ajhlovestheatre

SCHMIGADOON!

Book, music and lyrics by Cinco Paul

based on the Apple TV+ series created by Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio

directed by Christopher Gattelli

Nederlander Theatre, New York City – until 6 September 2026

running time: 2 hours 30 minutes including interval 

https://schmigadoonbroadway.com

Schmigadoon!, Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio’s affectionate TV spoof of the Golden Age of musicals finds its rightful home on the Broadway stage. Awards aren’t the be-all and end-all of theatre-making but the number of Tony nominations just lavished on this adaptation (twelve, the highest of any show this season apart from The Lost Boys, which got the same) gives an indication of how much love there is for a beautifully produced and performed tuner that celebrates the art form of the American musical while also skilfully sending it up. Frankly, it’s not hard to understand the enthusiasm. 

Schmigadoon! is the kind of show you watch with a great big goofy grin plastered across your face, and then realise you have a tear or two trickling down your cheek at its feel-good conclusion. Its basic plot (a modern city dwelling couple whose relationship has started to sour go on a rural camping holiday only to happen upon a timeless mythical village where every gingham and brocade cladded inhabitant is living their best high-kicking, thigh-slapping, high note-trilling lives in a classic musical comedy) is utterly preposterous, but no more so than that of Lerner and Loewe’s Brigdaoon from which it so clearly borrows. 

Musical lovers will get a massive kick out of spotting the references to beloved shows and films that Cinco Paul, seamlessly working as composer, lyricist and book writer, has strewn so generously throughout this gorgeous evening. There’s a fairground barker à la Carousel, a town flirt who’s a dead ringer for Oklahoma!’s Ado Annie, a set of stuck-up local dignitaries that could have wandered in from The Music Man, an all-knowing Finian’s Rainbow-style leprechaun….the list goes on and on. Wait til you see the Sound Of Music parody which effectively subverts a ‘Do-Re-Mi’ type song into a hysterical paean to the female anatomy, and the arrival of the Baroness, here Countess von Blerkom, played with elegant aplomb by Afra Hines (“of COURSE I’m a Nazi!”) ….but the ingenious thing ultimately is that even if you’re not musicals-mad, you’re still likely to get swept along by the breezy wit of the script and the sheer exhilaration of the numbers. 

Director-choreographer Christopher Gattelli marshals a glorious cast made up of Broadway stalwarts (Alex Brightman, Brad Oscar, Ann Harada. Max Clayton), stage and screen crossover names (Sara Chase, Ana Gasteyer, Maulik Pancholy, Ivan Hernandez) and rising stars (McKenzie Kurtz, Isabelle McCalla), plus a tightly drilled ensemble full of vim and sunshine. The contrast between the performance styles of Brightman and Chase as Melissa and Josh, the smart, cynical urbanites, and the heightened, energised work, exquisitely redolent of ‘old school’ musicals, of everyone else is superbly managed. It’s high camp of course but played with such a persuasive combination of knowingness and heart that it’s hard not to become invested in this merry band of lovable naifs and sincere lunatics. The high-precision execution of the Agnes de Mille-inspired dances, by turns graceful then rabble-rousing, is Broadway at its most exhilarating, and a big tap number in the second half rightly brings the house down.

Between his work on the Lincoln Center classic revivals, the diva-fuelled romp that is Death Becomes Her and now this delightful confection, Gattelli is increasingly seeming like the principal flame-keeper for traditional showbiz know-how on the Great White Way. Paul’s pastiche score is buoyant and manages to feel simultaneously fresh and familiar. His zinger-filled script is (mostly) family-friendly but never bland, and gets a lot of comic mileage out of looking at the wholesome but dated tropes of yesteryear entertainment through a distinctly 21st century lens. For instance, when Chase’s winsome but independent-minded Melissa asks Oscar, playing the repressed, clearly closeted Schmigadoon town Mayor, if he’s gay, his response is “well, I try to be” before reeling off his reponsibilities to the local residents. If occasionally there is a feeling of everything being hurled at the wall to see what sticks, perhaps that is inevitable when a whole TV series is being squeezed down into a two and a half hour stage musical.

The casting top-to-bottom is an absolute treat, a group of people with authentic funny bones, fabulous voices and a collective deranged joie de vivre energy that’s infectious. There’s no cuter curmudgeon than Alex Brightman, his droll detachment in amusing contrast with the all-in attitude of the insanely enthusiastic Schmigadooners, and when he finally sings his heart out at the end, it’s actually pretty moving. Opposite him, Sara Chase is a tremendously likeable modern leading lady, full of warmth but certainly no pushover. Isabelle McCalla is piquant perfection as the sensible schoolma’am with fire burning under her icy exterior while McKenzie Kurtz is adorably unhinged as a coquette who’s more innocent than she looks.

Ann Harada is kookie and hilarious as the mayor’s wide-eyed, perpetually frustrated wife, and Ana Gasteyer raises passive-aggressive sanctimoniousness to an art form in a rip-snortingly funny turn as the town’s self-appointed moral guardian. I’m not usually the biggest fan of kids on stage but, oh my goodness, Ayaan Diop is a tiny gem as lisping Carson. Brad Oscar’s Mayor, Maulik Pancholy’s hen-pecked clergyman and Ivan Hernandez as a doctor in urgent need of social reconstruction all make invaluable contributions. Max Clayton, rugged, entrancing athletic…and clueless, stops the show as the strapping Danny Bailey, like Billy Bigelow on MDMA, and proves once and for all that he is bona fide leading man material.

This is possibly the prettiest show currently on Broadway: Scott Pask’s hand-painted backdrops and set pieces exude old fashioned magic and are partnered by Linda Cho’s elegant, detailed costumes. It’s as though a technicolor movie has burst into real life then dialled everything up to ten. If the tunes are more generic than memorable, Doug Besterman and Mike Morris’ orchestrations wrap them in the glint and sparkle of a mountain stream, and the orchestra sounds generously full.

I had a lovely time at Schmigadoon! It knows exactly how much tongue to leave in cheek and is studded with enough pockets of real feeling to make for an entirely satisfying couple hours on Broadway. It’s the theatrical equivalent of receiving a warm hug from somebody special who then whispers something naughty into your ear. Irresistible.