Theater Review: Some Like It Hot Is The Best Musical!
Watching Some Like It Hot, The Musical, I, immediately, felt like I was watching the best musical I have ever seen. Words like, “Brilliant! Spectacular! Mesmerizing! Amazing!” are the only ones that encompassed how excited I felt at the singing story unfolding before me. In truth, Marilyn Monroe would be proud.
Doing a remake is a balancing act. You need something old enough that most people do not remember it, but legendary enough for them to google. Some Like It Hot is a Marilyn Monroe classic, and with the recent craze of biopics, it is in the cultural head-sphere. The story is known: two, tap-dancing brothers get in the cross-hairs of some mobsters during the Prohibition Era in Chicago, and decide to hide out by pretending to be two women instrumentalists in an all-female band headed to California. The problem is both find love and a new sense of self, they never had when they were men.
For Joe (Christian Borle), a mutual sax and sex player, becoming Josephine, his drag identity, gives him a moral compass that he never had before, especially with women. Deemed an “ugly gal,” Borle is so funny and nuanced as a man realizing that how he has treated women and their looks is truly what is ugly. As a guy, he can charm anyone, but, as a woman……..well. His energy is infectious, and the emotional tug of war he feels as he falls for Sugar Kane (Adrianna Hicks), in body and heart, is real, nuanced, and balances the weight, but exuberant storyline of J. Harrison Ghee’s Daphne.
A non-binary performer, Ghee is perfection and sincerely deepens what the original laughingly hinted about gender fluidity and sexuality: it can flow. They are amazing and so heartwarming as Jerry/Daphne; completely embodying the exhilaration and freedom one finds when they finally find themselves. It can happen suddenly and surprisingly, but, one day, you can simply look in the mirror and finally see the you, on the outside, that has alway been within. Ghee’s Jerry was on the coattails of Joe, but, as Daphne, they find LOVE with the absolutely scene-stealing and hilariously sweet Osgood (Kevin Del Aguila in a performance that will sweep you with glee). Frankly, their storyline is the heart of this show.
While Ghee’s Daphne becomes the show’s palpable center, Hicks supersedes the difficulty of putting on Marilyn’s dress. A good actor realizes they can never be another actor, but they can always be the same character. Hicks make Kane her own, by playing up the sadness and smarts of Sugar: a dreamy songstress with a drinking problem, a poor choice of men, and an unwavering determination to be a Hollywood star. Moreover, making Sugar a black woman in Prohibition world only adds to both the odds and unflinching hope she dreams for herself, which makes Hicks’ magnetic. In fact, the whole cast is a magnetic field.
I see Tonys abound for this musical, including the big prize of Best Musical. NaTasha Yvette Williams’s Sweet Sue HAS TO WIN for best supporting actress for her powerhouse performance, andMatthew López and Amber Ruffin will for this book. Yet, what is a musical without music and dance. Absolutely, every song written by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman will be sung by every theater- club high-schooler with a pulse. Tracks like the titular, “Some Like It Hot,” are going to be burgeoning the school-bus imaginations of kids, like myself, that saw theater as an identity escape. Add on the unbelievable, unforgettable tap choreography of Casey Nicholaw, including a 5 minute hotel chase sequence, and this show is the essence of everything we love about musical theater. Buy Tickets Here.
