in a Musical – Eddie Korbich
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Orchestrations – Larry Blank
- 2006 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Sound Design – Acme Sound Partners
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical – Bob Martin
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical – Sutton Foster
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Choreography – Casey Nicholaw
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical – Casey Nicholaw
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical – Danny Burstein
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Lighting Design of a Musical – Ken Billington, Brian Monahan
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Musical
- 2006 Tony Award for Best Orchestrations – Larry Blank
- ^ About NAMT. Retrieved on 2007-08-06.
- ^ Official London Theatre Guide, 6 March 2007
- ^ Ouzounian, Richard. Drowsy Chaperone wakes up British critics. The Star, 2007-06-08. Retrieved on 2008-04-20.
- ^ "Help, my tongue's stuck in my cheek!;" from The Independent; 10 June 2007.
- ^ The Guardian, 7 July 2007.Retrieved on 2007-07-25.
- ^ Andrew Gans and Kenneth Jones; "London's Drowsy Chaperone to Close in August," from Playbill.com; 6 July 2007.
- ^ "Drowsy closes early in the capital," from Society of London Theatre, 9 July 2007.
- ^ "The West End overtakes Broadway on price," from The Stage, London, 25 July 2007.
- ^ Kenneth Jones; "Drowsy Chaperone Returns Home, to Toronto, for Tour Launch," from Playbill.com; 19 Sep 2007.
- Official website Covers both Broadway and London productions
- The Drowsy Chaperone at the Internet Broadway Database
- Production: The Drowsy Chaperone Working in the Theatre Seminar video at American Theatre Wing.org, April 2006
- Drowsy closes early in the capital – Society of London Theatre, 9 July 2007
- Sutton Foster Sutton Foster News & Forums
- Bob Martin - Downstage Center interview at American Theatre Wing.org, June 2006
- Beth Leavel fansite
- Study guide from TUTS
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