Broadway legend Jerry Zaks discovers a new British star
The Jewish director needed someone to live up to Robin Williams for his musical Mrs Doubtfire and he found him
Brigit Grant is the Jewish News Supplements Editor
When New York’s favourite musical director Jerry Zaks told me he was bringing the movie Mrs Doubtfire to the stage with songs, I was puzzled. Zaks (see his Life Magazine interview) is more than capable of bringing any story with tunes to the theatre and does so regularly.
But the 1993 film starring the unstoppable and much missed Robin Williams is a hard act to follow, and comparisons would be inevitable for anyone brave enough to don the female guise, be Scottish and sing as well noch! Now that I’ve seen Gabriel Vick as Euphegenia Doubtfire, I’ll never be puzzled around Zaks again.
By avoiding the obvious and resist casting a famous comic to fill seats, the Jewish director gave Vick, a genuine musical theatre actor, a great opportunity. And boy did he deserve it. The show is a musical mirror image of the original story, which as you’ll recall is about a dad called Daniel who rather than lose access to his kids in a divorce disguises himself as a nanny in order to see them.
This brave initiative by a desperate father is even braver when he has to adopt the accent and dance moves of the Highlands and hold down a second job as a studio cleaner. Vick manages it all with bells on and even in a big pair of Spanx in one particularly hilarious scene. Topical bon mots befitting an English audience have been added by Spitting Image writer John O’Farrell, and Vick is a master at impersonations that include ex PM Boris Johnson.
But this guy can also hold a tune and he isn’t alone in this show as there’s ex-wife Miranda (Laura Tebbutt) who puts zing into sensible and one of the best of composers Karey and Wayne Kirpatrick’s songs ‘Make Me a Woman’ gives star turns to Cameron Blakely as Daniel’s gay brother and Marcus Collins as his husband in a disco readdressing of gender dressing that you’ll go home humming. The flamenco style He Lied to Me is marvellous. The dream sequence featuring multiple Mrs Doubtfires., even better. Even the young actors playing Daniel’s kids hit the spot and this is all thanks to my mate Jerry Zaks who with Vick in and out of mask and padding has given us a new star . Robin Williams would have loved it.
Mrs Doubtfire is at The Shaftesbury until June 2024 www.mrsdoubtfiremusical.co.uk/
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