LET’S GO ‘CRAZY’
Hit 1992 Gershwin musical aims for Broadway reprise
HERE’S a blast of heartwarming good cheer on a cold winter day — “Crazy for You” is headed back to Broadway. Susan Stroman, who directed “The Producers” and “The Scottsboro Boys,” is staging a workshop of the delightful 1992 musical later this month. The cast includes Laura Osnes (“Grease”), Tony Yazbeck (“On the Town”) and Rachel Dratch (“Saturday Night Live”). Rachel Bloom, creator and star of “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” will be along for the ride as well. Producer Joey Parnes, minting money from “Meteor Shower” with Amy Schumer, has been meeting with theater owners with an eye to opening “Crazy for You” in the fall. This is an improbable revival. The idea came to life almost a year ago as a one- night concert to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the show. Nobody was paying much attention to it until that night, when the show brought down the house. There were rumors that a Broadway production was in the works, but it took time to sort out the actors’ schedules.
But as a production source says, “We knew it was going to happen sooner or later. It was just so much fun.”
“Crazy for You” was one of the first jukebox musicals, although I don’t think anybody was using that term back in 1992. Writer Ken Ludwig fashioned a jaunty script around some of George and Ira Gershwin’s best tunes: “Someone To Watch Over Me,” “I Got Rhythm,” “Embraceable You,” “Nice Work If You Can Get It.”
The original director was Mike Ockrent, who’d had a big hit in the 1980s with “Me and My Girl.” Ockrent hired a then- unknown choreographer — Stroman — to work on the show. She came up with dances that sent critics into a frenzy of delight.
Calling her “an extraordinary choreographer named Susan Stroman,” Frank Rich in the New York Times said her talent evoked the work of Fred Astaire, Busby Berkeley and Hermes Pan.
Stroman and Ockrent fell in love during “Crazy for You” and eventually married. He died of leukemia in 1999 just as they were about to go into rehearsals for Mel Brooks’ “The Producers.”
Stroman was devastated. But Brooks urged her to get back to work, asking her to take over the direction of “The Producers.” The show went on to win a record 12 Tony Awards in 2001.
Stroman’s terrific dances for “Crazy for You” are still in place, although I hear she’s coming up with many fresh ideas for the revival. She may adjust the “Slap That Bass” number. In the original, chorus girls became basses “plucked” by male actors. It was a showstopping moment — I remember it vividly — but I don’t think you can get away with it in the age of “#MeToo.”
Better to reverse the roles and have the girls pluck the guys.
But I have no doubt Stroman will work her magic. She’ll keep the spirit of a great musical comedy while making some adjustments for a new era.
B ROADWAY came
off a recordbusting holiday season only to fall off a cliff.
Receipts totaled $50 million between Christmas and New Year’s, bringing the year’s total box office gross to $1.7 billion.
But the cold snap and the blizzard have everybody in a panic.
“The numbers are going to be brutal this week,” one veteran producer says.
Well, don’t cry for me Argentina. Broadway will survive. Now that the tourists are gone and everyone’s hunkering down, it’s easier to score a ticket to just about anything, except “Springsteen on Broadway.”
I’m tired of Broadway being only for the 1 percent. If it takes a brutal winter to make theater accessible for everyone, then, as the great Sammy Cahn wrote, “Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.”